Nick Clogg's propaganda line against Nigel Farage: the second EU referendum debate on British TV

[Paul Rigby]

Nigel Farage a natural Tory on course to drive the Tories from power
The Ukip leader is a gadfly who will one day go to ground. But before then it is Cameron, not Miliband, who has most to fear from his sting

Simon Jenkins
The Guardian, Thursday 3 April 2014 19.05 BST

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree...fear-sting

There is nothing new about Nigel Farage. He is just another politician adept at exploiting the gap that so easily opens between public opinion and a ruling class grown detached and introverted. Polls show his Ukip appealing not just to disgruntled Tories but a range of the politically dispossessed, particularly those who did badly from recession and expect little from recovery. Across Europe, most recently in France, rightwing parties are drawing on such a well of nationalist revanchism. Farage has proved an articulate exponent of the genre. He will not last and does not care about lasting. That is what makes him so dangerous to the established parties.

Wednesday night's second debating triumph of Farage over Nick Clegg pitted wild exaggeration (about Europe) against wild generalisation (about Europe). It could be mind-numbingly dull, but exaggeration proved the winner. What was mildly encouraging was that such gladiatorial exposure seems able actually to move opinion, a rare occurrence in politics.

Clegg's tactic was odd. He may have thought it smart to accuse his foe of wanting a return to the days of WG Grace and the gold standard. The audience knew this was untrue and yet might have welcomed such a prospect. For his part, Farage's style was direct, jargon-free and sardonic, a talent shared with Scotland's Alex Salmond and London's Boris Johnson. Britain's three most effective modern politicians seem a million miles from the cliches and robotic phraseology of Westminster. There is a fortune awaiting anyone who can teach British MPs how to speak.

Farage is in a long line of political eccentrics, from Enoch Powell, the SDP's "gang of four", and even early Clegg. They dazzle, fizzle and eventually fall, crushed by the potency of the two-party system. But they can have remarkable short-term impact. In 1968 Powellism won Lambeth council for the Tories by 62 seats to eight. In the 1980s the gang of four's SDP split Labour and kept the Tories in power for a decade. Clegg's Liberal Democrats denied the Tories a majority in 2010.

Predictions hold that Ukip's hour is at hand. In May's European elections it might emerge with the biggest vote, the first time a maverick party has done that in any nationwide election. The vote will be a referendum on Europe in all but name. Yet Europe does not lie at the core of Farage's appeal: in polls just a third even mention the issue.

As Robert Ford and Matthew Goodwin point out in their new study, Revolt on the Right, Ukip appeals not so much to Eurosceptics as to the Victor Meldrew persuasion, the "pessimistariat" of mostly former Tories, many working class, who were Thatcher's urban bedrock. To them Europe is merely code for a miasma of menaces to themselves and their way of life, from immigration to bureaucracy and central planning.

Farage has given this appeal a shrewdly rebellious overlay reminiscent of Wilkes, Cobbett and even Tony Benn. He claims that the EU had made the working class "effectively an underclass". He calls on everyone to "Come and join the people's army! Let's topple the establishment!". Clegg looked as if he would rather bury his head in the cushions of a Brussels salon.

Conventional wisdom holds that Ukip draws support from everyone and so threatens none. Roughly half its voters are former Tories, the rest spread equally across the other parties (and undecideds). Yet as YouGov's Peter Kellner points out in the latest edition of Prospect magazine, while "Tories may not be the only source of Ukip support, they are by far the biggest". They donate to Ukip four times more supporters than Labour.

If Ukip holds on to its current 12% in next year's general election, says Kellner, "it will probably cost Cameron the election". Ed Miliband can gain power on just 35% of the poll, as did Tony Blair in 2005. Cameron simply must reduce Farage's support to half its present level to stand a chance. Of the 32 crucial Tory-held marginals identified by the party's private pollster, Lord Ashcroft, all have experienced a tripling in Ukip vote share since 2010. Farage has offered a deal in which he does not put up candidates against Eurosceptic MPs. He has little to lose as he is not going to win the election, but if he can help a few Eurosceptics save their seats, he will win over many Tories for being a decent chap. Cameron has vetoed the deal.

At the same time Cameron comes up with hamfisted promises on immigration and EU renegotiation, promises he has made before and not kept. He also leaves naked his flank to Farage's lethal skirmishes on matters such as HS2, wind turbines and rural planning laws, all of which are infuriating local Conservatives. Farage claims that every time the planning minister, Nick Boles, opens his mouth another thousand votes switch to Ukip.

Farage's party is a classic political corrective. He has seized on the nation's present discontents and is riding them for all they are worth. He has no answers, but he asks telling questions. He is a standing rebuke to politicians whose casual promises are made only to be broken. He is patently a Tory who should by rights be challenging Cameron from inside the party, not outside. A contest for the leadership between him and Boris Johnson would add vastly to the entertainment of the nation.

Until that day, the gadfly will continue to sting. It will one day go to ground, but before then it seems likely to humiliate Cameron's party in May and, next year, possibly drive it from power. The Tories are mad to underrate him.

Given the long-standing ties between the Tory Party and British intelligence, one wonders at Farage's prospects of making it in one piece to the General Election. Another plane crash, perhaps?

Or are the deep politics of Farage's rise more complicated still?