Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, the populist far-right party, has seen a rapid rise of late - seemingly at a cost to the Conservatives.
Founded in 2021, as the re-launch of the Brexit Party, it's no longer on the fringes. Farage has ensured Reform pivots away from being a single-issue pressure group to one that is tough on immigration, crime, and more. From taking part to taking over the ring-wing space, Reform UK’s plan seems to be working, and Conservatives are taking note.
Like rats fleeing a sinking ship, many members of the Conservative party, colloquially known as the Tories, have been seeking greener pastures.
For context - the Conservative party suffered a crushing defeat to Keir Starmer’s Labour party in 2024’s general elections, ending 14 years in power.
Since that historic defeat, Reform has successfully poached at least 80 former candidates, donors and staff members from the traditional right-wing party, according to Reuters research. With former Conservative party chair Sir Jake Berry by far the most high-profile member to defect.
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Sir Berry announced his decision to join the Reform UK party on July 10 following 30 years as a Conservative Party member. Calling Britain “broken”, he slated the old parties saying they do not have what it takes to build “a Britain that we are proud of again”. Further adding that only Reform and Nigel Farage can do it.
Sir Berry isn’t the first and most likely won’t be the last.
He is the fifth former Conservative MP to defect to Reform UK in recent years. He is also the second ex-cabinet minister, after the former Welsh secretary David Jones. Furthermore, Lee Anderson, who was Conservative MP for Ashfield, defected during the previous parliament. As of this report, no sitting Conservative MP has defected during the current parliament.
But there are genuine concerns among party officials that the former Home Secretary Suella Braverman too might join her former Tory mates.
Officially, Reform UK reiterated that there is no concerted effort to attract Tory defectors. But a report by the Guardian states that, according to insiders, there has been a scattergun campaign to bring senior Tories onboard. One that could yield further success when UK MPs head back to their constituencies for the summer recess.
The recess, which will run from July 22 until September 1st, will most certainly bring the MPs face-to-face with UK’s disillusioned voters.
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Reform UK’s recent successes have stemmed from the fact that the Britons are fed up with the century-long dominance of Britain’s main political parties. They see Reform as a radical and viable alternative to the traditional duopoly of the Labour and Conservative parties.
So much so that polling firm YouGov on June 26 said the populist Reform UK party would be the UK’s largest political party if a general election were held now.
But, Reform UK would do well to heed the warning by
Sir James Cleverly, the former UK Home and Foreign Secretary and Conservative Party member warned Reform UK that they would start looking like a “repository for disgruntled former Conservatives” if they kept poaching members from his political party.
He’s right. The more defections from Conservatives the party entertains, the more Reform UK looks like ‘Tories 2.0’.
