To be worried Nigel Farage could have a lot more voters than people think

[username5979482]

On Mumsnet I rarely see much support for Nigel Farage (thankfully) so maybe I'm asking the wrong group of people. I'm from a very diverse family. I remember once being told I was silly for worrying that Trump would become president and that we would vote leave

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I'm from the North West where I see a lot of support for Farage especially in working class areas. Even our local area Facebook group there are always racial undertones or blatant racist comments. I think a lot of people who voted leave will vote for him in the general election. I am genuinely terrified he could win a lot more seats than people think. AIBU or do other see the support he is actually getting?

he isn't even standing as an mp. I do hope you are wrong.((prays))

I think that he'll split the Leave vote massively - places that are tribal Labour but overwhelmingly Leave are much more likely to vote for the Brexit party than the Conservatives, imo.

Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing probably depends on how you voted in the Referendum.

He (his party) isn't going to win (m)any seats at the election but they will get a lot of votes and they will have a say in the final result.

They won't win more than 5 seats, personally I'd be amazed if they won more than 1.

Farage supporters tend to be pretty vocal online as they are on the extremes of politics (I don't want to call them extremists) but don't worry about them winning loads of seats, just about them swinging seats one way or the other.

Much like his former party UKIP they will poll quite high (20-30%) but not actually win many (if any) seats.

I think the Brexit party will gain votes from people who traditionally voted for both Conservative and Labour parties. I'm more worried that we'll have a hung parliament.

Do the Brexit Party actually have any other policies apart from a NoDeal Brexit?

I’m hoping they will split the Conservative vote in Leave constituencies as much as possible. Then the LDs will win in marginal seats such as where I live which were over 75% Remain in the referendum. So the Cons will lose their far right as well as their moderate, Remain voters and so be left with not a lot..

Is this the same Nigel Farage that has suddenly developed a hard on for a second referendum ?

No, not that one. The other one ...

www.theweek.co.uk/101632/the-brexit-party-s-policies-examined

Voting reform

In July, the party became an unlikely ally of the Liberal Democrats, the Green Party and the Scottish National Party (SNP) by joining a cross-party alliance on voting reform.

The cross-party alliance signed a declaration calling for the first-past-the-post method for Westminster elections to be replaced by a proportional system, with a citizens’ assembly to be formed to advise on the change.

Farage has good reason to view the current system as unfair. In 2015, his UKIP party won just one seat in Parliament, despite picking up almost four million votes.

In a 2011 referendum, the British public rejected a shift to a “preferential” voting system by 68% to 32%.

He isn’t even standing so obviously won’t have any votes at all!

I think it will be a weaker version of UKIP, where they might well get a decent chunk of votes in certain areas, but not actually a majority to win seats anywhere.

I do think the press need to stop treating him as an equal to the main party leaders. He’s not even a candidate, they need to treat him the same as any other idiot with an opinion and a big mouth.

Nah. People in working class areas are less stupid than people on here like to think. Remind me how many GE seats the UKIPs ever won? This shower of sub-Fascists won't do any better.

I think this is worth bearing in mind in the run up to an election.

Hopefully they will split the Tory vote. I doubt they will win a seat.

I think, in my area at least, they could split both the Tory and Labour vote. However many of the vocal ones, are also very vocal in their opinion that they will never vote again, so who knows.

I think in many areas they will take labour votes from those that can't stick Corbyn, as well as a few conservative votes from those that want a clean Brexit.

The whole situation seems very unstable and predicting votes is difficult as more people than ever are voting on the issue (Brexit) as opposed to traditional party loyalties

Nigel Farage is shit at turning rhetoric into MPs. Hasn’t even managed to get himself elected.

@noblegiraffe but he is good at taking enough votes that mean an MP gets elected on a very small proportion of the vote

I don’t think I understand what you mean, Marie

Didn't UKIP get ~4 mln votes in 2010 or 2015?
A bit under 10% of all votes cast?

I imagine UKIP+Farage-Party together also getting 9-11% of popular vote in 2019.

The Brexit party will be crushed by FPTP, in exactly the same way as UKIP, the SDP and the Lib Dems were in the past.

I do think the press need to stop treating him as an equal to the main party leaders. He’s not even a candidate, they need to treat him the same as any other idiot with an opinion and a big mouth.

^This. He's really no more than a windbag who likes the sound of his own voice and has extreme views. People need to stop giving him more airtime than he deserves. UKIP never won more than one seat (from a defecting Tory who has gone back into the fold), despite very impressive showings at the EU elections.