Dr Alan Sked is a lecturer in European Studies at the London School of Economics. Sked studied History at Oxford. One of his professors at Oxford was A. J. P. Taylor, who was an major influence on Sked. In particular, Sked's writings on Austria-Hungary owe much to Taylor.

He was the founder in 1991 of the Anti-Federalist League, an anti-EU pressure group in the United Kingdom, and the founder leader in 1993 of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP). He resigned the leadership shortly after UKIP failed to make any impact in the 1997 general election, saying that the party was "doomed to remain on the political fringes," and that it was taking too much time away from his academic career.

Sked later joined the Conservative Party. Shortly before each subsequent national election (1999, 2001 and 2004) he published articles accusing UKIP of extremism and incompetence. A few days before the 2004 election to the European Parliament, in which UKIP increased their representation from three to twelve seats, he criticised his former party in a national newspaper, saying, "they are racist and have been infected by the far-right."¹ He also went on record saying, "UKIP is even less liberal than the BNP. Certainly, there is a symbiosis between elements of the parties,"² and, "UKIP’s MEPs are a standing joke at Strasbourg, where their attendance record, even by the standards of most MEPs, is relatively poor and where, according to independent research by the European Studies centre at the London School of Economics, the three often vote in different ways on the same issue."²

References

1. The People (Jun. 6, 2004)
2. Sunday Telegraph (May 30, 2004)