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He may not yet be an MP, but Nigel Farage is still the talk of Westminster

There are even rumblings of a Tory-Brexit Party pact

Andrew Grice
Sunday 02 June 2019 16:33 BST
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Love him or hate him, Nigel Farage has had more impact on the political scene than most of the politicians I have covered in 37 years on the Westminster beat. Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair changed Britain. But remarkably, a man who has failed on seven occasions to become an MP has twice shifted the tectonic plates.

The shockwaves caused by Farage’s victory in the European elections are bigger than in 2014, when Ukip under him topped the poll. A year later, the Conservatives won an overall majority at a general election, and Ukip won no seats. No one is betting that Farage’s Brexit Party would suffer the same fate now, even though first-past-the-post is cruel on smaller parties. A YouGov survey putting it in second place behind the Liberal Democrats would give the Brexit Party 141 seats, Labour 202, the Lib Dems 119 and the Tories 110.

These are fantasy figures, not least because the Tories would be mad to allow an election. But the Farage threat is the grim reality for Tory MPs. More than half of the 2017 Tory voters who took part in the European elections backed the Brexit Party.

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