Where Ukip went wrong

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[/audioplayer]What’s happened to poor Ukip? Not so long ago, they seemed unstoppable. They were revolting on the right, terrifying the left and shaking up Westminster. The established parties tried sneering at them, smearing them, even copying them. Nothing worked. Then came the general election, the centre held, and Ukip seemed to fall apart. Farage failed to win his target seat in South Thanet, the focus of his whole campaign. He resigned, then farcically unresigned, three days later.

The ‘Ukip wars’ followed: after an unseemly row over ‘Short money’ — the funding provided by the state for opposition parties in Parliament — Ukip started attacking itself through the media. Further leading figures have resigned and unresigned, or been sacked and unsacked.

Here’s the strange thing, though: the election was not a disaster for Ukip. It was a triumph. They won 3.9