Diane James is a formidable communicator who has been the obvious successor to Farage since the Eastleigh by-election in 2013. She has authority and charisma and is unusually fluent in a political age in which professional politicians waffle and endlessly repeat themselves for fear of saying the wrong thing. This is important because today a political party is part its the electoral appeal, but the leader is most of it.
And women in British politics are on the rise. The UK, Scotland and Northern Ireland all have leaders who are women. Sturgeon is by far the most charismatic of the three, but James will appeal to many outside the cauldron of conflicting ideas and ambitions which post Brexit UKIP has become. If she can bring good order and shared purpose to her party, Diane James will become a significant electoral factor in the future.