Ukip gains Clacton whilst Labour holds Heywood and Middleton but only just!

The votes are counted and the results declared. Douglas Carswell takes Clacton for Ukip with 21,113 votes whilst his Tory rival only manages to get 8,709 votes. Spare a thought for the Lib-Dems who lost their deposit with just 483 votes - down from 5,577 in 2010. Labour did almost as badly, dropping from 10,799 votes in 2010 to 3,957. Carswell has increased his majority to 12,404 from the 12,068 lead he enjoyed in 2010 and the result represents a 44% swing to Ukip from Tory.

Oop north I see that Ukip slashed Labour's six thousand majority at the Heywood and Middleton by-election to just 617. Liz McInnes, the constituency's new Labour MP received 11,633 votes whilst the Ukip candidate, John Bickley, got 11,016 - a swing to Ukip of 18% from Labour. In 2010, Labour got 18,499 (40.1%) and Ukip came fifth with 1,215 votes. The Conservatives came third but whereas they polled 12,528 votes and were second-placed in 2010, they only managed 3,946 votes this time. Ukip is taking votes from both Labour and Tory in almost equal amounts.

Back in 2010, Nick Clegg pledged his support for Conservative plans to implement constituency boundary changes, designed to even-up the electoral playing field, in exchange for a referendum on PR. Cameron gave the Lib-Dems their referendum in which 68% of the population voted against PR for General Elections. Clegg exacted his revenge by vetoing any boundary changes thus giving his new "Facebook Friends", Labour, a built-in advantage - next year, they only need 35% of the vote to become the party of power. All thanks to someone who can't be trusted to keep to his word.

Based on these two results, it would be foolish to even think that Ukip could gain swings of 44%, or anything like that. But bearing in mind that Heywood and Middleton was, until today, a safe Labour seat which its Politbureau was confident it would retain with an increased majority and that majority has been decimated, a swing to Ukip of 15% to 20% may be achievable. In the more marginal constituencies, that could result in Ukip getting more MPs.

My updated prediction for 2015 is that the Conservatives will form the government and that Ukip will replace the Lib-Dems as the third party of British politics. The Tories will have an overall majority of 2 or 3 in the House and therefore will have to rely on help to get Bills passed. There'll be post election blood-letting in both the Labour and Lib-Dem camps with Chukka Umana and Danny Alexander emerging as their respective leaders. Farage will keep Cameron honest and they will be the de facto leaders of the anti and pro camps for the 2017 referendum. Ousted at next year's party conference, Millionaire Miliband will join his former boss' company where he'll learn how to eat bacon sandwiches and Clegg - lonely due to being one of only two Lib-Dem MPs - will simply sulk.

Oh. We will never hear the end of it when Nigel visits IOM next month.

I agree that the next election will give us another tight finish.

There's been some bitter reaction from Labour MPs. John Mann is reported as saying, "If Ed Miliband does not broaden the Labour coalition to better include working class opinion ‎then we cannot win a majority government" whilst Frank Field predicts a gloomy General Election result for the party: "If last night's vote heralds the start of UKIP's serious assault into Labour's neglected core vote, all bets are off for safer, let alone marginal seats at the next election". Before last night's shock results in Lancashire, MPs had said ‎if UKIP finished within 2,000 votes of Labour, serious 'alarm bells would start ringing' about Miliband's leadership. But those bells appear to be silent. For now at least.

The victor, Liz McInnes was apparently booed and heckled when she claimed her victory showed support for Millionaire Man Miliband: "The people gave their backing to Ed Miliband's plans for an NHS with the time to care," she said. Well they might, Liz, until they realise that they'll have to wait until the end of 2016 before a Labour government increases NHS funding at all.

There appears to be no reaction 'down south' to either the humiliation of the Clacton result or the drubbing they received 'up north'. Was it so wise of the Tory Toff to label Ukip as 'loonies, fruitcases and closet racists' and can he continue to be so dismissive of a party with such obvious growing popular appeal?

I am going to cut and paste some remarks made on Facebook by a friend who lives in Spain, which sum up the situation as I see it:

"Some old hands may say "remember the SDP", but this looks different to me. Neither mainstream party has an easy answer to UKIP.

"There's endless talk about "disengagement" and "disillusionment with mainstream politicians", but I frankly can't see how the pretty piffling expenses scandals can explain this sort of result. I think it's simpler: it's the economy, stupid. Specifically, two things have come together. The working class, already battered by deindustrialisation, have been received another hammer blow as medium-skilled jobs have disappeared, taking away their ladder upwards out of dead-end jobs. Large swathes of the middle classes are just as fed up, for the same reason - they're being forced down into unskilled work. Median wages have stagnated - the average voter doesn't see much improvement in his or her prospects.

"No one really has an answer to any of this, so there aren't any clear policy proposals which voters can latch onto. Therefore, the frustration it causes is being expressed in all kinds of other forms that UKIP is exploiting: anti-immigrant sentiment, anti-EU sentiment, nostalgia, a general sense that "everything is going down the drain", etc. To me, this is only explanation that makes sense. The actual day-to-day level of irritation to the man in the street caused by Polish plumbers or EU directives cannot possibly give rise to this.

"This would also explain the apparent conundrum, observed by the Economist, that although plenty of voters moan about immigrants, mainstream parties who pander to that particular concern don't actually seem to gain much from it. Much the same could be said for Europe. If the real worries are elsewhere, the parties are looking in the wrong place.

Large parts of the working class may now be so disconnected from the notion of education as a means of self-improvement (because they have no experience of it as such) that no government policy can pacify them. But at the very least, there ought to be some new thinking about education and training that offers some hope of advancement to the massed ranks of the middle class who are watching their jobs being consumed by technology."

That is precisely the situation as I see it.

We are, as a consequence of the IT revolution, heading towards a state of affairs not unlike that which prevailed in Rome under the later Republic and the Empire. In the case of Rome, slave labour, both on large estates and in factories, displaced the small farmers who had made up the backbone of the Roman Republic and the craftsmen who had worked in the towns. The big estates were more profitable than small farms, the small farmers went bust and moved to the towns, where, along with the former artisans, they became, in effect, pensioners of the State, dependent on the bread dole and on "circuses" for entertainment, and the existence of this "Roman Mob" destabilised the Republic, whilst the politicians and the professional classes continued to praise the virtues of the Roman Citizen even as they had driven him out of business.

Our situation looks very similar.

I am not really into politics myself, however I see this as being a good step in the right direction.

• A vote to reclaim our country from the German led, Marxist, EU dictatorship, which rides roughshod over democracy.

• A vote because people are so fed up with the blatant lies told by the main political parties.

• A vote for a party more in tune with the electorate.

sadly--a huge number of people in this country have the right to vote----but shouldnt. many of them probably cant even spell the word. one person one vote is wrong--better if it was 1 household one vote.

Explain that assertion. I think I know what you mean....

ok. picture it--a household with several grown up kids--all over 18---each have the vote---which means they could cancel out votes from the same number of one-person households. it should be the name of the first--or only--person on the council tax bill that has the vote. remember---it used to be called the poll tax.

I AM into politics. Always have been. I have forty years of shoving leaflets through letterboxes, knocking on doors, telling at polling stations, running committee rooms, giving lifts to the polling station, standing for the District Council, etc., etc., behind me. I have done so for Labour, for the SDP and in recent decades for the LibDems.

I have heard the lady of the house call up the stairs "Ken, how do we vote?". I have dealt with dogs and vicious letterboxes. I know that "It's my business, thank you!" means "I vote Tory". And so on.

And I know that nobody ever reads the Manifesto of the party they vote for, let alone any of the others, and that urban myth and simple peasant prejudice are, along with the weather (rain is good for the Tories; they have more cars) what decide elections.

Are you saying that most people arent informed enough to make a sensible decision?

Oh for sure, but that is not to say that they should not have the right to decide. I believe that they do have that right, just as the Filipinos had the right to vote for Estrada (a very foolish thing to do) and just as they have the right to vote for Binay (which I sincerely hope they do not do!).

Very topical examples right now.

Yes. I confess to a fascination with Filipino politics; who needs "Game of Thrones" when you can watch the real thing?

Binay's spokesman signed off my wifes university scholarship.

That does not mean that she has to vote for a crook.

Agreed. In any case, she wont be voting for any of them from here.