Winners and losers: UKIP collapse suggests the local elections were a referendum on #Brexit
Is there a huge elephant in this discussion, that everyone in the mainstream media [MSM] is ignoring so they can attack Labour?
Did nobody notice what just happened to the UK Independence Party?
UKIP has collapsed – losing a massive 123 of the 126 seats it was defending.
The MSM have been desperate to ignore the implications, being happy to say ‘Leave’-voting areas migrated back to the Conservatives and ‘Remain’ areas to Labour or the Liberal Democrats.
But that’s not the whole picture. It’s more accurate to say voters moved their support back where it was before Brexit became the political football it is now.
We could say it’s simply a verdict on UKIP itself – a belief that this was a single-issue political party whose time has gone, having achieved its goal.
But people don’t usually form political parties for short-term reasons; UKIP wanted, not only to trigger the decision to leave the EU, but also to have a say in the nature of that departure – and that isn’t happening.
Also, let’s not forget that the ‘Leave’ campaign has been rocked by scandal after scandal – over expenses, over the alleged use of Cambridge Analytica to influence voters covertly, over the pathetic handling of negotiations with the EU27.
So, can’t we be honest? People are sick and tired of Brexit!
They know they were hoodwinked; they hate the fact that they’re now being led into financial ruin and international obscurity.
And they have punished the organisation they consider to be most responsible.
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Excellent post Mike. Shame the mainstream media can’t tell the truth about the nonsense that is Brexit and the fraudulent referendum which basically began as, and remains an internal power struggle in the nasty Tory Party.
Indeed they give the impression that the largest ever vote on an issue is nonsense and give time to the likes of Anna soubrey who are inherently anti democratic. I am a a staunch socialist, that is why I voted leave, peddling the right winger internal nonsense is not only a lie it is downright childish.
Yet, in the end, UKIP emerges as the the most successful Party in the elections. They lost nearly all their seats but took control of the Tory Party!
One tragic consequence of this will be felt most painfully by Britain’s visible minorities, the black and Asian people, muslims and jews, and gay people. Because there is a history of far-Right organisations working hard to get elected and, when that all goes wrong, turning back to street violence against the usual targets ie. ethnic and sexual minorities and their friends.
Sadly your post is too near the truth to be contemplated. Most I feel understand that UKIP is a one trick pony, and that whilst some returned to Labour the bulk went back to the Tories, hence the real reason we failed by a whisker to take all those councils. Barnet lost by just 141 votes, and Swindon by one seat.
Undeniably the turmoil and corruption in UKIP also made them un-electable but you never hear that in the media.
The mass media did nothing but mention the UKIP collapse, strangely the tories who if you believed the hype about UKIP being far right didn’t get the votes but then labour didn’t do as well as expected either. It is time people looked at the facts most leave votes came from traditional Labour supporting areas because true socialists like Wilson, the last socialist leader of the Labour Party, do not support the EU.
“The mass media did nothing but mention the UKIP collapse”?
Did you not hear the incessant nonsense about what a bad night Labour had – when in fact Labour won more than half of all the seats available?
At least you’re no longer saying that Labour voters were the largest contingent in favour of Leave.
I think we are falling victim to lots of loose talk about “Brexit” areas and “Labour-voting Leave areas” etc as if the bulk of Leave voters were Labour supporters in northern cities and towns. A more detailed analysis might reveal that most Labour voters all round the country voted Remain and that, in Labour constituencies, the bulk of Leave votes came from the large minorities of regular Tory voters who had had to stomach watching Labour getting elected in their towns for decades. The Brexit vote was their chance to finally have their backward -looking, xenophobic voices heard. Of course, there were also a minority of Labour voters adding to the total to take the result to just over 51%.
We should not assume that we have to concentrate exclusively on winning over a vast mass of “Labour Leavers” to gain power. Evidence suggests that many, if not most, “Labour Leavers” still vote for Labour in General and local elections anyway. The Tory strategy of positioning themselves as the “Brexit” Party has gained them some UKIP votes but they have not exactly flourished since the referendum.