Polling place, Edinburgh North and Leith. Image: Adam Ramsay
If the first rule of politics is that you should take everyone seriously, then the second is that it moves from the edges. And so, let’s start there and work in. In 2010, the ‘to the right of UKIP’ parties stood 464 candidates, not counting the various hard-right ‘Christian’ parties. This year, that number is 17.
Partly, Joe Mulhall of HOPE not Hate tells me, this is because these groups abandoned electoral politics after their failure to make a breakthrough that year. They no longer believe in the democratic road to power. But it’s also because their base all went to UKIP. Will it now go to the Tories? We’ll see – it seems likely, he thinks, that while Paul Nuttall will see support for his party collapse in general, it will hold up in old BNP strongholds like Dagenham. It’s worth looking out for the result there to see what the more hoary hard right voters are up to.
