Nigel Farage, Eurosceptic scourge of “the political elite”, ended a remarkable 2016 appearing in the most potent and ironic picture of the year: smiling alongside a victorious Donald Trump outside the gold doors of the president-elect’s New York apartment.

Everything about the former UK Independence party leader is improbable: the man who led the Brexit revolt that shook the British establishment is a pinstriped former City trader who has spent much of his adult life trying (and failing) to get elected to parliament.

Yet Mr Farage will be remembered as a truly important historical figure. He took Ukip, a ragtag party once described by David Cameron, the former prime minister, as being full of “fruitcakes and loonies”, and turned it into a real political movement.