Nigel Farage triumphs over Nick Clegg in second televised debate. Nigel Farage triumphs over Nick Clegg in second televised debate. / The Guardian.

Even Lib Dem voters thought Farage won the debate against Clegg

Guardian/ICM poll finds 69% of viewers giving victory to the Ukip frontman, while just 31% think that Liberal Democrat leader won

Tom Clark

The Guardian, Wednesday 2 April 2014 / http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/apr/02/poll-farage-clegg-tv-debate

Nick Clegg suffered a resounding defeat in Wednesday's televised Europe debate with Nigel Farage, according to an instant Guardian/ICM poll. Of viewers giving a verdict, 69% said Ukip's frontman had won, with just 31% giving victory to the Liberal Democrat leader.

Viewers also judged, by 49% to 39%, that Nigel Farage came across as having the "more appealing personality". By an emphatic 64% to 30% margin viewers thought he had the better arguments.

Farage was judged the victor with ICM across all age groups and regions, and even among viewers who had been Lib Dem voters in 2010 – only 41% of those who had backed Clegg in the last election thought he came out on top, as against 59% who thought Farage did.

Whereas only 7% of viewers say they are now more likely to vote Lib Dem in next month's Euro election, 38% say the same of Ukip.

Turning to the prospect of an in/out EU referendum, only 16% say their vote would be shifted by what they saw, against 69% who say they had already made up their mind. But overall, 53% of the sample are now inclined towards voting to "leave the EU" against 39% who say they would want to stay in.

After the first of the two Europe debates, an instant YouGov poll judged Farage to have beaten Clegg by 57% to 36% last week (with 6% don't knows). The Lib Dem press office tweeted out complaints that the poll was skewed towards more elderly and middle-class voters, because the sample was not weighted to reflect demographics.

ICM's analysis seeks to assess the effect the debate would have had on Britons as a whole had they all been watching, by adjusting for age, sex and region, as well as recalled vote from the last general election. Yet Clegg's defeat with ICM this week was more emphatic than with YouGov last week. And a fresh YouGov poll mirrored ICM's findings closely – YouGov found 68% judging Farage had performed better, against 27% for Clegg, and 5% unsure.

Voters who continue to back the Lib Dems were the only group who believe that the deputy prime minister won the night – by 58% to 42%. With the Lib Dem/Labour flank regarded as one of the more competitive parts of the political field, Clegg will be particularly dismayed that 57% of existing Labour supporters gave Nigel Farage the night, as against just 43% who called the evening for Clegg.

ICM Research interviewed a random sample of 1,458 adults aged 18+ who had watched the debate on 2 April. Respondents were warned that the survey invitation was coming, and agreed to complete the questionnaire immediately after the debate finished. Interviews were conducted online, and the results have been weighted to the profile of all adults. ICM is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules.

Nigel Farage triumphs over Nick Clegg in second televised debate

Ukip leader judged to have beaten Liberal Democrat opposite number in head-to-head by 69% of those polled

Patrick Wintour, Nicholas Watt and Rowena Mason

The Guardian, Wednesday 2 April 2014 / http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/apr/02/nigel-farage-triumphs-over-nick-clegg-second-debate

Nigel Farage triumphed in the second television debate on Europe by a clear-cut 69% to 31%, an instant poll showed, suggesting that a more emotional but often overscripted Nick Clegg failed to convince viewers that Ukip is selling the British people a "dangerous con" and a "fantasy".

The Guardian/ICM findings after the BBC2 debate were almost exactly matched by a separate YouGov poll for the Sun, showing that in a sometimes brutal debate, with both men accusing the other of lying, it was the Ukip leader who came out ahead by an even bigger margin than a week earlier. Farage scored points as he lashed out at big business and wealthy landowners and warned there will be violence on the streets of Europe if the EU is not dismantled and democracy handed back to nation states. He said his aim was to protect the white working class.

The result as demonstrated by the polls will be a heavy blow not just to Clegg, but also to David Cameron, who will be terrified that the two hour-long TV debates have given Ukip not just massive publicity, but political momentum for the European elections on 22 May.

The YouGov poll gave Farage 68% and Clegg 27%, a big increase on the lead he chalked up last week in the first debate, broadcast on LBC radio and Sky News, which Farage won by 57% to 36%.

Clegg will still hope to benefit from at least being the man willing to fight Ukip populism, but the image of the man that can "Stop Nigel" has been badly dented. The Lib Dem insisted afterwards he could not turn the Eurosceptic tide in the UK in two hours of debate.

But the outcome is also likely to convince Cameron that TV debates in a general election would be highly unpredictable and combustible, and therefore worth avoiding.

Throughout the debate, the two men offered competing visions of what a modern Britain can achieve in or out of Europe, with Clegg trying to portray Farage as a man who shunned the modern world, living in the 19th century.

The Ukip leader accused Clegg of wilfully lying to the British people. He called on voters to join his "people's army" to overthrow the political establishment. "Let's take back control of our country. Let's control our borders and have a proper immigration policy. Let's stop giving away £55m a day as a membership fee to a club that we don't need to be a part of. I would urge people: come and join the people's army. Let's topple the establishment who have led us to this mess."

Farage claimed immigration had led to a cut in real wages of 14% since 2007. "It's good for the rich, because it's cheaper nannies and cheaper chauffeurs and cheaper gardeners, but it's bad news for ordinary Britons." He highlighted a report by the anti-immigration group MigrationWatch that raised the prospect of 130,000 EU immigrants arriving in Britain every year.

He said: "I fear there is going to be a very big migratory wave from the Mediterranean … It [immigration] has left the white working class, effectively, as an underclass and that, I think, is a disaster."

Clegg countered by bringing out an old Ukip leaflet claiming Britons would be reduced to living on a reservation like the Native Americans if the open door to the EU continued.

Farage had been urged by his advisers to appear as an avuncular Ronald Reagan figure, but he became more apocalyptic near the end when he warned that the EU would break up in a violent way if voters across the EU were not given a vote on whether to remain members.

He said: "I want the EU to end but I want it to end democratically. If it doesn't democratically, I am afraid it will end very unpleasantly. We are already, in some countries, beginning to see the rise of worrying political extremism.

"If you take away from people their ability, through the ballot box, to change their futures because they have given away control of everything to somebody else, then I'm afraid they tend to resort to unpleasant means."

Clegg repeatedly accused Farage of wanting to turn the clock back to a simpler, bygone age in which women stayed at home. He said: "I don't believe in the dishonesty in saying to the British people that you can turn the clock back.

"What next? Are you going to say we should return to the gold standard or a pre-decimal currency, or maybe get WG Grace to open the batting for England again? This is the 21st century, it is not the 19th century."

He said Farage's politics would isolate Britain, describing it as a "sort of Billy No Mates Britain – well it will be worse than that, it will be Billy No Jobs Britain, a Billy No Influence Britain".

Before the debate, Farage had caused consternation when he suggested it was likely that the chemical weapons used in the Syrian conflict had been deployed by the Syrian opposition, and not by President Assad, a judgment that conflicts with the view of the UN and almost the entire western political establishment.