'No-one represents betrayed Brexiteers' Ukip attacked for accepting transition period
A LEADING professor has hit out at the "mixed messages" of the Ukip conference as he urged the party to listen to the "betrayed Brexiteers" who have been left behind by the political class.
Professor: UKIP should appeal to BOTH sides of Brexit
Matthew Goodwin, who teaches at the University of Kent, hit out at Ukip's new leader for suggesting a transition deal with the EU was needed to avoid a "car crash".
Speaking to Niall Paterson on Sky News, the politics professor said this policy shift would relegate Ukip to the books of history.
He told Paterson there was a massive proportion of the British population who have felt left behind by the "betrayal of Brexit" led by the British political class.
Goodwin, who teaches at the University of Kent, hit out at Ukip's new leader
Henry Bolton was elected Ukip leader in a shock result
Henry Bolton, who was elected Ukip leader yesterday in a shock result, earlier told Sky News that a Brexit transition deal was necessary to "avoid a car crash at the border".
Both Labour and Conservatives have recently diluted their Brexit plans by accepting the inevitability of a transition period of around two years after 2019.
Mr Goodwin said this middle-ground mainstream policy went against the radical, populist wave that triggered the rise of Nigel Farage.
He said: "Ukip have been unable to come up with a defining, uniting message for a post-Brexit Britain.
"One in three of their voters did not turn out at the election in June, they effectively stayed at home.
"If they accept a transition period, that will be the end of them. Small amateur radical political parties need to be populist."
The politics professor said this policy shift would relegate Ukip to the books of history
The professor hit out at the "mixed messages" of the Ukip conference
There is space for a party that wants to leave the EU immediately, that wants much lower migration, and wants to stop freedom of movement
The professor explained: "There is space for a party that wants to leave the EU immediately, that wants much lower migration, and wants to stop freedom of movement.
"A good 15 per cent or so of the electorate want that, and no-one represents those positions at the moment.
"Ukip could sweep up those voters and became the Brexit betrayal party, and put forward a Brexit that Theresa May has ignored."
Mr Goodwin also urged the right-wing party to imitate Jeremy Corbyn's success from speaking to "Britons who are left behind by globalisation".