With their Farage-reliant party structure, the idea of a ground game is alien to UKIP
This Sunday in South Thanet Labour’s campaign against Nigel Farage will be helped by a day of campaigning on the doorsteps led by Owen Jones. Several hundred people are set to come down, and there’s a lot of excitement in advance.
The mass canvass comes after Nigel Farage’s call to arms last weekend, when the UKIP leader became belatedly alert to the fact he would not receive the coronation he had expected in South Thanet.
What was striking about Farage’s plea to supporters was quite how novel it was to his party. Whereas for Labour the custom of campaigners seconding themselves to marginal seats from safe ones is a mainstay of the electoral cycle, for UKIP it generated national headlines.
Indeed, with their tadpole-like, Farage-reliant party structure, the idea of a ground game is in many ways alien to UKIP. This week in Thanet they paid for their second £8,000 wraparound of the local newspaper, and the area is now decked out in expensive purple and yellow advertising. But those who have seen their supporters out and about report a shambolic and often undirected canvassing operation.
Increasingly this is the story in South Thanet, with UKIP (and the Tories, for that matter) pumping vast amounts into big budget marketing and advertising – effectively deploying a high volume, low engagement strategy. Farage’s tinny claim to lead the “people’s army” is hollower than anyone quite appreciates.
With Ukip ploughing the lion’s share of national party resources into two or three seats they believe they can win, the paradox is acute. Farage’s team use Goliath-like resources to plaster every billboard, newspaper and bus with the message that they are the David-esque electoral underdog.
The only way Labour can counter this is by doing what we have been doing for the last two years in South Thanet – and are doing across the country – and continue with a methodical, street-by-street, house-by-house approach that genuinely engages with people. By ramping this up, through mass canvassing events like the Owen Jones one this weekend, this election can become British politics’ great Wizard of Oz moment – a sign of quite how little there is behind the purple curtain.
For more information about Sunday’s event, click here.
Will Scobie is the Labour candidate in South Thanet
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69 Responses to “UKIP have no ground game – Sunday is the day to expose them”
DaveAtherton20
If the residents hand you a bowl of water, soap and towel don’t be surprised.
CGR
UKIP are the only party supporting the interests of the British working class.
Joe Bloggs
The revolution has not, nor will not, happen under Socialism.
It might, under UKIP.
Labour4PIE
If any Labour Peodophile supporting scum knock on my door they will get a mouthful.We are sick to death of the Labour freakshow around here.A WORD OF ADVICE LABOUR SCUM STAY AT HOME SUNDAY YOUR NOT WELCOME
JBRodrigues
At what moment after you brandished all UKIP supporters and voters as “racist toothless thugs”, did you think they would suddenly come in open arms to vote for you, Mr Scobie? The reference is down below. You should be thoroughly ashamed of such an execrable comment. Your contempt for the very people you are trying to win votes from is obvious and extremely unnerving. You have torpedoed any chance you had to win your seat with such bigoted remarks for which, if you had any decency, you would apologise.
Plenty of 1st and 2nd generation immigrants will be voting UKIP in order to get immigration under control, to ease the pressures on primary school places, A&E waiting times, the housing market, and so the immigrants who are already here can integrate better. It is not racist to support UKIP or oppose mass immigration.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/04/09/fighting-farage-for-south-thanet-we-arent-all-ukip-supporting-toothless-thugs_n_7033916.html