UKIP’s Patrick O’Flynn has quits his party over Gerard Batten’s embrace of Tommy Robinson… and joined the rump SDP. Former Political Editor of the Daily Express, O’Flynn was quite a coup for Farage’s UKIP when he joined the party in 2014. He now becomes the third elected official of the party, as it already has two town councillors. Will the last MEP to leave UKIP please turn out the lights…

Brexodus: UKIP have now lost 10 of the 24 MEPs elected in 2014… Jonathan Arnott, Janice Atkinson, Amjad Bashir, James Carver, William Dartmouth, Roger Helmer, Bill Etheridge, Diane James, Patrick O’Flynn, and Steven Woolfe.

UPDATE: Guido has been reminded of what O’Flynn said in interview with BrexitCentral in February 2017…

“He [Farage] seems to be worried people like me are crypto-SDP [supporters] and he couldn’t be more wrong. But we want to be a mainstream party, that’s how you win elections.”

It seems as if Farage was right after all..!

h/t: David Scullion

UPDATE II: The SDP have been in touch to tell Guido they are “delighted” by this defection and that today is “a great day for social democracy.”

“The SDP is delighted that Patrick O’Flynn MEP has joined the party. It’s a great day for the resurgent SDP and a great day for social democracy. We believe that millions of British people will support the communitarian approach to politics in our New Declaration.”

“Our aim is to provide a political home to all social democrats who seek a stronger more capable state along with greater individual responsibility, trust and social solidarity. We have consistently supported the nation-state as the upper limit – and the defining unit – of democracy. The SDP believes the 2016 referendum vote must be respected.”