UKIP are probably smart to avoid a pact with the Tories

Just a quick post relating to this news that Michael Fabricant MP, a vice chairman of the Conservative party, has called for an electoral pact with UKIP followed rapidly by Nigel Farage saying “No deals...it’s war” on Twitter.

Ignoring the fact that the photo makes him look quite sinister, Mr Fabricant’s proposal is superficially quite logical. UKIP’s threat to the Tories is not that they might win seats themselves but that enough potential Tory voters in marginal constituencies might vote UKIP to deny the Conservative candidate victory.

In 2015 the Conservatives already have a significant hurdle preventing them from winning a majority as the current arrangement of constituencies and voters means that if both main parties have 37% of the vote, Labour would have 309 seats and the Tories 267. To get a tiny, barely workable majority of 6 seats, the Conservatives need to win the election by 7 points while Labour would need a 1 point win.

The proposed changes to the boundaries, to make this situation more even, have been vetoed by the Lib Dems and have almost no chance of passing unless David Cameron can buy off every other minor party to pass the changes by a tiny margin.

So it’s not surprising that lots of Conservatives have looked to UKIP as the potential solution to this problem given the purple party’s current position at third in the polls. (Tip for any aspiring Conservative MPs, if you want the media to instantly promote you to “Top Tory” status just call for a pact with UKIP).

However it’s also not surprising that Nigel Farage has reacted the way he did, for three main reasons, excluding the offence taken when David Cameron called UKIP a collection of closet racists:

1. As this chart from the ComRes poll last week shows, although 2010 Conservative voters are the largest single group of new UKIP supporters, they also draw from both the Lib Dems and Labour parties as well as from those who did not vote. Associating themselves directly with the Conservative party would risk putting off the 32% of voters in that chart who did not vote UKIP or Conservative in 2010.
2. As the Lib Dems are finding out now, in coalitions the junior party almost invariably suffers more than the senior party as it loses most of the supporters who voted for it as a protest against the establishment but doesn't have the base that larger parties do to withstand the mid-term unpopularity that governments endure.
3. (This is the big one).  If UKIP’s primary goal is (logically) for the UK to leave the EU then that may be better served by a Labour victory in 2015 than a Tory one.

Daniel Hannan may despair of the lost opportunity of a Conservative/UKIP pact but picture the two possible scenarios:

Some sort of referendum on the UK's EU membership (either a straight remain/withdraw vote or some sort of ratification of a "renegotiated" arrangement where rejection will be taken as a vote to withdraw) is almost certain to be in the Conservatives' 2015 manifesto and will likely be matched by a commitment in the Labour manifesto. Either that or Labour commit first to outflank the Conservatives and David Cameron then has no choice but to commit as well.

If, by whatever parliamentary arithmetic, the Conservative party continue to govern after that election, presumably with David Cameron in Downing St then we'll see a split in the right when that referendum comes.
The "stay in" campaign will have the support of the the Labour party, the government and the establishment voices of the Conservative party while the "leave" campaign will have the right wing of the Conservative party, UKIP and a few right wing newspapers. The government's mid-term unpopularity won't be so much of an issue because the main opposition party will be on side and therefore unwilling to exploit it.

If Labour win, either an outright majority or in coalition with what remains of the Liberal Democrats, then the Conservatives will presumably depose Mr Cameron as their leader and revert to the form they showed after 1997 with the more Eurosceptic candidate becoming leader. Being in government forces moderation upon a party and once freed from that burden, the Conservative party will be able to indulge the Eurosceptic wing even moreso. In this scenario there is still a split in the Conservative party but the right wing is clearly dominant and the opposition, and the Conservative supporting press, is united in favour of withdrawal.

If we accept that an EU referendum is likely to happen no matter which party wins in 2015 then a Eurosceptic vote is more likely under a Labour government (which, given recent economic news, is going to be unpopular) with the Conservative party and the whole centre right united behind one position than under a Conservative or coalition government where the right is split between moderates like David Cameron and the more UKIP inclined members of his party.

There really aren't any compelling reasons for Nigel Farage to accept any offer from the Conservative party.