UKIP leader Nigel Farage addressed an audience of nearly 300 party supporters in the region tonight (October 29).

The United Kingdom Independence Party leader and MEP told an audience at the Assembly Rooms, in Newcastle, that the time had come for Britain to leave the European Union - a central plank of his party's policy agenda.

Mr Farage said Ukip could reach beyond 'retired colonels living in Wiltshire' and appeal to 'old Labour' voters, who had suffered more than anyone under mass immigration from eastern Europe.

He also said his party would return its first North-East MEP at the next Euro-elections in 2014 and introduced Ukip's candidates for the Police and Crime Commissioner elections in Northumbria and Durham: Alastair Baxter and Mike Costello, respectively.