The polls with a pinch of salt

It’s worth putting the latest ones into perspective.

Good luck to Daniel Critchlow, the 26-year-old vicar picked to fight Wythenshawe and Sale East

With the Lib Dem vote facing a squeeze and UKIP planning to target Labour voters, it’s all to play for.

WATCH: Nigel Farage delivers the UKIP weather forecast

‘Twas the UKIP leader’s light-hearted attempt to turn the political weather in his favour, after a difficult week.

Could Patrick O’Flynn, iconoclastic journalist turned political spinner, be UKIP’s next leader?

The party is trying to professionalise while retaining its insurgent appeal. We take a look at the man tasked with the job.

UKIP Week: What makes councillors defect to it?

Usually the defection of councillors to UKIP has nothing much to do with policy

WATCH: Andrew Neil skewers Nigel Farage with UKIP’s own policy proposals

Farage: “I’m not sure where you got that from.” Neil: “From your website.”

UKIP Week: In Kent the purple peril could be strong if UKIP had a coherent message

The Council Tax rise in Kent gives UKIP an important opportunity – yet they seem much too inept to seize it.

Henry Hill: Ian Paisley claims to have been ‘forced out’ as First Minister by the DUP

Also: Police find ‘no evidence of criminality’ in Unite’s Falkirk emails; Ian S Smart sees Tory chance in SNP weakness; and Wales could lose £7m to English universities.

UKIP Week: Bitter divisions in Lincolnshire

UKIP councillors in Lincolnshire don’t seem interested in policy but personal recriminations

How will UKIP perform in the Council Elections?

It seems quite likely that UKIP will win the Euro Elections yet not take control of a single one of the councils holding elections the same day.

In Norfolk UKIP are keeping Labour and the Lib Dems in power

Anyone in Norfolk who voted for UKIP because they believed the Party was about lower Council Tax must be disappointed.

Sunder Katwala: The national mood for 2014? Keep calm and muddle on.

Tories are cheerful, socialists gloomy, the Scots expect to vote No…and UKIP supporters expect England to be knocked out in the first round of the World Cup.

WATCH: Should UKIP be involved in the 2015 television debates?

The question was debated on today’s Daily Politics. The Tories’ Tim Loughton replied that he’s quite relaxed about the possibility.

Toby Young: How a tactical alliance between UKIP and the Tories could work

The author replies to Paul Goodman, arguing that the CountryB4Party campaign is practicable.

Toby Young’s Tories Before UKIP plan

In nearly every constituency, if not all of them, the best way to keep Labour out is to vote Conservative.