UK election: Nigel Farage Wins Seat In Clacton

Transcript

00:00I therefore do hereby declare that Nigel Paul Farage is duly elected as the Member of Parliament

00:07for the Clacton constituency.

00:18And the turnout was 59.23%.

00:22Thank you very much.

00:24Well, Mr. Returning Officer, all here at Tendring, and I have to say, fellow candidates, it's

00:30been a well-run, well-fought, and remarkably clean election battle.

00:34I think we'd all agree on that, and thank you for your services.

00:38I promise that I will do my absolute best as a Member of Parliament.

00:44I had 20 years as an MEP, but it's not quite the same link or same responsibility with

00:49constituents.

00:50I will do my absolute best to put Clacton on the map, I'll do my best to bring more

00:55tourists, I'll do my best to try and bring some private investment.

01:00It's over 30 years ago that I fought my first parliamentary by-election, and I've fought

01:06lots of them over the years, and I've had big successes in European elections, and perhaps

01:11less so under first-past-the-post, which is a very demanding, very, very demanding problem

01:17for smaller parties.

01:18I will say this.

01:19It's four weeks and three days since I decided to come out of retirement and throw my hat

01:24in the ring.

01:25I think what Reform UK has achieved in those just few short weeks is truly extraordinary.

01:32Given that we had no money, no branch structure, virtually nothing across the country, we are

01:39going to come second in hundreds of constituencies.

01:43How many seats we're going to win, I don't know.

01:45But to have done this in such a short space of time says something very fundamental is

01:51happening.

01:52It's not just disappointment with the Conservative Party.

01:54There is a massive gap on the centre-right of British politics, and my job is to fill

02:00it, and that's exactly what I'm going to do.

02:03But it's not just what we do in Parliament as a national party that matters, it's what

02:07we do out round the country.

02:09Getting 5,000 people in that room in Birmingham last week, the energy, the optimism, the enthusiasm,

02:15the belief that Westminster is just completely out of touch with ordinary people says to

02:21me that my plan is to build a mass national movement over the course of the next few years,

02:27and hopefully be big enough to challenge the general election properly in 2029.

02:34What is interesting is there's no enthusiasm for Labour, there's no enthusiasm for Starmer

02:40whatsoever.

02:42In fact, about half of the vote is simply an anti-Conservative vote.

02:46This Labour government will be in trouble very, very quickly.