23/10/2014
No doubt motivated by a surge of bitterness, the
Mail is headlining that: "Support for staying IN the European Union surges to a 23-year high... all thanks to the rise of Ukip".
This is data from an
Ipsos MORI report which show the majority of Britons would vote to stay in the European Union in a referendum.
Some 56 percent would vote to stay in the EU, compared with 36 percent who would vote to get out; eight percent answer that they do not know how they would vote. This translates to 61 percent support for Britain's EU membership and 39 percent opposing after excluding "don't knows".
This is the highest support since December 1991, before the signing of the Maastricht Treaty, when 60 percent said they would vote to stay in the European Community and 29 percent wanted to get out.
What is especially significant about the poll though is that it shows how Ukip's growing popularity has coincided with increasing support for Britain's membership of the EU. In November 2012, Ukip was on just three percent in the polls and 48 percent backed leaving the EU. Only 44 percent favoured staying in.
Now, with Ukip now on 16 percent, the polls indicate that we are further away than ever from leaving the EU. While Ukip has risen 13 points in the polls, the number wishing to leave the EU has fallen by 12 points over the same period.
Worryingly, this is not an isolated poll result. Sentiment has been turning since
earlier this year, so much so that it is being called the "Farage Paradox". Numerous voices are now joining in the throng to aver that Farage is damaging the eurosceptic cause.
That, to us, is the issue. Much as UKIP supporters would like to personalise it, the criticism from this blog is directed at a party leader who seems more interested in electoral success than in developing and supporting the anti-EU cause.
Furthermore, we believe that the sequence of "pro-EU" polls is good evidence that the movement is failing. And, with Farage setting himself up as the spokesman for the anti-EU movement, he cannot walk away from responsibility for this.
For those of us who have spent decades opposing the EU (and the constructs that went before it), this is unacceptable â completely unacceptable. And this is where our critics either unwittingly or deliberately misrepresent us. Farage is entitled to pursue his personal ambitions, but not at the expense of the cause.
Our best judgement is that Farage is damaging the cause and, if we think so, we are entitled to say so. Furthermore, we are entitled to take what action we feel necessary (and able) to take, in order to reduce the damage. What we can do is limited, but if Farage is entitled to do his stuff, so are we. It ain't personal. This is bigger than all of us.
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