Poor Nigel Farage was ‘egged’ yesterday in Nottingham. Poor man had a life and death experience with a chicken embryo and the embryo won as Nigel, having just got out of his car, jumped straight back in and was driven off. To the pub. Of course to the pub. Where else does he ever go? Four pints and half a pack of fags later he was restored to the cool, confident, slightly pissed, fag-smelling Nigel we all love.

Though this is ‘new Nigel’, this is ‘Nigel the bottler’. Who decided for numerous reasons, all of them good, viable, credible and solid, that he would NOT stand for the parliamentary seat of Newark, so recently vacated by Patrick Mercer, tory scumbag, slimeball and racist. The man who took money for asking questions in parliament. Then ‘manned up’ and ‘apologised’ and told of his ‘shame’ and ‘disgrace’ when resigning as a MP. One has to wonder if he’d have been quite so manly if he hadn’t been caught.

So Nigel is presented with his golden opportunity; a parliamentary seat to contest. The chance for his tin-pot party to actually have a member of parliament. Ahhh, but it will detract from UKIP’s high expectations in the European elections. And remember, European seats are really important for the future funding of their political party by fleecing money out of the endless cash-cow that is ‘Brussels expense accounts’, even though its against the rules.

But the real reason Nigel ‘bottled it’ and decided not to stand in Newark is because he couldn’t win. And Nigel, though many things to many men (most of them offensive or ignorant or just plain drunk) is not stupid. So he’d rather leave fighting the parliamentary seat to one of his colleagues in the party.

And that’s where the problem lies.

We live in the age of the sound byte. We adore ‘personalities’ and ‘celebrities’ and ‘characters’. And UKIP possess just one of those. Just one. Nigel. How many other UKIP members can you name? Errrrr, well there’s errrrr… that bloke who blamed the floods on God’s wrath and punishment for making gay marriage legal. There’s the one- sorry, the seven, who used to be part of the BNP, there’s that woman who no-one listens to and is just a puppet so they look more like a normal political party, or there’s that bloke with the swastika tattooed on his face, you know, the one who’s not a racist but supports West Ham anyway.

I can’t name one other UKIP member. So for most of the country, UKIP IS Nigel Farage. And if he doesn’t stand for parliamentary seats, then his sorry band of Daily Mail devotees won’t win seats. Which is good news for the rest of us. Good news for those who aren’t xenophobic, misogynistic, racist, chauvinist or just pissed. And for egg-throwers in general.

Happy Friday

A xxxx