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Bad and worse (part II)

The Tories must not overreact to the UKIP performance

A few months ago, Conservative strategists were looking forward to the elections to the European Parliament with even more enthusiasm than the council contests. The Tory position on Europe, they knew, was popular while the Liberal Democrats, who outperform their national poll ratings in local ballots, invariably struggle in a battle for representation in Brussels/Strasbourg.

The Labour Party, furthermore, could be attacked for its arrogant refusal to concede a referendum on the proposed EU constitution. There was always a potential threat from the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), which had secured 7 per cent of the vote in the 1999 European elections, but that camp had been relatively quiet in recent years. The Tories could thus expect an absolutely smashing victory when these ballot papers