Ukip

[merylpeep]

what chance of UKIP winning the 2015 General Election?

[agchristie]

None, but I predict a dozen seats gained.

[ChillDoubt]

Very doubtful, though there are plenty of Tories and Labourites swapping allegiance and with the Labour Party's propensity for putting its foot in its mouth who knows?

[Old_Geezer]

As near zero as makes no difference.

If they could, and it's a big if, repeat the bye election results in a general election, they might gain enough seats for the larger parties to court. But I'm not putting any money on it. Likely to prove a protest vote.

[agchristie]

Where Rochester was concerned, the Tories did well to get as close as they did and can be rightly hopeful of reversing the result but they have to get their act together fast.

[weecalf]

Is it not worth it to see the Tories and labour run around with long faces ,just because the people give their verdict on them by voting ukip .you would think these people had the right to be in power .have yet to hear them say the people have a right to choose as they want . No its all ,they have made a mistake and will come back to us .

[EDDIE51]

Zero

[jomifl]

Zero, nix, nul, nada.

[Gromit]

None.

But they have a great chance of losing it for the Conservatives.

[VHG]

There is a big difference between winning a couple of seats with MPs who have defected to UKIP and are standing in the same constituency, and winning seats with "fresh" candidates who nobody in the constituency knows.

As has been said they may win a dozen seats but no more.

With our "first past the post" system they may get a decent percentage of the votes but if you are 50 votes behind the winning candidate you don't win the seat.

[VHG]

>>But they have a great chance of losing it for the Conservatives.

Also stopping Labour wining a majority.

Remember the Labour vote went down nearly 12% which is nothing to be too proud about.

[Zacs-Master]

The chances of UKIP winning ANY election in the next 20 years is nil.

[Egara_Flegin]

zero but they do seem to have shaken things up a bit.

[mushroom25]

//The chances of UKIP winning ANY election in the next 20 years is nil. //

in 1928, the german chatterati said the same about the Nazis who polled less than 3% of the vote and lost two of the seats they gained in 1924.

[barney4444]

//The chances of UKIP winning ANY election in the next 20 years is nil. //

I think zac will have to eat his words. He is, like the `main` political parties completely underestimating how fed up Mr and Mrs Average are..

[VHG]

>>>Remember the Conservative vote went down 14%,which is nothing ,
too be to proud about.

I am aware of that, I was replying to Gromit who said UKIP could lose the election for the tories.

I was merely pointing out that as well as being bad for the tories it was also bad for labour.

So no need for your "points scoring".

[Gromit]

// Remember the Labour vote went down nearly 12% which is nothing to be too proud about. //

It was a solid Conservative seat, so Labour were never going to do anything. All the evidence so far is that UKIP takes more votes from previous Conservative voters than Labour ones.

Labour held onto its seat in the recent by election, while the Conservatives lost both of theirs. The Conservatives should be more frightened of UKIP than the Labour Party should be frightened. UKIP will affect the Labour vote, but not to the same extent as the Conservatives.

[Zacs-Master]

Well, that gave me a giggle.

[TTG]

It could split the Tory vote in the South...letting Labour in. A dreadful thought.

[alexanderd]

In my opinion the answer to your question is "No chance" It would be interesting to see what would happen if it was not a sitting mp who had defected. A lot of people vote for the person if he/she is a good mp.