Ukip avoids key seats to boost Unionists’ chances
UKIP Scotland chose not to stand candidates in key SNP-held seats to help the Tories win, a senior party figure has claimed.
Despite recording some of its best results in Moray and Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale in 2015, and having candidates available, Ukip stood back from those seats as part of a strategy of avoiding a split in the Unionist vote.
The source said: “There was a strategy of not pushing the boat out in those seats where there was the possibility of a Unionist candidate winning.
“We know the difference might have been just a few hundred votes but that can be the difference between winning and losing in these seats.”
Ukip Scotland leader David Coburn MEP did not deny the claim, and admitted he could have stood in Moray, but said the party decided there were “happier hunting grounds”.
At the last election, Ukip Scotland stood in 41 seats, but this time is standing in just ten. It is absent from all 15 of the Conservatives’ top target seats, as well as all the Labour and LibDem targets.
Ukip had its largest haul of votes in Moray in 2015 with 1,939 or 3.9 per cent. However, the party is not standing in Scotland’s most Euro-sceptic seat, thereby helping the Tories challenge the 9,065-vote majority of SNP deputy leader Angus Robertson.
Although it polled 1,472 votes last time, Ukip has also chosen not to stand in Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale, where Tory Scottish Secretary David Mundell is defending a majority of 798.
Ukip has also abandoned Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk, where the SNP’s Calum Kerr has a majority of 328, making Ukip’s 1316 votes potentially critical.
At Ukip Scotland’s manifesto launch on Wednesday, Mr Coburn accused the Tories of being weak in their defence of the Union.
However, the Ukip source, who was present at internal discussions, said Mr Coburn and others had chosen to give the Tories a free hand in many seats.