Britain's anti-EU and anti-immigration UK Independence Party (UKIP) has surged in local council elections at the
expense of the three main parties including Prime Minister David Cameron's.
UKIP leader Nigel Farage said party would now be "serious players" in European parliament elections, which were also
held yesterday alongside the council polls, and in the May 2015 general election.
Despite his party having no seats in the national parliament, the beer-swilling, chain-smoking Farage who is accused
of being a racist and fuelling inter-racial tension, has led UKIP from the margins to claim a major place in the
country's national debate on its place in the European Union.
"The UKIP fox is in the Westminster hen house," Farage said as the first results came through this morning.
In results counted so far, UKIP had gained 89 council seats, while the main opposition Labour party led by Ed
Miliband also did well, gaining 106 seats.
Cameron's Conservatives lost 97 seats while the Liberal Democrats of Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg lost 103.
UKIP is hoping to dramatically increase its tally of nine members of the European parliament when results are
announced across the EU on Sunday night.
Farage's party has shrugged off accusations of racism to strike a chord with a British electorate that widely views
the EU as a meddlesome bureaucracy and fears that immigration from the 28-nation bloc is threatening jobs.
Cameron has promised an in-out referendum on Britain's EU membership in late 2017 largely to see off the perceived
threat of UKIP on the right.
Today's results are a far cry from the 2010 British general election when Farage, a former commodities trader, was
principally famous because he was injured in the crash of a plane that was towing one of the party's election
banners.
