Mark Reckless installed a fire-proof letter box after Ukip defection The same man encouraged other people to make him unwelcome on the local high street, he said. Mr Reckless, who is expected to win back his seat in the by-election on Thursday, agreed to dress up as a knight in a chain-mail shirt and sword and shield for the magazine interview, which he wore over a purple checked shirt and suit trousers. The former Conservative MP, who had a long history of rebelling against the Conservative whip revealed that he learnt to touch type when he was six years old and began to get seriously interested in politics during the 1976 US elections, when he was 5. The Conservatives have all but written off their chances of winning in Rochester and Strood with a Tory cabinet minister admitting the party just hoped to keep Ukip's leader in the single digits. If the polls are correct Mr Reckless will become Ukip's second MP on Friday after Douglas Carswell, who also left the Tories, won the party their first seat in Westminster last month. However a poll last week by Lord Ashcroft, the former Conservative party vice-chairman, has suggested that voters in the constituency are likely to use the by-election as an opportunity to protest and punish the Government but that Mr Reckless will be ousted after six months in the general election.