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| Steven Woolfe quits Ukip calling party ‘ungovernable’ | Steven Woolfe quits Ukip calling party ‘ungovernable’ |
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| Ukip leadership favourite Steven Woolfe has dramatically quit the party, branding it “ungovernable” and in a “death spiral”. | |
| Mr Woolfe - who spent three nights in hospital after a row with a party colleague – said he was resigning from a party that had “elected politicians fighting each other”. | |
| He again accused fellow MEP Mike Hookem of inflicting a “blow” to his face in the now infamous row at a party meeting in Strasbourg nearly two weeks ago. | |
| And he told the BBC: “I’m resigning with immediate effect, which to me fills me with a huge amount of sadness because of all the people that I’ve worked with. | |
| “I did believe that it had a great opportunity to represent millions of people who’ve been ignored by the Labour Party and by the elites who will still take great efforts to try and prevent Brexit.” | |
| Mr Woolfe added: “I hope there might be a leader out there that can stop this spiral, but it isn’t me.” | |
| Asked why he was resigning, the North West MEP referred to the “visceral hatred in some cases towards Nigel [Farage] or anyone that’s seen to be associated with him”. | |
| He added: “I don’t think at this stage UKIP is governable in a way that can make them achieve the potential that they’ve got. And I have to look after my own health at this moment.” | |
| It had been expected that Mr Woolfe would contest the Ukip leadership contest, despite the incident in Strasbourg, with a new leader to be announced on November 28. | |
| He was kept in hospital and had a brain scan following two “epileptic-like fits” after the altercation. | |
| Mr Hookem has said that he “categorically did not” throw a punch at his colleague, but acknowledged there had been a “scuffle”. | |
| The pair were said to have clashed after Mr Woolfe revealed that he had previously considered defecting to the Conservative Party. | |
| Today, Mr Woolfe said he will now sit an independent MEP in the European Parliament. | |
| In a separate article for the Daily Telegraph, he alleged Ukip “lacks direction, it lacks a purpose and it lacks any semblance of professional organisation”. | |
| And he wrote: “Having been treated in such a way, I considered joining the Conservative Party. I am not a tribal politician. | |
| “If other parties say or do things I support, I will praise them. And the beginning of Theresa May’s premiership has been impressive.” | |
| Only a “small handful” of UKIP politicians and officials had contacted him to ask how he was since the incident, he told the BBC. |