“Clear your desk!” Farage tells Alex Salmond after Euro election triumph

From The Daily Mail:

Nigel Farage is preparing to replace Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond with his UKIP MEP David Coburn following his historic fourth place in European elections.

The UKIP leader has asked the SNP leader to “clear his desk” to make way for his victorious candidate, to the horror of the established Better Together allies.

Mr Farage was yesterday basking in the glory of winning one-third as many votes north of the Border as Alex Salmond’s SNP, which retained both of its MEPs on a largely unchanged share of the overall vote.

David Coburn, UKIP’s victorious candidate in Scotland, yesterday called for the First Minister’s resignation, as Labour accused the SNP of foolishly delivering a boost for Mr Farage. In a stinging attack, Labour's Scottish leader Johann Lamont said: 'Scotland now has three nationalist MEPs.'

After winning more than one-tenth of the votes cast on a one-third turnout, Mr Farage is now planning repeat visits Scotland in the run-up to September’s referendum as he feels there are plenty of pubs in the country which have not yet served as backdrop for a photo opportunity.

He told the Mail: “With the appointment of David Coburn as First Minister [in Scotland], we will have not just put a fox into Westminster’s henhouse, we have put a pine marten onto the Holyrood throne.

"Apart from Labour and the Conservatives, we are the only truly national political party, and apart from the SNP – who have never campaigned outside Scotland, for obvious reasons - and the aforementioned Labour and Conservative parties, we obtained the largest vote share in Scotland in these elections, which proves that there is a voice for those who believe in an independent Scotland as part of the UK.

“Alex Salmond now finally has to deal honestly and openly with handing over the keys to his office and explaining to our man how to use the photocopier, how to get his expense claims authorised and all that day-to-day bureaucratic crap.

“They know it, we know it, and now we can see the Scottish people know it as well.”

Mr Salmond was rather bemused by these events, pointing out that "...the Lib Dems lost an MEP and UKIP gained an MEP. Both these parties are campaigning against Scottish independence so what difference does it make to anything?"