Friday, May 17, 2013

Nigel Farage's difficulties in Scotland

I know this blog is chiefly concerned with Shropshire and railways and photographs of churches, but if you look hard enough there are some quite prophetic political posts here too.

Back in February I pointed out that UKIP's policy platform consist of a ragbag of issues designed to reflect the worldview of angry white men of a certain age.

I then went on to say:
But there is another issue that appeals to this demographic. 
Unionism used to be the Conservatives' trump card. It won them a majority of Scottish MPs in the 1950s, which is something that it is near impossible to believe now. 
Not only is Unionism less effective as a policy: the Conservatives are not that keen on it any more ...
And if you ask an angry white man of a certain age what he thinks of the Union he will most likely tell you (if he lives in Southern England, as so many of them do) that he is fed up with paying for services in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales that are better than the ones he can use himself. 
If the Scots want independence, he will likely continue, let them have it and see how much they enjoy paying the full cost of those services themselves. 
Which makes me wonder how long the UK will stay in UKIP. Their target voters are not keen on it at all.

1 comment: