A new survey of social attitudes out earlier today has revealed that Torquay has turned into the Hate Capital of the UK overnight after groups of xenophobic, racist and ultra-right wing political activists gathered in the Devon resort.

Whilst Torquay is bracing itself for a short-term, but crippling, shortage of catering and hospitality staff as many of the immigrant and ethnic minority staff decline shifts during the UKIP conference period, other towns and cities across the country are breathing a sigh of relief and looking forward to a weekend free of having badly written letters deploring the state of UK and pamphlets with made-up statistics pushed through their doors.

Local Café owner and entrepreneur Sajid Kahn told us that it was just easier to shut-up and leave town for the weekend. “My Grandparents came over in the 60’s and I’m as British as can be.” he told us “But you try explaining that to someone with an I.Q of 50 who thinks that being British means you should have the skin colour of raw pastry. It’s just not worth the bother.”

UKIP appear determined to use this year’s conference to make themselves appear relevant to the political world despite falling membership numbers and an increasing inability to find anyone with even a vague veneer of respectability and common human decency to lead them. However, publicity hungry UKIP activists may find themselves verging on mental breakdown as they try to juggle the desire for mainstream press coverage with the very real need to hide much of what is said during the conference from the general public. A UKIP spokesman revealed in an interview “UKIP is a party of people who feel strongly that anything foreign, foreign looking or foreign sounding is a threat and should therefore be removed. For some reason, people have a tendency to think that means we’re xenophobic and racist but we prefer to think of ourselves as patriotic. We are aware that many members of the party believe that their patriotism is best demonstrated by rounding up and shooting all them Muslim types and that this can mistakenly be interpreted by some as hate speech.”

The conference will see the unveiling of UKIP’s new logo as well as the announcement of the appointment of new leader Anne Marie Waters. Both are expected to be met by a mixed reaction from the UKIP membership, somewhere between ecstasy and a cup of cold sick.