Senior Scottish Tory Sir Malcolm Rifkind has likened supporters of the UK Independence Party to the appeasers of Nazi Germany.

Rifkind's comments indicate the how seriously the Conservatives are taking the electoral threat of UKIP, which pushed them into fourth place in the Hartlepool by-election

The former foreign secretary said that UKIP voters would enable Labour to retain office who would then sign the European constitution and eventually adopt the Euro.

His comments follow UKIP MEP, Robert Kilroy-Silk's statement that the party intended to "kill off" the Tories.

Rifkind said that UKIP supporters employed "the kind of argument used in 1930s Germany by the people who said: ‘Let Hitler come into power, he’ll destroy the Communists and the rest of us will be better off.'"