Labour must wake up to the UKIP threat

With UKIP’s electoral successes in Clacton hitting the headlines, Labour have been quick to distance themselves from the impact of the result with Douglas Alexander claiming it is coalition supporting defectors switching to UKIP.

But if you look at the percentage share of the vote results for an imaginary combined Clacton, Heywood and Middleton constituency, the result is clearly a poor one for all three political parties and should be sounding warning bells for Ed Miliband’s “core vote strategy.”

Raw data for both this post and that on UKIP’s election success mirage is here.