Ukip now resembles its enemies, just like Animal Farm’s pigs | Matthew d’Ancona

With defections, dithering and division, the party’s claim to represent change is ever more ludicrous

The UK Independence party is in deep ideological crisis over an issue close to its tribal heart: the true significance of the pub, and what is said there. For years, Nigel Farage has held his pint aloft like the sword drawn from the stone, the grail of authenticity. Let the faceless men of Westminster mutter their evasions and lies in the metropolitan bubble, the Ukip leader has seemed to say. I speak the unvarnished truth of the saloon bar.

Now, however, the party’s general secretary, Matthew Richardson, has declared that “there are hundreds of thousands of bigots in the United Kingdom and they too deserve representation”. According to Richardson, this unfortunate description of Ukip’s electoral base was “lighthearted harmless banter in the pub”. But surely the pub is where the party’s most solemn verities are uttered? And if one of its most senior officials says Ukip’s ranks are heaving with bigots – well, isn’t he to be believed? I only ask. Clarification, please, Mr Farage.

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