While one can only admire Nigel Farage's optimism in putting up candidates at the next European and Parliamentary elections in Scotland, he is wasting his time ("UKIP is confident it can win seats at Holyrood", The Herald, February 15) .
At the last European Parliamentary elections in 2009 UKIP came second in the UK, winning just under 17% of the vote and securing 13 MEPs. In Scotland, however, it came behind the Greens in sixth place with just over 5% of the vote. At the last Scottish Parliamentary election in 2011 UKIP achieved less than 1% of the vote.
While the party has had success south of the Border, where the majority want the UK to leave the EU, in Scotland this position is reversed. While UKIP in England has forced Mr Cameron into an In-Out referendum on UK membership of the EU, its isolationist agenda has only ever seen it inhabit the fringes of Scottish politics, where it is destined to remain.
Alex Orr,
Flat 2, 77 Leamington Terrace, Edinburgh.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article