How Nigel Farage blew up the UK election

LONDON — Two weeks ago, Nigel Farage’s latest vanity project looked like a busted flush.

Now it has the potential to upend the U.K. election — and reshape the future of British politics for good.

For the first time on Thursday evening, an opinion poll from one of Britain’s most respected pollsters put Farage’s startup venture, Reform UK, ahead of its long-standing mainstream rival, the Conservative Party.

The YouGov poll sparked panic in Tory ranks. This was a tipping point many had dreaded — by one measure, at least, the Conservative Party, which has led Britain for the past 14 year, was now in third place, and falling fast.

And with less than three weeks to go until the general election, Westminster observers openly speculate about whether Reform could destroy the Tories altogether.

The U.K.’s first-past-the-post electoral system makes it very challenging for smaller parties to win seats, even if they gain significant vote share. But if Farage can — at the eighth attempt — get elected to the House of Commons and secure enough votes to qualify his party for state funding, that may prove enough of a launching pad to blow up the right of British politics.

“[The Tories] have done a terrible job,” said Richard Tice, the millionaire businessman and ex-leader who is helping to bankroll Reform. “They’ve broken Britain, and they must be punished.”

“Our job is to present a serious alternative to the British people. This is a serious, medium-term plan to replace the Tories and become the opposition to Labour,” he said.

Tice was speaking back in May to POLITICO’s Westminster Insider podcast, which has followed Reform politicians for months as part of a new documentary about the fledgling party.

Despite Tice’s apparent confidence, at the time a Reform insurgency seemed close to impossible.

As late as May 30, it was a ragtag bunch which gathered for Reform UK’s first press conference of the election campaign, in Glaziers Hall, near London Bridge. Farage — then still only “honorary president” — had recently ruled out a return to frontline politics, letting the wind out of Reform’s sails before its campaign had got off the ground.

The assembled press pack in Glaziers Hall far outnumbered the party’s actual supporters, and every camera was trained on Farage rather than Tice, then Reform’s official leader. 

Behind the questions sprayed to the two men — both on the official subject of the press conference (immigration), and the unofficial subject (Farage’s ambitions) — lurked a set of unasked questions: Why are we here? What is the point of all this? 

Reform was barely known beyond Westminster.

A ramshackle operation

Indeed Reform bore little resemblance to what most Brits think of as a political party. 

It was formed in 2020 from the remnants of Farage’s previous project, the Brexit Party, which had in turn been formed from the remains of UKIP. Unusually, Reform was set up as a limited liability company, with Farage as its majority shareholder and honorary president.

Until recently, Reform could barely afford any full-time officials, and had no headquarters at all. Gawain Towler, a former UKIP MEP and Farage’s longtime lieutenant, ran operations from his house outside London.  

Where other parties used internal polling and focus groups, Reform relied on a single nerdy activist: Alex Wilson, dubbed the “John Curtice of Reform” (in reference to a well-known British polling guru) because of his fondness for data and spreadsheets.

And while Reform had experienced several significant boosts over the previous year — strong-ish showings at a handful of parliamentary by-elections, and the high-profile defection of former Tory party deputy chairman Lee Anderson — it still suffered from obscurity beyond the Westminster bubble.

Farage himself admitted in response to a question from POLITICO that brand Reform needed some work.

But the threat to the Tories was always clear. Both the Brexit Party and UKIP had made serious inroads into Conservative support during the 2010s, forcing the party to tack rightward in response.

This, in part, was why Sunak called his snap election for July 4 — a desire to catch Reform on the hop, while the party lacked the structure and resources to pose a serious threat.

At first it seemed the gamble had paid off. Farage announced he would not run for election, saying there was no time to build a winning campaign. He preferred instead to focus on the U.S. presidential campaign, he said, where he has been a regular cheerleader for his friend Donald Trump.

But within a week, Farage had changed his mind — and with it, the course of the campaign. He would stand for parliament as leader of Reform UK. The Tory campaign was distraught. Reform began to surge in the polls.

Seeking revenge

“I took the day off yesterday,” Farage told journalists at a hastily-organized press conference to announce his decision. “Had a normal day. Walked the dogs. Did a bit of fishing. Popped into the pub, you know — a normal sort of day. It gave me time to think and reflect, and I began to feel a terrible sense of guilt.”

Farage himself admitted in response to a question from POLITICO that there was work to do in gaining brand recognition for Reform. | Leon Neal/Getty Images

This guilt, he said, was due to the impact he believed his decision was having on his avid fanbase, left bereft by his decision not to stand for parliament. 

But another kind of reasoning was also at work. Dismissing earlier remarks about cutting a possible deal with the Tories, Farage repeatedly referred to their “betrayal” when it came to issues he considers totemic — delivering Brexit, and bringing down immigration levels. 

Vengeance toward the party he left in the 1990s over its EU policy appeared to be at least part of Farage’s motivation — alongside sheer enjoyment of his ability to foment chaos. 

He invited voters to send him to parliament to cause “a bloody nuisance,” sounding as if he was picking himself up by the scruff of his signature covert coat and giving it a shake. 

The second coming

Until that point, the 2024 election had promised to be a battle of the nerds.

Allies of both Sunak and the opposition leader, Keir Starmer, admit they are competent grafters rather than showmen. Both sides argue that’s exactly what’s needed to turn the stuttering U.K. economy around.

But their lack of pizzazz left the field wide open for a charismatic — or repellent, depending on your view — figure to “ginger up” the campaign, as Farage memorably put it.

Farage’s galvanizing effect was obvious last week as crowds descended upon Clacton, the seaside town in Essex where he’d chosen to stand. (It was an obvious choice — Clacton had elected UKIP’s sole MP back in the early 2010s.)

Farage’s arrival was, said one admiring onlooker, “like Jesus has turned up.” Another attendee — less supportive — made their feelings clear by upending a milkshake over Farage’s head. Chaos ensued.

These headline-grabbing scenes — Farage was later mobbed in a pub — revived a persistent worry from Farage’s liberal detractors, that he is at least partly a media creation, and that his anti-immigration views would gain less traction if everyone just ignored him. 

Farage’s decision to stand for parliament means he cannot be ignored altogether, and means more scrutiny of what he actually stands for.

Reform is clear what it’s against: immigration, the net zero climate target, political correctness, criticism of Britain’s role in history. But asked by POLITICO what their positive vision for the country looks like, Reform’s flagbearers alluded vaguely to a return to Britain’s supposed former glory. 

Farage’s galvanizing effect was obvious last week as crowds descended upon Clacton, the seaside town in Essex which he had chosen for his eighth attempt at entering the House of Commons. | Carl Court/Getty Images

Farage spoke of “a freer Britain” where the “little man” can flourish. Anderson said he wanted to see “a country where we’re not ashamed of our history, our heritage, our culture.”

Some see an implicit racism in this rhetoric, a dividing line between British and non-British. Supporters dismiss such concerns as liberal nonsense, and lap it up.

Challenged on claims by Tory Party veteran Michael Heseltine — and indeed some members of the public at the Clacton rally — that he and his party are “racist,” Farage told POLITICO this was a “ludicrous” accusation and “an excuse for not having a debate.”

Like other dominant figures on the right, Farage dismisses most questions on his controversial positions as the bleating of a “woke” elite. And since he has never had to face the inconvenience of governing — nor even representing a constituency — he has no real record against which to be measured. 

Reform is hoping that will change on July 4.  

Next stop Downing Street?

Farage is outwardly bullish about his party’s chances at the election, predicting it will win more than one parliamentary seat — even as aides privately admit this is unlikely.

As was frequently the case with UKIP, Britain electoral system and the geographical spread of the party’s support means Reform could stack up millions of votes while winning precisely zero individual seats. 

But those millions of votes have a power of their own, taking right-wing support away from the Tories and potentially costing them dozens of other close-fought seats. This threat meant both UKIP and the Brexit Party were frequently effective at forcing Conservative leaders to change policy, without any presence in the House of Commons.

But Reform’s future may live and die with Farage’s personal battle in Clacton, a seat currently held by the Conservatives. If he is thwarted again it will be a personal repudiation from which he will find it difficult to return.

And if he finally wins election to the House of Commons, it could be a game-changer for his fledgling party.

Securing a seat in parliament — plus at least 150,000 votes — would mean Reform qualifies for Short Money, a formal parliamentary scheme under which opposition parties are awarded significant public funds to carry out their duties. 

The party is also far more likely to attract donors under his banner, joining wealthy existing supporters such as plumbing magnate Charlie Mullins and Holly Valance, the pop singer and celebrity wife of property developer Nick Candy.

Farage’s election would also introduce the specter, as his friend Towler puts it, of the Reform leader “wandering around [parliament], having a drink here and there, sitting on the smoking terrace, chatting to everybody.”

Might further Tories defect? “The whips of the other parties will be crapping themselves,” Towler chuckled.

The time is ripe for such an intervention, according to Henry Hill, acting editor of the ConservativeHome website, an online bible for Tory activists.

“I’ve been hearing from Conservative candidates that since Farage’s announcement, they’ve had actual activists just walk out and join Reform,” he said. 

If Farage finally wins election to the House of Commons at the eight attempt, it could be a game-changer for his fledgling party. | Ben Stansall/AFP via Getty Images

Hill said the party of government was facing a major problem with its core supporters, in that “pretty much no matter what wing of the Conservative Party you’re on, the last 14 years have been a disappointment.”

Wilson, Reform’s London Assembly Member, confessed that he had admired Farage even when he was still a Tory member, helping to crunch numbers inside CCHQ. He said a lot of fellow Tory officials inside the party felt the same.

If he gains that crucial foot in the door, Farage’s stated ambition is to use his new platform as a launchpad for Reform to become Britain’s main right-wing party of opposition by 2029 — or even to cannibalize the Conservative Party from within. 

Seasoned strategists believe he could do it.

Andrew Cooper, former senior aide David Cameron and a non-affiliated peer, predicted that if an elected Nigel Farage was ever allowed to join the Tory Party and made it onto a leadership ballot, “it’s absolutely certain” that he would win.

Farage himself has leant into the idea of some sort of Tory/Reform merger amid the ashes of what looks likely to be a crushing election defeat for the ruling party.

“Something new is going to emerge on the center-right,” he told LBC Radio Thursday.

“I don’t know what it’s called — but do I think I could end up leading a national opposition to a Labour party with a big majority, where I can stand up and hold them to account on issues? Yes.”

The extraordinary career of one of Britain’s most influential postwar politicians still has some way to run.