Polemicist William Cobbett, a native of Farnham in Surrey, who railed against authority all his life, believed in an end to rotten boroughs, where a tiny number were able to send MPs of unvarying loyalties to the House of Commons in the 19th century.
Today, Farnham is part of the South-West Surrey constituency, which elected Conservative cabinet minister Jeremy Hunt by a near 16,000 majority in 2010.
Skipping between houses on Weybourne Road yesterday, 25-year-old Alexandra Swann, who is contesting a seat on Surrey county council for the UK Independence Party in Thursday's elections, has little doubt but that Conservative supporters are unhappy. "But there is a difference between them being unhappy and not putting an 'X' against a Conservative candidate," says Swann. She is but one of nearly 1,800 candidates that Ukip – once derided by the established parties – intends to run in Thursday's elections in England and Wales – three times more than it did when the same seats were up for grabs four years ago.
Nazi salute
So far, a few have run into problems, and worse. One was suspended after the
Daily Mirror
published a photograph showing him giving a Nazi salute; and a few have been outed as past members of the British National Party. One died on Sunday of alcoholism, aged just 30. In Gloucestershire, a candidate declared on his Facebook page that physical exercise "released tension" and stopped young people becoming homosexuals. He also congratulated "the Russians" for banning gay pride marches in Moscow.
Some of Ukip’s problems are due to its success, because it decided to increase dramatically the number of candidates it would run on the back of opinion polls and election results showing it on the cusp of success. “Not everybody was checked out in the way that you’d like,” said 24-year-old Waverley Borough councillor, Eliot Nichols, who has been campaigning with Swann for much of the last month. “I’m glad that people who were in the BNP have been outed.”
Like Swann, Nichols is an ex-Conservative, but he jumped ship just last month. t David Cameron “is not a Conservative” and he “doesn’t understand that many in the party have genuine grievances” about his leadership, he says. He believes UKIP could take between three and eight seats on Surrey council and could cost the Conservatives even more . “They [the voters] are not happy with the Tories, but they are undecided about where they want to go.”
Ukip’s popularity has forced Cameron to appeal to Conservative instincts with the announcement that prisoners would no longer get TVs automatically, while ministers continue to make negative noises about Europe, immigration and the European Court of Human Rights.
Party heavyweight Ken Clarke says the Tories are paying the price for taking tough, but necessary measures. “It’s very tempting to go for a collection of clowns or indignant, angry people who promise that somehow they’ll allow you to take revenge.”
In the Farnham North constituency, however, which is less affluent than either of the other two districts in the Surrey town, it will be ex-Labour and ex-Liberal Democrat voters, or those who never voted, who will determine Swann's fate in Friday's count.
Election pitch
"One in three people who say that they are considering voting for her have never voted for any party," says Nichols. "Having people like Ken Clarke having a go at us helps, because people don't want to be patronised." Standing at one door, Swann's election pitch is interrupted by a courier hand-delivering a letter from sitting Tory councillor, Denise Le Gal. "God, they have so much money. They'll send you letters, but they won't come and talk to you," she tells the householder.
