Ukip’s former head of media, Alexandra Phillips, has written a Guardian opinion piece arguing that the Stoke byelection comes at a crucial point for Ukip.
Of course we are talking about Ukip versus Labour. The two parties go head to head in a byelection that has the potential to determine both of their fates. After a successful Brexit campaign, I wondered what Ukip – my former party – would convene around as a new raison d’etre. The departure of Nigel Farage, who still remains spokesman-in-chief for the commonly referred to “left behind” voters, has yet to strike a fatal blow to the party whose rapid growth has often challenged the organisation’s structural capability. As the penny drops that Nigel has left the building, I wonder whether the prominence of the new party leader Paul Nuttall as Ukip’s candidate in Stoke is a curse, rather than a blessing.
A week tomorrow two parliamentary byelections take place - one in Copeland, the other in Stoke-on-Trent Central.
Both seats were previously held by Labour.
The vicar at All Saints Church, Hanley, in the heart of Stoke, has written for the Guardian on the preoccupations of his city as the byelection approaches.
Now, in the wake of the byelection triggered by the resignation of Tristram Hunt, national attention once again turns to my parish. But many of us here feel that the real troubles confronting our community are in danger of being sidelined in a never-ending debate about the EU. We think this election represents a brilliant opportunity to talk about the other things that matter to us. After a year of relentless, daily canvassing from leave, by remain, by political parties of every colour – each wanting to debate geopolitics on our doorsteps – a lot of people here want politicians to switch their attention to our more pressing, local problems.
I’m not writing my usual blog this week because I’m off for half term but here, as an alternative, is the Politics Live readers’ edition. It is a place for you to discuss today’s politics, and to share links to breaking news and to the most interesting stories and blogs on the web.
Feel free to express your views robustly, but please treat others with respect and don’t resort to abuse. Guardian comment pages are supposed to be a haven from the Twitter/social media rant-orama, not an extension of it.
You can read all today’s Guardian politics stories here.
And here are some of the main ones on our site this morning.
- The Ukip leader, Paul Nuttall, is facing more questions about Hillsborough after being forced to admit that claims on his website about losing close friends in the disaster were false.
- Critics of the Brexit bill are increasingly confident that they will be able to win a vital parliamentary battle in the House of Lords, a senior opposition peer said on Tuesday.
- Theresa May is expected to miss the EU’s 60th anniversary summit in March because the British government sees no point in being involved in planning the future of the EU.
- At least 4 million people are at risk of falling below the poverty line because of rising food and fuel prices, a new study from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has warned.
- Arron Banks, the biggest donor to Ukip, has said that he is “sick to death of hearing about” the Hillsborough stadium disaster in which 96 people died, describing it as an “awful accident” that “could have happened anywhere, anytime” in the 1980s. He also accused one of his critics of “milking a tragedy forever” .
