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UKIP nul points! Brexit party decimated in local elections Ex-UKIP donor Arron Banks blames leader Nuttall for ‘car crash’ disaster in local elections
(about 2 hours later)
The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) has fallen to a new low after failing to hold on to a single seat in local council elections. Former UK Independence Party (UKIP) donor Arron Banks has slammed Paul Nuttall’s leadership following the party’s disastrous results in local council elections.
Douglas Carswell, who used to be the party’s only MP, said UKIP is ‘done’ now that it has lost dozens of seats to Britain’s leading Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. The millionaire said that while former UKIP leader Nigel Farage headed the party with “skill,” Nuttall is the reason for losing all but one seat in Thursday’s elections.
Results from 15 different councils saw UKIP failing to win a single contest, as it lost all 30 of its seats. “The current leadership has crashed the car, at the first bend of the race, into the crowd, killing the driver and spectators,” Banks said in a statement as the results of local elections emerged.
‘UKIP 0’ is now trending on social media in a mockery of the party’s disastrous performance. “As one of the Leave.EU team said to me: a strategic bullet to the back of the head. It’s a sorry state of affairs.”
Others mocked Ukip leader Paul Nuttall... Banks claimed Farage had been a “skilled driver” who would take chances.
Paul Nuttall’s party lost seats in Lincolnshire, Hampshire, and Essex – key battlegrounds for UKIP in next month’s general election. “Today’s local election results show that. If we use the analogy of UKIP as a racing car, Nigel was a skilled driver who drove the car around the track faster and faster, knowing when to take risks, delighting the audience.”
Carswell tweeted “Job done” as it became clear the party had been wiped out at the ballot box. Nuttall’s right-wing party lost almost all their seats to the Tory and Liberal Democrat party.
“The Europeanism that possessed the upper echelons of the Tory party for 40 yrs today looks like an aberration,” he wrote. It also failed to win support in the Brexit heartlands of Lincolnshire, Hampshire, and Essex – key battlegrounds for UKIP in next month’s general election.
“We won.” The Brexit championing party did, however, manage to steal a seat from Labour in Lancashire.
He said speculation about the right being torn apart by Euroskepticism is unfounded, as anti-EU sentiments have actually “reunited us.” Douglas Carswell, the former MP representing Ukip, said he is "delighted" about the results.
UKIP’s share of the national vote could now plunge to three percent, down from 22 percent in the same contests in 2013, according to an election expert, University of Plymouth Professor Michael Thrasher. The insurance millionaire said Tory-leaning UKIP voters were deterred from voting for the party because its electoral campaign focuses on Muslim immigration in the UK.
“UKIP received one in eight votes cast at the 2015 general election, and therefore those votes are absolutely critical in a month’s time at the general election,” Professor Thrasher told Sky News. Although admitting there is a substantial “Islamic problem” in the country, Banks pointed out that the next general election, due to take place on June 8, is more of a “second referendum on Brexit” than a “normal” election.
“The indications from the local elections are that UKIP is losing all of its councillors and it’s the Conservatives that are making the gains on the basis of that collapse.” “Within a day of announcing their new policy, UKIP’s poll rating dropped from 11 to 6 percent as Tory-leaning UKIP voters rightly concluded this is about delivering Brexit and the other issues just don’t matter in this election.
READ MORE Following the local election results, UKIP’s share of the national vote could now plunge to three percent, down from 22 percent in the same contests in 2013, according to election expert, University of Plymouth Professor Michael Thrasher.
UKIP’s Lisa Duffy refused to brand the outcome a “disaster,” but admitted the night had been “challenging.” Commenting on the party’s performance in the latest polls, UKIP leader Paul Nuttall said his party had been a “victim of its own success,” and blamed the Tories’ recent tougher attitude towards the EU
“I won’t use the word ‘disaster,’ I’ll use the word ‘challenging,’” she told the BBC. “Mrs May’s public dispute with the EU in recent days – which led to her speaking about standing up to Brussels in an eve-of-poll statement in Downing Street – was particularly fortuitously timed for the Conservatives,” he said, according to the Telegraph.
“We knew it was going to be a difficult night.” But he added that the plight to leave the EU goes beyond any other interest and said: "If the price of Britain leaving the EU is a Tory advance after taking up this patriotic cause, then it is a price UKIP is prepared to pay.
UKIP local government spokesman Peter Reeve told the BBC that Thursday’s results do not signal the party is no longer needed. “We are the victims of our own success and now we pick ourselves up and go on to further success in the future.”
“[This] couldn’t be further from the truth,” he said.
“Even if we don’t win a single seat later on today, UKIP still has 300 councillors across the country and is still a very relevant, real voice in local politics."
He added the party, which championed the ‘Leave’ cause during the EU referendum last June, has and always will lead the national agenda.
“What is also true is we continue – and have done for many years – to control the national agenda and the government agenda. They didn’t want to have a referendum on Brexit, UKIP forced that on them, they were terrified of us and they did it.”