The count hadn’t taken long. Only 18,000 Ukip members had bothered to vote for a new leader. The rest had either sloped off to join the Tories or lost interest. If they couldn’t have Nigel, they would rather have no one. Paul Oakden, Ukip’s chairman, did his best to instil some excitement into the proceedings but was up against it. Perhaps, on reflection, straight after lunch on the first day of the party conference wasn’t the best time to announce a new leader. Old habits die hard and all that.
“The winner with 8,451 votes is Diane James,” he announced to no great surprise. If anyone other than the Continuity Nigel-Lite candidate had won, there might have been a walkout.
James’s succession was merely an indication of business as usual; if without any of Nigel’s sparkle and energy. James climbed up to the stage and frantically threw her arms into the air. Not waving but drowning. “We did it, you did it,” she shouted, which won her a few lacklustre cheers. They’d heard Nigel say just the same thing earlier in the day and he had said it so much better. There’s only so much triumphalism anyone can take. The EU referendum was in the past and what the kippers were looking for was a roadmap for the future. Many took one look at James and feared they were heading up a dead end.
Sensing she was losing her audience before she had started, James quickly mumbled “Nigel” several times in a row. That got everyone going a bit. James went for the kill. “I’d now like to say my own personal thank you to the man who has given his hall for us. So thank you Nigel.” Nigel wandered across the stage to bestow his blessing on his successor and to acknowledge the plaudits. The applause levels went up several decibels but were far from what they had been earlier.
This was the third standing ovation Nigel had been given in the space of a couple of hours. It was as if no one really knew what to do with themselves. Ukip had been the most successful political party in the last 100 years but now so many of its objectives had been achieved there was little obvious left to fight for. The party that had done so well with appeals to a nostalgic past now had only its own past from which to take comfort.
Once Nigel had left the hall, James tried to give a raison d’etre but seldom managed to sound more inspiring than a company director giving a logistics presentation to a board meeting. It didn’t help that all the graphs were heading in the wrong direction. Halfway through, the video screen behind her crashed. Call it coming out in sympathy. Nor did it help that much of what she said was inconsistent and incoherent. “We’ve only won the first heat,” she insisted. “I’m not going to talk about battles.” Within seconds she was talking about battle grounds. She also accused Theresa ‘Magpie’ May of stealing Ukip’s grammar school policy only to add that she had no chance of getting it through.
There were more blank faces when James suggested, “the people of Britain have voted for an outward-looking country”. No one in the hall could remember voting for that. What they wanted were their blue passports back. When that happened they would know that Brexit really did mean Brexit. After all, hadn’t Nigel only just said before lunch that blue passports must be one of Ukip’s three lines in the sand in any negotiations with the EU? No one could ever accuse Nigel of not knowing his audience. And playing to it.
James ended by calling on the prime minister to trigger article 50 on Christmas Day. Because Baby Jesus was British and it’s what he would have wanted. That done she trooped off stage to a muted reception. Only then did she remember Nigel’s closing words. “I will be right behind the new leader,” he had said. Just what she didn’t need. A bad day had just got worse.
