Ukip loses only MP as Tory who defected quits AGAIN
UKIP’S only MP quit the party yesterday after a series of bitter rows – with former leader Nigel Farage wishing him good riddance.
Douglas Carswell, who had become embroiled in a long-running feud with Mr Farage and other senior party figures, said he would now represent his Clacton constituency as an independent.
Ukip claimed Mr Carswell had resigned after learning he was likely to be thrown out of the party tomorrow over charges that he joined only in order to ‘neutralise’ Mr Farage, who he believed was damaging the chances of Brexit.
Mr Carswell said he was leaving Ukip ‘amicably, cheerfully and in the knowledge that we won’. The ex-Tory MP triggered a by-election – and a political storm – by defecting to Ukip in 2014. But he said he would not force a repeat contest by returning to the Conservatives.
Mr Farage said: ‘Carswell has jumped before he was pushed. He was never Ukip and sought to undermine us. He should have gone some time ago.’
The MoS reported last year that Mr Carswell had ‘fooled’ then-Ukip leader Mr Farage into letting him join to stop his ‘awful’ views deterring voters from backing Brexit – and secretly wrecked Mr Farage’s bid to lead the official Leave campaign in the referendum.
According to a book by Ukip expert Owen Bennett, Mr Carswell had decided it was his ‘national duty’ to ‘neutralise’ Farage because polls proved that ‘the better Farage did, the less support there was for leaving the EU’ – something described as the ‘Farage paradox’.
Ahead of the referendum, Mr Carswell campaigned in the official Vote Leave camp, alongside his former Tory colleagues Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, while Mr Farage was relegated to the secondary Leave.eu campaign. Mr Farage had long believed Mr Carswell was a ‘cuckoo in the nest’ and the pair clashed frequently.
Allies even claimed to have evidence that Mr Carswell used confidential party data to help the Tories defeat Mr Farage in South Thanet at the last General Election – something he denies.
Ukip leader Paul Nuttall said the party did not regret losing their only MP as they had ‘not benefited financially or organisationally from having Douglas Carswell in Westminster’.
He said: ‘On Monday, he had been due to meet with the national executive committee to answer various questions relating to long-standing issues, including… allegations that he had joined us in order to try to minimise Nigel Farage’s involvement in the referendum.’
‘He jumped before he was pushed’