Paul Sykes believes the UKIP has 'blown it'

The anti-EU party has pledged to fight almost every constituency at the general election expected in May.

But Paul Sykes, who has donated �1.4m, thinks UKIP will achieve little more than unseat Eurosceptic Tory MPs.

Nigel Farage, UKIP's leader in the European Parliament, said the news was a "blow" but MEP Robert Kilroy-Silk said other donors were offering money.

Trust speech

UKIP's would-be leader Robert Kilroy-Silk's declaration he wanted to "kill" the Tories is understood to have been the final straw for Mr Sykes, who has twice left the Conservative Party because of its policy on Europe.

Coming just days after UKIP pushed the Tories into a humiliating fourth place in the Hartlepool by-election, Mr Sykes' declaration will boost Michael Howard as he prepares for his first conference speech as leader.

The thing is not to buy off people who are thinking of voting for UKIP William Hague Ex-Tory leader Profile: Paul Sykes

Mr Howard will say the party must not make promises it cannot keep and pledge to sack ministers who fail to deliver.

Mr Sykes told BBC Radio 4's Today programme there was little chance in a first past the post voting system in UKIP getting any number of MPs elected.

"There is only one major party now that is anti-Brussels, that is for repatriating powers," he said.

"I am at least warming to what I am hearing from the Conservative Party and I have no intention whatsoever of upsetting their applecart."

Mr Sykes said the Tories now seemed to be "waking up to the fact that it is not a bad idea to make our own laws in our own Parliament by our own people, rather than importing them from unelected Brussels".

But he said he had not decided to fund the Tories and denied negotiating with the Conservative leadership.

Carried away?

UKIP MEP Mr Farage said the party had lost sight of its key objective amid the euphoria over recent election results.

"We have never been about UKIP as a party, as a tribe, being the most important thing," he told Today.

Redwood says he has been arguing the Tory case with Sykes

"The most important thing to us is we get out of the EU and get back to a simply free trade agreement."

Mr Farage also rebuffed Mr Kilroy-Silk's leadership ambitions, saying there was no appetite for "any kind of internecine warfare".

Leadership wrangle

However, Mr Kilroy-Silk told the BBC he was "relaxed" about Mr Sykes' decision, saying that they had other people offering UKIP funding.

He said he was a personal friend of Mr Sykes, pointing out that they and their wives were lunching on Tuesday.

Mr Kilroy-Silk did not rule out Mr Sykes funding UKIP again, and said he believed the businessman would still fund his own personal election campaign.

The former television presenter said the party had to decide on its leadership.

But he was "not quite sure" current leader Roger Knapman had done a good job, saying the party would have a full range of policies if he had been doing the job himself.

He criticised Mr Knapman for using former Clinton aide, Bill Morris, "a foreign adviser as a crutch".

And he accused Mr Farage of a "slur" on UKIP members over their decision to contest every constituent.

Changing loyalties

Mr Sykes gave money to Tory Eurosceptic candidates at the 1997 election.

A year later he pledged �20m to the Democracy Movement, an amalgamation of his own anti-euro currency campaign and the Referendum Movement - set up by the late Sir James Goldsmith.

Former Conservative leader William Hague told Today: "He [Mr Sykes] likes maximum dramatic effect for minimum expenditure and that's fine but it does mean he changes from time to time."

Mr Hague said UKIP voters could be convinced they did not want to help elect a Labour government.

"The thing is not to buy off people who are thinking of voting for UKIP by a change of policy," he said.

'Wisdom'

A "delighted" Tory deregulation spokesman John Redwood said he had been talking to Mr Sykes in recent weeks but denied he had offered him any concessions.

He told Today: "It is one thing to vote UKIP in a proportional representation election... [but] they realise in a general election they wouldn't get anybody elected, all they could do is mess us up."

Education spokesman Tim Collins told the Tory conference on Tuesday that UKIP would not win a single seat at the general election.

Urging UKIP voters to "come home" to the Conservatives, he said: "Don't just hope for a Eurosceptic government, vote for one."

Warning of the UKIP threat at an earlier fringe event, shadow home secretary David Davis suggested the Referendum Party had cost the Tories 30 to 50 seats at the last election.

Labour Cabinet Office Minister Ruth Kelly said the Tories had given up on being a One Nation party and were "lurching to the right".