The political Richter Scale

UKIP are keen to tell us that there is a 'political earthquake' underway.  That the party is gathering momentum is not in doubt – but is it really an 'earthquake'?  No.

Last night saw Mark Reckless (re)elected as the MP for Rochester Strood, to become the second MP to be elected under the UKIP name.  His majority of close to three thousand over the Conservatives was comfortable, but not insurmountable for the Tories at a General Election, where polls show voters do tend to approach things slightly differently.  Nevertheless, it was a good victory for UKIP and they are quite understandably celebrating the result.

However, I don't believe this result is quite as momentous as the UKIP types on the news and on social media would have us believe.  Sure, it's a good result for them – but how earth-shattering really is it?

As in last month's by-election in Clacton, UKIP's candidate was a defector to the party from the Conservatives, and the incumbent MP in that seat.  Incumbency brings with it certain benefits, and when we look at other recent by-elections in Heywood & Middleton and in Newark – where UKIP have not been 'helped along' by the defection of a local MP already known to the people in the constituency – UKIP have polled fairly well, but not won the seat.  Really winning a seat is a different proposition from holding a seat (even under different party colours), and that is something UKIP are still yet to do.

the people of #RochesterAndStrood have spoken. They have said: “we told you before that we wanted this guy, why are you asking us again?!”

— Kit Marsden (@manek43509) November 21, 2014

What is certain, though, is that the General Election next year is looking set to be very interesting indeed!  It will be fascinating to see how UKIP fare with their 'homegrown' (for want of a better word) candidates – those dyed-in-the-wool 'Kippers who haven't crossed over from another party, taking with them a certain level of local support and a preexisting record of achievement in parliament which they can use on the campaign trail.

Personally, I think it's quite unlikely that we'll see any further defections to UKIP before the General Election.  So, when we come to May next year, UKIP candidates will stand or fall on their own merits – and although the party is on the rise, I don't think we will see the huge numbers of UKIP MPs some of their activists are hoping for.

My personal feeling is that they'll be extremely lucky to get into double figures with the number of seats they win.  That's a tremor, but is it truly an earthquake?  Not really.

Good by-election

Douglas Carswell - former Conservative MP for Clacton, and now UKIP candidate in today's Clacton by-election - is almost certainly going to retain his seat in Parliament, and become UKIP's first MP.  Which I find a little odd.

the curious thing about voting for a #UKIP defector is that you are supporting continuation because you are fed up of the status quo.
— Kit Marsden (@manek43509) October 9, 2014

The thing is, voting UKIP is a protest - a kick in the teeth to the corpulent, self-serving, disinterested complacency of the political establishment.  It is a vote for change.  A vote for a different kind of politics - not for 'more of the same'.  Which is why it is a little strange, then, to cast this anti-establishment vote for somebody who, until only a few weeks ago, was as much a part of the ruling elite as any other politician in the mainstream parties.

Mr Carswell is clearly popular with the people of Clacton; at the last general election, he achieved a majority of over 12,000 votes.  But to be so disaffected with 'business as usual' in politics that you vote to maintain the status quo is a bit unusual, isn't it?

Mr Carswell's highly probable re-election in Clacton is likely to owe as much to the benefits of incumbency and local voters' familiarity with him as a candidate as it is to UKIP's rising popularity as a party.

Much more interesting, as a barometer of the political mood, will be the concurrent by-election in Heywood & Middleton.  Following the death of Labour MP Jim Dobbin in September, this is a by-election campaign with no incumbent fighting to retain the seat - it is expected that Labour will hold this constituency, but UKIP's progress here will tell us a lot more about their fortunes ahead of next year's general election than the 'coronation' of an already popular defector could ever hope to.

#Newark - what a Farage-o!

I am left somewhat bemused by the media reaction to the news that UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage will not stand in the forthcoming parliamentary by-election in the Nottinghamshire constituency of Newark.

Always keen to jump on a Farage story, the country's political press went into a frenzy several days back over  whether the UKIP leader (currently a Member of the European Parliament) would stand in the by-election.  Having decided not to stand (rather sensibly, I think - as does Isabel Hardman in The Spectator), Farage now finds himself the subject of media taunts and jibes from politicians of other parties that he has 'bottled it'.

Well, how terribly 'playschool' that all is.  Encapsulating everything that's wrong about Britain's culture of "yah, boo!" politics, this is the equivalent of the rest of the school egging on one kid in the playground to eat worms and dirt.  That kid knows its a bad idea to eat the worms - and so do the kids gleefully trying to push him into it - but in the playground, the threat of being called 'chicken', and jeered at for being afraid, is a powerful thing indeed.

I certainly wouldn't frame myself as a UKIP supporter - but I don't think I am being unreasonable to expect our politicians and journalists to be a little more grown-up than this.