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They boast they are the only political party to represent ordinary British folk - but the bigwigs at the heart of Nigel Farage’s UKIP have been exposed as wealthy members of the political elite.

A Sunday Mirror investigation has discovered that almost all of Ukip’s self-declared ‘key players’ have enjoyed high-flying lifestyles in lucrative professions.

The revelation will come as a huge embarrassment to Farage’s party only days before a crunch by-election in Rochester, Kent that they are expected to win.

For weeks now UKIP officials have attempted to dupe the electorate by claiming that unlike Labour and the Tories they are “a party for ordinary folk.”

But the reality is somewhat different.

Nigel Farage, who trades on his man of the people image and likes to be pictured supping a pint in a pub and puffing on a cigarette, is known to have attended fee-paying Dulwich College before a money-spinning career as a City trader.

But we can now reveal his deputy Paul Nuttall, a Liverpudlian thrust in front of TV cameras in a cynical bid to lure northern voters who aren’t swayed by Mr Farage, was an assistant to a UKIP Euro MP and ran the party’s youth wing.

(Image: PA)

He has a masters degree in Edwardian politics.

UKIP Executive chairman Steve Crowther was a journalist and spin doctor during Margaret Thatcher’s era, and was previously president of Bristol Polytechnic’s students’ union. He also ran an advertising agency.

Gawain Towler, who failed in his bid to become an MEP in May, was previously Mr Farage’s spokesman, while another key press aide, UKIP head of media Alexandra Phillips, is a professional speech writer who failed in an attempt to become a Parliamentary candidate in Gloucestershire.

Deputy chairman Suzanne Evans is a former BBC journalist and runs a PR and marketing firm, while Treasurer Andrew Reid is a City lawyer and former chairman of a Tory constituency association.

General secretary Roger Bird went to Oxford before qualifying as an auditor and finance director, while communications chief Patrick O’Flynn studied at Cambridge University before stalking Westminster’s corridors of power as a political commentator for a right-wing newspaper.

Former party leader Lord Pearson attended Eton College and has been a member of the House of Lords since 1990.

Matt Richardson, who works for a UKIP peer, went to Oxford University and qualified as a barrister. He is tasked with finding candidates likely to jump ship from other parties.

Eton-educated Hugh Williams, whose father was a Tory MP, owns an accountancy firm and stood as a UKIP candidate in South West Devon in 2005 and 2010, while top donor Stuart Wheeler, a multimillionaire whose donations have boosted UKIP’s high-profile by-election campaign, went to Eton and Oxford.

(Image: Getty)

Top UKIP officials have been pounding the streets of Rochester and Strood for the past month with voters going to the polls on Thursday after sitting Tory MP Mark Reckless defected to UKIP, triggering a by-election.

Mr Farage likes portraying his party as the anti-Establishment alternative, hailing his “people’s army” and claiming his would-be MPs and MEPs are “real” candidates compared with the Tories, Labour and Lib Dems.

Hitting the campaign trail in Rochester, Mr Reckless declared : “I see Nigel Farage and UKIP as the agents of change.”

And Mr Reckless’ close friend and fellow Tory defector and now UKIP MP Douglas Carswell said: “Each of the established parties seems the same.

“They are run by those who became MPs by working in the offices of MPs.”

He added: “Only UKIP, a party for the kind of ordinary folk who throng our campaign office, can change politics for the better.

“Only with a bit of choice and competition in politics can we shake up that smug, self-regarding clique called Westminster.”

(Image: PA)

Voters on Rochester’s rain-lashed streets on Friday were outraged by UKIP’s claims to be “different” from the other parties.

Grandmother of four Hilary Liddiard said: “All politicians are the same. Farage pretends to be a man of the people but he’s not. He’s just another member of the political elite.”

Hilary, 65, accused Mr Reckless of “being reckless”, adding: “He goes from one party to another and still expects people to vote for him? Obviously, I’m not.”

John Murray, 51, who owns a hardware store, branded Mr Farage an “a***” and said the party leader and his cronies were just as distant from ordinary folk as the other parties.

“UKIP are like other parties, just look who’s leading them. I can’t stand the man,” said John.

“He’s exactly the same as the rest of them. He’s a yuppy who went to a posh school.”

John voted for Mr Reckless previously, but will not back the defector on Thursday.

“It doesn’t matter who gets in – Joe Public isn’t going to be any better off,” he said.

“They are full of promises – ‘we will do this, do that’ – but they get into government and do the opposite.

“I might not even bother voting, that’s how disillusioned I am.”

(Image: PA)

Steelworker David McGuirk said: “There are too many of them too far up their own backsides, too many promises they don’t keep. I’m 44 and I’ve never voted in my life.”

Asked what he thought about Mr Farage, he replied: “Who? Never heard of him.”

UKIP are set to win Thursday’s vote – but it will not be the landslide victory in Clacton which swept Douglas Carswell, who quit the Tories to stand for UKIP, back to Westminster last month(OCT).

Rochester has below-average unemployment and rather than empty, boarded-up shops, its pretty high street is filled with independent stores selling cupcakes, wedding dresses and old-fashioned tearooms, alongside town centre staples like pizza restaurants, pubs and a handful of charity shops.

Immigration is less of an issue for voters here than other parts of Kent – despite UKIP’s claims to the contrary.

Ex-financial auditor Jane Emmington, 53, criticised the parties for throwing so much cash at the campaign and vowed to vote for an independent.

She called on candidates to focus on local issues rather than immigration.

“They seem to forget this is only a local election yet they are pushing themselves on national issues which don’t bother me,” she said.

“I don’t think there is a problem with immigration in Rochester.”

Romanian Camelia Adumitroaei, 33, came to Britain eight years ago and runs a bar in Rochester.

She agreed with tougher immigration rules, but branded UKIP “a bit racist”, saying: “I agree with some of their policies but they have gone too extreme.”

Camelia said she wanted to employ British bar staff but they were reluctant workers.

“They work for a few days and then say they can’t be bothered, they don’t care,” she said.

“East European people work harder and they work more hours but they struggle with the language.”

She said rules introduced this year made it easier for Romanians to work in the UK, adding: “I had to go through two interviews and visit the embassy in Romania. “Now, you just jump on a plane and come over and there’s no check on you at all, like whether you know any English, if you have an education – they just let everyone in and that’s not fair.

“If they want to study here that’s fine, let them in and if they want a better job that’s fine too.”

Bookseller Bob Peters, 68, a former lorry driver, will vote for UKIP having supported the Tories in 2010.

“I have been accused of being a racist, but some Asian friends of mine are voting UKIP so it’s not a racist thing,” he said.

“It’s not to do with immigration as such, it’s to do with the mickey takers who are quite entitled to come over here, go straight into unemployment and get vast benefits claiming for children at home.

“The system is being abused and people don’t like it.”

He admitted he was surprised when Mr Reckless defected, but added: “I don’t think he’s a turncoat; he’s making a point.”

The point Oxford-educated Mr Reckless, a barrister before being elected to Parliament in 2010, is unwittingly making is that whatever Nigel Farage say, UKIP are just like the rest of them after all.

Labour MP John Mann hailed our findings, saying: “This exposes the hypocrisy at the heart of UKIP.

“They are the same old politicians, just recycled - the same old grey men.

“Often they aren’t even the same kind of people, they are actually the same people just running under a different badge.

“There’s nothing new about them; it’s a bunch of career politicians who are very much part of the Westminster elite.”