The UK’s nationalist party is on the rise:
Polls conducted in the run-up to Ukip’s local election surge suggested that some 60 per cent of its supporters voted Conservative in 2010, while a survey released by the Tory peer Lord Ashcroft at the end of June indicated that almost a quarter of those who picked David Cameron’s party at the last election would today plump for what he once branded a bunch of “fruitcakes and loonies and closet racists”. More recent research, however, reveals something even more alarming for the Prime Minister: it’s not just Tory voters who are tempted by Ukip; it’s also his own grassroots members.
At the beginning of June, and with the help of YouGov and the McDougall Trust, we surveyed 852 Conservative Party members – enough to ensure that we can be 95 per cent confident that their responses are a true reflection of the membership as a whole, plus or minus 4 per cent. What we found is that at least a fifth and very possibly even just over a quarter of the Tory grassroots would seriously consider voting for Ukip in a general election. Asked whether they’d think about it at a European election, the figures are even more worrying for the Conservative high command: in that case, over a third of its grassroots members are wondering whether to give Ukip a go next year.
Note that these aren’t Tory voters, these are the card-carrying Conservative Party members. They are migrating to UKIP because there is no point in voting Tory due to better policy positions than Labour; a vote for either the Tories or Labour is a vote for Brussels. Every British voter, regardless of his ideology, who believes in national sovereignty has no choice but to vote UKIP. And that’s why no one should be surprised if an unexpectedly high percentage of Labour party members also go UKIP.
The British have UKIP. The Scots have the Scottish National Party. The Italians have Movimento 5 Stelle. The Greeks have Golden Dawn. The Hungarians have Jobbik. The French have Front National. The Finns have the True Finns. The Swiss have the Schweizerische Volkspartei. Even the Germans have Alternative für Deutschland.
Who do the Americans have?