Friday 5 November 2010

Nigel Farage re-elected as leader of UKIP

Nigel Farage has been re-elected as leader of the UK Independence Party. Mr Farage, who led UKIP from 2006 to 2009, took just over 60% of votes in a ballot of party members. He beat fellow MEP David Campbell-Bannerman, economist Tim Congdon and former boxer Winston McKenzie. He will take over from Lord Pearson of Rannoch, who stood down after only nine months in the job.

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The leader of the party in the European Parliament, Mr Farage was injured in a light aircraft crash on 6 May - the day of the general election. He then failed in his attempt to get elected to Westminster in the seat of the Commons Speaker John Bercow. All 18,000 members of UKIP had a vote in the postal ballot.

The party has long campaigned for the UK to pull out of the European Union, but failed to make its hoped-for breakthrough in May's election. However, its share of the vote did increase by nearly 1% as it polled more than 919,000 votes.