Editorial: The protest vote

TWO big elections next year which could see the rise of two political parties. Spain is holding local elections and it is more than likely that the left-leaning protest party, Podemos, will score some notable successes. In Britain it is general election time and as we have seen, the United Kingdom Independence Party are on the rise. The only similarity between UKIP and Podemos is that they are both protest parties. And that is it. Podemos leans to the left and was born from the protest movement during the Spanish recession. So have the mainstream parties lost touch with voters in Spain and Britain? Well yes obviously. But what will be interesting to see is whether the public will stick with Podemos and UKIP in elections that really matter.  I suspect that they will give the political classes in both Britain and Spain a scare but I doubt that it wil be a big scare. You see voting for these two parties on a big election day is a vote for the unknown and in  these hard times sometimes it is better to vote safe.