Nigel Farage to stand for Reform UK in general
election U-turn
Honorary president of the former Brexit party to make
eighth attempt to enter parliament
Ben Quinn,
Pippa Crerar and Eleni Courea
Mon 3 Jun
2024 16.16 BST
The
Conservative party’s faltering general election campaign suffered a potentially
damaging blow when Nigel Farage announced he intended to stand as an MP and
lead the Reform party for the next five years.
The former
Ukip and Brexit party leader said he would stand in Clacton, Essex, after
changing his mind while spending time on the campaign trail. He claimed that he
did not want to let his supporters down.
Farage will
also take over as leader of Reform UK from Richard Tice, pledging to stay in
post for a full parliamentary term.
While his
announcement poses an immediate threat to the Tory candidate in Clacton, it may
also energise his party’s national campaign, splitting the rightwing vote in
other constituencies.
It also
raises the spectre of Farage antagonising the Tories as they descend into a
post-election battle for the soul of their party.
Farage’s
bid to win in Clacton, which was the first to elect a Ukip MP in 2014 and has a
Tory majority of 24,702, will be his eighth attempt to enter parliament. He has
failed on each of the previous seven occasions.
In a
further blow to Sunak, YouGov’s first MRP constituency projection, before
Farage’s announcement, showed Keir Starmer could win a 194 majority, bigger
even than Tony Blair’s 179 majority in 1997.
It put
Labour on 422 seats (+222 from the 2019 election, based on new constituency
boundaries), the Tories on 140 (-232), the Lib Dems on 48 (+40) and the SNP on
17 (-31). One senior Tory described Farage’s return as an “existential” risk.
At a news
conference in central London, the rightwinger said that he had witnessed “a
rejection of the political class” across the country in a way that had not been
seen in modern times and that he wanted to lead a “political revolt”.
He also
sought to portray Reform UK’s surge as part of what he described as “a new
phenomenon” ahead of elections this weekend to the European parliament, when
parties of the far right are expected to do well. “I promise you something is
happening out there,” he said.
Farage had
been expected to choose to run either in Clacton or in Thanet East, in Kent,
which includes much of the old constituency where he made two failed bids to
become an MP in 2015 and 2005.
But Clacton
would now appear to be a better bet for Reform UK, even though the Tory
candidate Giles Watling, who backed remain, is defending a majority of 24,702.
Farage
suggested that Reform UK could take more than the 3.9m votes that Ukip won at
the 2015 general election, before the Brexit referendum, and could even win
some seats, although he acknowledged that it would be harder without
proportional representation.
Reform UK
is aiming to hive off votes from the Conservatives’ right flank, potentially
splitting the vote in some marginal seats and allowing Labour through the
middle.
“They are
split down the middle on policy, and frankly right now they don’t stand for a
damn thing,” Farage said of the Tory party. “So our aim in this election is to
get many, many millions of votes. I’m talking far more votes than Ukip got back
in 2015.”
However,
the return of the rightwing firebrand, who is close to the US presidential
candidate Donald Trump, to frontline politics will alarm even moderate
Conservatives. In an indication of the type of campaign he will run, Farage
described the UK contest as the “immigration election”.
Tory MPs
warned that a Reform UK surge could result in the party pitching further to the
right, to try to win back support, with more tough rhetoric on their Rwanda
plan, and even a pledge to leave the European convention on human rights.
“It also
possibly makes it more likely that we have a daft, full-blown ‘leave the ECHR
policy’ in the manifesto,” said one candidate. “That’s attractive to one end of
the market and really unattractive to the other. We needs to remain attractive
to both.”
They were
downbeat about Reform’s impact on the Tories’ electoral chances. “It probably
just locks in the worst-case scenario with Reform and means it’s very hard for
the Tories to make as much of a dent as we need to do to be in better
territory.”
Another
said Farage’s decision was a “big blow” to Sunak. “He will undoubtedly have an
impact on both campaigns – but probably more of an impact on the Conservative
one. Reform were always going to nibble around the ages of the Conservative
vote but their in-road will be bigger now.”
It also
reinforced the view among some Tories that Sunak’s decision to call the
election for 4 July, rather than the autumn, when Farage was likely to be in
the US supporting the Trump campaign, was a mistake.
A Tory
candidate said: “The PM’s decision was really stupid – and obviously really
stupid. Your whole thing is the Tories are about stability and the economy is
going to get better, and then you call an election before anyone bloody
notices.
“I just
find it inexplicable. It was [deputy prime minister Oliver] Dowden’s argument
that won, which was that it’s going to get worse. Well, show me how.”
The return
of the former Brexit party leader now also opens up the possibility of unhappy
former Tory donors opening their wallets, with Farage saying the party had
started to get some “serious money” since last week.
Those
gathered at the Reform UK press conference included the property developer Nick
Candy, who has previously donated hundreds of thousands of pounds to the
Tories, and the Pimlico Plumbers founder Charlie Mullins.
The new
Reform UK leader deflected questions about whether his party’s members had been
ignored by a backroom deal that has led to Tice being replaced. “Sometimes tough things have to be done,” he said.
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