Off the wire
• 34th world congress of art history opens in Beijing  • Russia cuts its key interest rate amid sustained inflation drop  • Six officials punished after woman kills her four children in NW China  • Kenya pledges to phase out ozone depleting substances  • 22 pieces of debris possible part of MH370 found so far  • Islamic schools in southernmost Thailand under probe for alleged links with Turkish terrorist group  • Ukraine gov't foresees 3-pct growth in 2017 draft budget  • South Sudanese refugees across region pass one mln mark: UNHCR  • Over 1 mln South Sudanese forced to flee their homes: UNHCR  • CIS summit to adopt statement on countering terrorism  
You are here: 　 Home

UKIP names new leader to succeed Nigel Farage

Xinhua, September 16, 2016 Adjust font size:

The political party set up to campaign for Britain to leave the European Union elected a new leader Friday to succeed Nigel Farage.

The United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), now regarded as the country's third political party after the Conservatives and Labor, was a key player in the recent referendum, has chosen Diane James as its new leader.

James, a 56-year-old businesswoman, came a close second to the Liberal Democrats in 2013 parliamentary Eastleigh by-election.

Now an MEP for South East England, she has been the party's deputy chairwoman as well as its home affairs and justice spokesperson.

In her first speech as leader James said: "We are the political change movement in the United Kingdom."

She promised to steer the party into a winning machine, saying the referendum result was "a just heat in a running competition."

"The ink on the document is not dry and we still have to follow what Europe says," James told the conference.

She said she will campaign for UKIP to be battle ready for the next general election, due in 2020, convincing the population that UKIP was a political force that would deliver its promises.

She listed her shopping list, saying UKIP wanted a true 100 percent European exit and a sovereign independent Britain. She said UKIP also wanted Britain to be free to trade with whoever it chose and whenever it wanted to.

James said she also wanted to see an immigration policy that enabled people to come to Britain, irrespective of origin, if they had the skills and social values Britain needed.

In a message directed at Prime Minister Theresa May, James described UKIP as the "next opposition party in waiting."

Before the leadership election result was announced, Farage gave a rousing speech to the conference in Bournemouth.

"Without us there would have been no referendum," he said, adding: "together we have changed the course of history. We brought down a prime minister, we got rid of the chancellor and we got rid of a European commissioner."

He said he feared that with the main Labor opposition party "in a mess," and with the Conservatives "heading for an easy general election in 2020," there may be a temptation for Theresa May to go for a "soft Brexit".

"We won the war, now we have to win the peace," said Farage.

UKIP was formed in 1993, but still only has one MP in the House of Commons. It has 22 MEPs sitting in the European Parliament and more than 400 local councilors. Endit