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How can the Tories end their family feud with Ukip?
Insulting Nigel Farage won't work, but David Cameron shouldn't impersonate him either.
David Cameron gave a hint, never properly fleshed out, during an interview this week that
one of his close relatives is a supporter of the UK Independence party.
The remark was seized on by political chatterers, delighted by the prospect of a prime ministerial
version of an earlier story involving Priti Patel, a Conservative MP whose father was a Ukip candidate
in Hertfordshire - until he appeared to withdraw, presumably under some heavy filial pressure
, before unwithdrawing 90 minutes later. Both stories struck a chord because they spoke to a larger
truth about the Ukip phenomenon: that this is a family feud on the right, a split in the conservative
clan that could prove lethal for their shared cause.
At the very least, Ukip's success when the votes were counted yesterday - bagging more than a
quarter of ballots cast and winning 139 councillors, to go with a silver medal in the South Shields
byelection, where they pushed the Tories into third place - has brought into the open what has
been an internal Conservative argument since 2005.
