Paul Nuttall claims it ‘doesn’t really matter’ how many MPs Ukip gets as party slumps in the polls

Ukip leader determined to play up party’s future

Paul Nuttall said as 'Brexit backslides' the Ukip party will 'flourish' (ITV)

Ukip leader Paul Nuttall said it "doesn’t really matter how many MPs" Ukip has in an attempt big up the party’s future in the face of declining support in the polls.

Mr Nuttall was asked on the Andrew Marr show how his party could act as the “guard dogs” of Brexit it if has no MPs.

He responded: "It doesn't really matter how many MPs that you have.

"If you think back to 2013, we forced the then British prime minister David Cameron in to offering a referendum he never wanted to give. We didn't have an MP at that time.

"What Ukip needs to do is it needs to be electorally viable, going up in the polls, needs to be doing well in local elections and I predict after this election Ukip will go up substantially and we will do very well indeed."

A recent poll showed Ukip support had slipped to just 2 per cent.

He said his party was “still strong” in areas where it claimed voters before, such as Clacton in Essex and Dagenham in East London.

But as voters flock to the Tories, the anti-Europe party faces the prospect of having no MPs in the House of Commons.

Douglas Carswell was Ukip’s first elected MP in 2014 after he defected from the Conservatives and won his seat in Clacton.

He announced earlier this year that he would sit as an independent, leaving Ukip without an MP.

Mr Carswell said he would vote Conservative on 8 June and would not stand for the General Election.

The party still has around 350 councillors across the UK.

Mr Nuttall’s party wishes to cut foreign aid and reduce net migration to zero, by having the same number of people leaving the country as those coming into the UK over a five-year rolling period.

He is an advocate for the Australian-style points based system with preference given to skilled workers.

Asked if his system would prevent, say, a Bangladeshi family's wish to reunite in the UK, he replied: “No, that will be tapered into our immigration policy.

“We've got our manifesto launching on Wednesday and all of this will be ironed out and you can come back and interview me on that issue in a couple of weeks.”