There is a new political landscape in Britain and it is a very ugly one: David Cameron back in Downing Street with a majority government and, across the country, a livid purple racist scar.

UKIP has cemented its place as the new third party of British politics. The far right racist populist party has seen a fresh surge, this time in the more difficult terrain of parliamentary elections.

Thankfully, we are spared the sight of Nigel Farage MP. That is the one bright spark, and a credit to Stand Up to UKIP and other campaigners whose huge efforts in Thanet South were reflected in a higher turnout as people used their votes to keep the UKIP leader out.

But UKIP took not far off 4 million votes across the country: 3,881,129 according to the BBC’s final figures. That is 12.6% or one in every eight voters.

Add that to the 36.9% vote for the Tories and the total right wing vote is huge.

And, as local election results come through, it has emerged that UKIP has seized control of its first local authority – Thanet council – taking 33 of its 56 seats.

Now, as with other parts of Europe, frustration and anger at the mainstream parties and their austerity regimes is fuelling the rise of a racist populist party on the far right.

In Scotland, the SNP presented a credible pole of attraction to pull discontented voters to the left of Labour. In England and Wales UKIP has hoovered up the bitter and the betrayed.

UKIP has its MP, with Douglas Carswell holding the seat he won in last year’s Clacton byelection. Although UKIP had hoped for more, that is one up on the 2010 total. Indeed, the seat is the first the party has ever won at a general election.

A more accurate indicator of UKIP’s rise is that it has taken second place in 120 seats – up from precisely none at the last election.

This is a key part of UKIP’s “2020 Strategy” – getting the party lined up as a serious and credible opponent to both Tories and Labour in order to launch a far stronger challenge at the polls in 2020. By then, UKIP believes that the scale of the cuts and economic crisis will deepen the unpopularity of the mainstream parties. UKIP then hopes to capitalise on this.

Farage resigned as UKIP leader after failing to win his seat, but he is the party’s best-known figure, part of its brand, and there is every chance he will be back in charge by the autumn.

UKIP’s second places

We have identified 120 seats where UKIP came second and have compiled the voting figures here – scroll down for our full list.

It is worth noting that our list does not include seats where the party came third – although in a few of these it is a clear threat, as in Thurrock where it took 31.7% of the vote and just two percentage points separate the Conservatives, Labour and UKIP.

In some of its second places, the UKIP vote makes it a relatively close challenger to the winning party, while in others second place is a long way behind a landslide winner.

But these second places allow UKIP to present itself as the main credible opponent to the sitting MPs. A vote for UKIP in these seats no longer seems a wasted protest vote, but a viable means of unseating the discredited purveyors of austerity.

Geographical spread

UKIP has done well across a surprisingly wide geographical spread. The map below shows this clearly, with a noticeable UKIP vote in apparently unlikely areas such as parts of Wales.

There are two huge exceptions: London (aside from its Essex edges) and, of course, Scotland. It is easy to spot the locations of several other multicultural, multiracial cities – like London, they show up as islands of unpopularity on the UKIP map.

Tory shires and Labour heartlands

UKIP has proved that it can make inroads both in traditional Conservative areas and in Labour heartlands too.

It has built on its existing presence in the Tory shires, where over the past couple of years it has gained substantial numbers of councillors at the local elections.

But Farage and UKIP deputy leader Paul Nuttall have also made great play of the party’s increasing popularity in northern, traditionally Labour constituencies – and the general election vote reflects this.

The table below shows UKIP’s top 20 second place results, coloured red or blue according to whether the seat was won by Labour or the Tories – there is an equal 10-10 split. (The full table of second places is at the end of this post.)

UKIP’s top 20 second places, by percentage of vote, compiled by Dream Deferred

Constituency	% vote	number of votes
Boston and Skegness	33.8	14,645
Thanet South	32.4	16,026
Heywood and Middleton	32.2	15,627
Castlepoint	31.2	14,178
Rochester and Strood	30.5	16,009
Rotherham	30.2	11,413
Dagenham and Rainham	29.8	12,850
Rother Valley	28.1	13,204
Hartlepool	28	11,052
Basildon South and Thurrock East	26.5	12,097
Thanet North	25.7	12,097
Hornchurch and Upminster	25.3	13,977
West Bromich West	25.2	8,836
Wentworth and Dearne	24.9	10,733
Sittingbourne and Sheppey	24.8	12,257
Doncaster Central	24.1	9,747
Bolton South East	23.6	9,627
Barnsley East	23.5	9045
Cambridgeshire North East	23.5	11,605
Norfolk South West	23.3	11,654

Where UKIP gets its vote

It is important to note that UKIP’s vote is not coming mainly from Labour voters, although it has won these in some areas: Farage took votes from Labour as well as the Tories and the Lib Dems in Thanet South, for example. But Labour’s vote went up slightly overall, despite its wipeout in Scotland.

The maps below show where UKIP has gained support (from any other party), with the length of the arrow corresponding to percentage points, and where Labour has lost support (to any other party). UKIP’s gains in support are spread far beyond Labour’s losses, which are mainly to the SNP in Scotland.

And a look at the Labour seats where UKIP is now second shows that in many Labour’s vote has gone up. That is important because it means that there is a solid core of Labour voters who reject UKIP as a racist rightwing party.

But it is UKIP that has benefited most from the suicide of the Lib Dems, whose collapse following their coalition with the Tories would otherwise have been much more enjoyable.

UKIP is now the repository for the votes of the “working class Tories” who have always existed even in Labour heartlands, and the populist party is the new home for many of the voters disaffected by both the two main parties, who previously opted for the Lib Dems.

Labour’s disaster – and its shame – is that after five years of Conservative-led austerity government it has done so little to grab the Lib Dems’ votes for itself or to pull away voters from the Tories.

Racism

And – key to its appeal in a climate of austerity – UKIP is a racist party, building on scapegoating of immigrants and Islamophobia just as far right racist populist parties and outright fascists have done across Europe.

Through the election campaign Farage ratcheted up his racist rhetoric, culminating in claims that EU moves to address the migrant boat crisis in the Mediterranean “could lead to half a million Islamic extremists coming to our countries and posing a direct threat to our civilisation”.

It should not be forgotten either that the fascist British National Party – now collapsed – had its electoral base in Yorkshire and Lancashire. The English Defence League’s fascist and racist street thugs focused on these areas in their turn. These are areas where Farage now trumpets UKIP’s successes as the new challenger to Labour.

There is no doubt that UKIP has scooped up the votes of those who backed the BNP at the last election – this has given it a useful base of five percent or so on which to build in a number of constituencies.

Last October, we looked at the Clacton and Heywood byelection results – when UKIP won the seat it has now held, and came within 600 votes of taking a second – and at how UKIP had made headway in formerly solid Labour towns like Doncaster. At the time, we said this:

The grim byelection results bring home again how far UKIP has come, and that socialists and anti-racists can’t afford to duck the arguments. UKIP’s stockbrokers and public schoolboys are not just targeting the better-off types in the leafy Tory shires – they want our people too.

And as we can see with the growth of racist populism – along with outright fascist parties – across Europe, UKIP is not merely a party of purple clowns. It is a real threat.

That is more true now. We will need to resist the attacks we know will come from David Cameron’s new government. But we also need to argue, over and over again, against the racist scapegoating of immigrants that fuels UKIP.

Full table of UKIP’s second places, compiled by Dream Deferred

Constituency	% vote	number of votes
Aberavon	15.8	4,971
Arundel and South Downs	14.4	8,154
Ashford	18.8	10,798
Aylesbury	19.7	10,925
Barking	22.2	9,554
Barnsley Central	21.7	7941
Barnsley East	23.5	9045
Basildon South and Thurrock East	26.5	12,097
Beaconsfield	13.8	7,310
Bexhill and Battle	18.4	10,170
Blackley and Broughton	16.5	6,108
Blaenau Gwent	17.9	5,677
Blaydon	17.5	7,863
Blyth Valley	22.3	8,584
Bognor Regis and Littlehampton	21.7	10,241
Bolton South East	23.6	9,627
Bootle	10.9	4,915
Boston and Skegness	33.8	14,645
Bournemouth West	18.5	7,745
Braintree	18.8	9,461
Brentwood and Ongar	16.8	8,724
Bridgewater and Somerset West	19.2	10,437
Broxbourne	19.7	9,074
Buckingham	21.7	11,675
Caerphilly	19.3	7,791
Cambridgeshire North East	23.5	11,605
Cambridgeshire North West	20.1	12,275
Castlepoint	31.2	14,178
Chesham and Amersham	13.7	7,218
Chichester	14.9	8,540
Christchurch	21.4	10,663
Clacton (1st)	44.4	19,642
Dagenham and Rainham	29.8	12,850
Devizes	15.4	7,544
Devon Central	13.2	7,171
Devon West and Torridge	18.3	10,371
Doncaster Central	24.1	9,747
Doncaster North	22.6	8,928
Dorset North	17.1	9,109
Easington	18.7	6,491
Epping Forest	18.3	9,049
Fareham	15.4	8,427
Faversham and Mid Kent	18	8,243
Folkeston and Hythe	22.8	12,526
Gateshead	17.8	6,765
Gosport	19.4	9,266
Grantham and Stamford	17.5	9,410
Hampshire East	12	6,187
Hampshire North West	14.7	8,109
Hartlepool	28	11,052
Havant	20.6	9,239
Hereford and Herefordshire South	16.8	7,954
Herefordshire North	14	6,720
Heywood and Middleton	32.2	15,627
Horsham	14	7,969
Houghton and Sunderland South	21.5	8,280
Hornchurch and Upminster	25.3	13,977
Hull East	22.4	7,861
Hull North	16.3	5,762
Hull West and Hessle	19.9	6,313
Isle of Wight	21.2	14,888
Islwyn	19.6	6,932
Jarrow	19.7	7,583
Knowsley	9.8	4,973
Louth and Horncastle	21.4	10,778
Liverpool Walton	9	3,445
Liverpool West Derby	8.5	3,475
Ludlow	14.9	7,164
Makerfield	22.4	10.053
Maldon	14.7	7,042
Meon Valley	14.8	7,665
Merthyr Tydfil	18.7	6,106
Middlesbourough	18.7	6,107
New Forest East	17.5	8,657
New Forest West	16.5	7,816
Norfolk Mid	19	9,930
Norfolk South West	23.3	11,654
Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford	21.3	9,785
Oldham West and Royton	20.6	8,892
Orpington	16.7	8,173
Poole	16.8	7,956
Rayleigh and Wickford	22.3	11,858
Reigate	13.3	6,817
Richmond (Yorks)	15.2	8,194
Rochdale	18.8	8,519
Rochester and Strood	30.5	16,009
Romford	22.8	11,208
Rother Valley	28.1	13,204
Rotherham	30.2	11,413
Rutland and Melton	15.9	8,678
Saffron Waldon	13.8	7,935
Sevenoaks	17.9	8,970
Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough	22.1	8,856
Sheffield Heeley	17.4	7315
Sheffield South East	21.9	9128
Sittingbourne and Sheppey	24.8	12,257
South Holland and the Deepings	21.8	10,736
South Shields	22	7,975
Spelthorne	20.9	10,234
Stoke on Trent Central	22.6	7,041
Stratford-on-Avon	13.2	6,798
Suffolk West	21.7	10,700
Surrey East	17	9,553
Surrey Heath	14.3	7,778
Surrey South West	9.9	5,643
Swansea East	17.2	5,779
Thanet North	25.7	12,097
Thanet South	32.4	16,026
Tiverton and Honiton	16.5	8,857
Tonbridge and Malling	15.2	8,153
Uxbridge and South Ruislip	14.2	6,346
Washington and Sunderland West	19.6	7,321
Wealden	16.7	9,541
Wellingborough	19.6	9,868
Wentworth and Dearne	24.9	10,733
West Bromich West	25.2	8,836
Wiltshire South West	17.5	9,030
Witham	16	7,569
Worcestershire Mid	17.7	9,231
Worcestershire West	14.4	7,764
Worthing West	18.3	9,269