NIGEL Farage has revealed that he is viewing his party's general election campaign in Scotland as a stepping stone to winning UKIP's first seats at Holyrood.
The UKIP leader admitted that his party's chances of winning a Westminster constituency north of the border next week are "pretty remote", but added that gaining representation in the Scottish Parliament next year was a "completely realistic objective".
Speaking to STV's Tonight, in an interview that will be broadcast tonight, he also claimed that the notion that people in Scotland held different views on immigration and the European Union to those in the wider UK is "a great myth".
David Coburn became Scotland's first elected UKIP politician last year when he won a seat at the European Parliament, when the party took just over 10 per cent of the vote north of the border.
Under Holyrood's proportional representation list system, the party can expect to see multiple MSPs elected if the result was repeated in the parliamentary poll. In 2011, the Scottish Greens won two Holyrood seats by winning less than five per cent of the regional vote.
Speaking about next week's election, Mr Farage said: "We're going to be fighting virtually every single seat in Scotland, there are one or two in the Highlands where it's not easy to organise but virtually every single seat in Scotland will be standing... I see the general election in Scotland as a staging post building on winning a seat in the European Parliament, but really getting ready for the Scottish parliamentary elections... winning seats in the Scottish Parliament is a completely realistic objective."
He added: "There is this great myth that Scottish people have a different view on Europe and immigration to British people, I was looking at some polling evidence recently, the margins aren't that great, it's really very interesting that Scottish views are not that different."
In the same program, Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood spoke about her relationship with Nicola Sturgeon.
She said: "I think over time it's developed into what I would now call a friendship, but clearly the political commonalities between us all help to contribute towards that relationship."
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