Nigel Farage will lose when mainstream parties level with the public, believes Anthony Painter

We face a complex set of national challenges. We have an enormous national debt. We are heading towards a position where we spend more on interest than education. We have an ageing society. That means we need to pay for pensions, social care, and the NHS. Wages are stagnant. We have a carbon-intensive economy which will have accumulating consequences for our habitat. We have an unsound housing market that needs replenishing with housing in all categories. These are big structural challenges.

The solutions to these challenges require strong collective action over time. That tests any democratic society. It needs a focus on innovation, productivity and growth. That comes from science, entrepreneurship, an open economy – all the components of creative destruction. It means building millions of new homes and not just in urban areas – green field and even green belt will also have to be part of the solution. New support for people on lower and stagnating wages will be needed. It means retaining our place within the European Union and opening out our economy. That does not just include openness to trade and investment but to people of varying talents. Unless we are an open economy and society, we are not going to be able to service the debt, pay the pensions, support the NHS, and pay for the social care.

Labour, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats broadly agree on both the analysis of the problem and proposed strategic imperatives while disagreeing on how to get there. Labour would be more interventionist and more focused on distribution than the other two but there is basic agreement. The United Kingdom Independence party, on the other hand, disagrees with much of the analysis of the problem and certainly disagrees when it comes to proposed solutions.

What is more, the two positions – looking forward versus looking back – are polarising. There is not a halfway house between ‘face the future’ and ‘cling to the past.’ There is no compromise between ‘trust the body politic’ and ‘elbow it into the English Channel.’ There are only two strategies that work in polarised politics: capitulation or confrontation.

Despite its strong performance in the local and European elections the questions about whether Ukip will hold on to its support next May or go up in a puff of smoke really miss the point. The challenges exist beyond politics. What is more, if Ukip vanished tomorrow then the fundamental social and cultural divides that afflict the United Kingdom and other western societies would still remain. Anyone who has looked at any data on social or political attitudes in the last few years without party-coloured spectacles on can see these divisions laid bare. Divisions exist within party support, between parties, and outside of mainstream politics. There is a shadow political system of social and cultural anxiety. This shadow politics is what Ukip is successfully tapping into. If it did not then either someone else would or the numbers walking away from democratic politics altogether would increase.

The reality is that most people sit neither in the ‘face the future’ nor the ‘cling to the past’ camps. They are pragmatically poised in between. They are open to persuasion. It is this pragmatic centre – economically anxious and culturally concerned – that holds the future of our society. At the moment, they are just about sticking with the mainstream parties despite concerns. However, unless the mainstream parties start to confront people with the real choices we face as a society, they could start to drift towards alienation and populism.

The simple fact is that Nigel Farage has nothing to offer Britain. He makes his political trade by provoking hate and turning people against one another. He peddles simplicities that will leave the country in a desperate situation. He preys on people’s fears and indulges their negative emotions. He flirts with racial prejudice in a despicable fashion. In all this, he is absolutely in the same family as Geert Wilders, Marine Le Pen, and Jorg Haider before him. While the truth of what Farage is and how he operates should never be ducked, it is not in itself the means of defeating far-right populism.

Mainstream politics is at its best when it confronts hard realities instead of aping populism. The way to defeat the populists (and there are some leftwing as well as rightwing populists, though far less numerous) is to pose hard questions. Yes, we can leave the EU. But then we are sending a clear signal that Britain is disengaging from the world’s most prosperous single market and that will harm us over time. Yes, we can close or severely restrict our borders. But then our national debt, pensions and social and health care system become unaffordable and unsustainable. Yes, we can refuse to reduce our dependency on carbon. But then we are locked in to a global resources war, increasing oil prices, and to widespread misery through environmental disaster. Yes, we can try to stop economic development because it has losers as well as winners. But then we have an economy that is stagnant and a society that is unsustainable. And, yes, we can protect every blade of grass. But then the housing-driven social and economic divide and economic instability that comes with it will remain permanent features of an increasingly unjust society.

Human beings are frail. We often want contradictory things. We want to indulge now and still maintain our health in the future. We want to spend our cash now yet still have savings in the long term. We want everything to remain the same yet, to secure what we want and need, so much has to change. It is through politics that we can negotiate between the present and future. It is by working through our problems that we can find a way of compromising so we can get more of what we desire and need, not just now but into the future. That means there are things we will have to compromise on. Sometimes ‘common sense’ just is not enough.

When that is the case, the worst thing that mainstream politicians can do is pretend there are not big choices and there are not consequences. That is playing the populists’ game. It is a game that gives them a chance to create a political foundation; it is a chance they should be denied.

So the question about what happens to Ukip is not really in its gift at all. It is in the gift of mainstream politicians. It is they who have the opportunity to be honest about the collective challenges we face. It is the mainstream that has the opportunity to level with the electorate. The defeat of Ukip and all it represents is down to honesty, leadership and conviction. If all that is offered by the mainstream is ‘populism-lite’ then that is when Ukip will prosper.

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Anthony Painter is a contributing editor to Progress and author of Left Without a Future? Social Justice in Anxious Times

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Photo: Derek Bennett