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Ukip overtakes Lib Dems as third most popular party

The latest YouGov poll puts the Eurosceptic outfit above Nick Clegg's party.

Ukip supporters demonstrate outside Parliament.
Ukip supporters demonstrate outside the Houses of Parliament, London, October 2011. Photograph: Getty Images

Ukip may never have won a seat in the House of Commons, but today it has overtaken the Liberal Democrats as the third most popular party, if a YouGov poll for the Sun is to be believed.

The daily poll puts Nigel Farage’s party on nine per cent, one point ahead of the Lib Dems, who have eight per cent of the vote. While Ukip has consistently polled close behind Nick Clegg’s party since the 2010 election, this appears to be the first time it has actually closed the gap overall. (One YouGov poll last year put them ahead among 18-24 year olds, but not overall).

As with any unusual result, it is worth noting that this could be an outlier. A Populus poll in the Times (£), also out today, keeps the Lib Dems safely in third place with 11 per cent of the vote.

However, it would be foolish to write off the result entirely, given that this has been on the cards for the last six months at least. In some ways, it is hardly surprising. The Lib Dems have traditionally been the beneficiaries of protest votes from those unenamoured with the two main parties, a support base it lost when it entered government. While many disillusioned Liberal Democrat voters went to Labour, Ukip benefited from those seeking a more anti-establishment alternative.

Conversely, Tory right-wingers frustrated at the perceived softness of their party in coalition may also be switching allegiance. As Antony Wells explains at UK Polling Report, there may be some more immediate factors too:

A third, more short term cause is probably the granny tax: we’ve seen significant drops in Conservative support and increases in support for UKIP amongst over 60s since the Budget and older people have always been by far the most likely group to vote UKIP.

It is certainly a boost for Farage’s party ahead of May’s local elections, though it remains unlikely that this will be translated into seats in parliament in the next general election. However, as my colleague Rafael Behr argued last year, increasing support for Ukip could shape future policy, particularly on Europe:

One factor that could really change the dynamic is the performance of Ukip - or rather, Nigel Farage's party's anticipated performance in 2014 European elections . . . Conservative strategists are, apparently, very worried about what that might mean for a poll that is due just a year before the next general election. It is feasible to imagine that, come 2014, Cameron will be more afraid of Farage's populist, nationalist agitation beyond the gates of his coalition than Clegg's cosmopolitan Europhile hand-wringing within.

It is entirely possible that Ukip will not sustain its lead in tomorrow’s YouGov/Sun poll – but this is a significant vote share for a minor party, and clearly, it cannot be entirely dismissed.
 

34 comments

Stuart Eels's picture

The great, fantastic, cutting edge commentator David Lindsay and the truly swivel eyed Peter Hitchens in agreement about UKIP that should reassure everyone, or maybe get them to vote for UKIP.

First "cleggover" and his gang of sellouts are overtaken by UKIP and then Labour are canned by Gallway and still people like David Lindsay don't get it, we don't trust any of you and haven't for an awlful long time!

Livers's picture

Am I the only one that finds it ironic that UKIP have more MEPs than MPs ?

Arddeyeff's picture

Not in the slightest. It is a product of our corrupt electoral system for the Commons which has a built in advantage for Labour and the Tories. The procedure for MEPs is not corrupt and represents a truer position than Westminster where sice 1935 minority votes have elected one or the other these two until 2010.

Anthony (Ukipper And Proud)'s picture

@Rob Decker Well said, and there is Winston Mekenzie (Black) ex-boxer who stood against Nigel for leadership of UKIP, he's now standing as a ukip Candidate in Croydon and Thandi Jeet (Asian, UKIPs Young independence candidate) .

We have to expect smear campaigns alot more now, it allways happens when smaller partys start upsetting the apple cart.

Fraziel1's picture

I am looking forward to the May elections. The polls in Scotland show it is likely the SNP will win control of every city in Scotland and the lib dems will be wiped out. No more liberals, Hurrah! I would never vote ukip in a general election but I will seriously consider voting for them in the European election.

Richard Evans's picture

There must be some seriously worried Lib Dems and Tory backbenchers out there, if things continue growing for UKIP, and with the Euro folding that may well be likely, the 2014 and 2015 elections will see a lot of blood on the carpet.

Benjamin Rae's picture

Don't mind being called a smurf but I'm certainly not a Lib/Lab or Con supporter.

Davidaslindsay's picture

Unless we are seriously expected to believe that there are as many "natural Tories" in, say, Hull or Cornwall, both of which placed UKIP at the top of the poll for Strasbourg last time, as the combined Conservative and UKIP votes there would suggest, then we must accept that at least half of UKIP's Strasbourg vote is Old Labour or, especially in the West Country, Old Liberal rather than Old Tory or "Thatcherite" New Right (don't mention the Single European Act). The idea that they would otherwise vote Conservative is laughable. They would just go home. As, at General Elections, all sections of the UKIP Strasbourg vote always do.

As a matter of party policy, the Conservatives are not even remotely Eurosceptical, and they never have been. The Liberals and the SDP, both of which still exist, are both far more critical of the EU. So is the Gordon Brown-Ed Miliband-Ed Balls wing of New Labour, like the Labour Left and the parliamentary remnant of the Old Labour Right.

Miliband is already making hay, entirely sincerely and without any hint of opportunism, over the Coalition's daft schemes to cripple provincial economies by slashing the spending power of public employees far from London, to redefine legal marriage in order to include same-sex couples (which has never been Labour Party policy, and on which Labour MPs are probably going to have a free vote), to deregulate Sunday trading, to devastate rural communities by flogging off our Post Office and our roads to private companies and even to foreign states, to break the Royal Mail's direct link between the monarchy and every address in this Kingdom, to abolish Gift Aid while drastically reducing the activities entitled to charitable status, and to bankrupt the Church of England by imposing VAT on listed building repairs.

He could seal his position as the voice of moderate, mainstream Britain by promising primary legislation to restore the supremacy of British over EU law, to use that provision both to repatriate agricultural policy and to restore the United Kingdom's historic fishing rights (200 miles, or to the median line), to require that all EU legislation pass through both Houses of Parliament as if it had originated in one or other of them, to require that British Ministers adopt the show-stopping Empty Chair Policy until such time as the Council of Ministers meet in public and publish an Official Report akin to Hansard to the satisfaction of a resolution of the House of Commons, to disapply any ruling of either European Court unless and until ratified by a resolution of the House of Commons, and to disapply anything passed by the European Parliament but not by the majority of those MEPs certified as politically acceptable by at least one member of the House of Commons.

Heaven knows, the party of Heath, Thatcher and Major never will.

Richard Evans's picture

You are living in cloud cuckoo land, Labour have been extremely pro-EU ever since Mr. And Mrs. Kinnock told them about the Danegeld to be had there

Anthony (Ukipper And Proud)'s picture

Correct , remember the turn-coat Kinnock was a prominate figure in the NO campaign, he then turns tail, takes his pieces of silver and runs of to Brussels, and dont get me started on bullshitting Blair , who wanted nothing more than to be Emproer of Europe, after being booted out.

Davidaslindsay's picture

Well, you are both fairly obvious UKIP voters. But that only serves to prove that UKIP is nothing to worry about. No wonder that even Peter Hitchens calls you "Dad's Army" and wants his own network of serious candidates instead.

Anthony (Ukipper And Proud)'s picture

I'm not a dad yet im only 26 . but thanks anyway.

Agent's picture

@ Nick Cleggg

Ahahahhahahhahahahhahahahhaha

ahahahhahahahhaha
hahhahahahha

hahahhahahhahahahaah

Arturo Bandini's picture

In England

Benjamin Rae's picture

Ghandi and Nigel Farage. Got the laughing part right

Anthony (Ukipper and Proud)'s picture

Go UKIP the pride of Britain, the wind is in your sails. the lib/lab/con lackeys are running scared (just look at some of the smurfs commenting) KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK

Remember what Gandhi said -

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

VOTE UKIP !!!

Tom Henry's picture

I was alway's a Labour voter, not now with mass un-controlled immigration, shame on Labour for selling hard working people down the line, I certainly will not be voting for them again. UKIP have my support all the way.

Anthony (Ukipper And Proud)'s picture

Good to have you on board Sir, i couldn't agree more , Labour failed the working class.

Benjamin Rae's picture

As ridiculous as UKIP is it's enjoyable seeing the Lib Dems continue to decline in the polls. Wonder when it'll occur to them that trusting Clegg was a mistake?

IanCStirk's picture

I'm sure Samira Shackle is bright enough to know about margins of error, even if Sun reporters are not (or more likely don't bother to mention them). But surely they are greater than plus or minus 1 per cent - I can't see how we can be so sure that Ukip are ahead of the Lib Dems according to this poll's figures.

CG's picture

Survey data here.

http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/4v1i2t5nh2/YG-Archives-Po...

Will Podmore's picture

Please could dmyers or Thomas provide some evidence for their assertion that UKIP are insular xenophobes?
Otherwise it just sounds like the ritual abuse hurled by the parliamentary parties at anyone who opposes the EU.

TheRedBladder's picture

Has anyone any idea what the average age of a member of Monsieur Farage's rag-bag of an army is?

Richard Evans's picture

Why would it matter how old a voter is?

Tesco Shelf Stacker's picture

Considering that most people out there tend to blame the Labour Party for their current woes and think that Labour would probably have followed the same policies as this Coalition - I'm even more concerned that 43% of the electorate think that voting for a Labour Party with a cabinet full of old faces from the unpopular 'Brown' era is the answer to an unpopular coalition?

It's insanity, I tell ya!

Stuart Eels's picture

Thomas Breannacht

You seem a bit confused, you joined them after you left the Tories and then quit them for the Lib/Dems. You've gone through the entire political scene here, If I were the Labour Party, I would be making notes not to let you in! You are obviously ab attention seeker.

Going on the real news, if this shakes the big three parties up a little great!

Thomas Breannacht's picture

UKIP are wholly racist Eurosceptic Little Englanders - I joined them after the Pro Euro Conservatives went belly up but left in disgust at their narrowness and racist outlook. I later joied the LibDems but left when they went in with the Tories. Am now toying Green.

Richard Evans's picture

I don't think you'd like the watermelons.

Rob Decker's picture

Thomas Breannacht says 'Ukip are wholly racist Eurosceptic Little Englanders'.
I've been an active promoter of Jamaican music since 1997 and I, and the black folks in Ukip, just laugh at your unfounded drivel.
Looking at the various 'parties' you've dallied with, I suggest you don't know your own mind. If putting my country's interests above that of unelected Eurofascists makes me a 'wholly racist Eurosceptic Little Englander' then fair enough.
Like your flip-flopping opinion counts.

Anthony (Ukipper And Proud)'s picture

Well said, and there is Winston Mekenzie (Black) ex-boxer who stood against Nigel for leadership of UKIP, he's now standing as a ukip Candidate in Croydon and Thandi Jeet (Asian, UKIPs Young independence candidate) .

Thomas Breannacht's picture

UKIP are wholly racist Eurosceptic Little Englanders - I joined them after the Pro Euro Conservatives went belly up but left in disgust at their narrowness and racist outlook. I later joied the LibDems but left when they went in with the Tories. Am now toying Green.

DMyers's picture

I'm surprised that you were surprised by what they are like once you'd joined. It's immediately obvious to the rest of us that they are insular xenophobes, and we didn't need to join up to find that out.

Richard Evans's picture

Remind me again, what is the nationality of Farage's wife?

Thomas Breannacht's picture

That's good - it will give Ken an advantage in the Mayoral election if the vote is split.

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