Reform UK is on course to win its first ever Welsh assembly election next week according to a new bombshell poll of the seat. Nigel Farage is eyeing up the major victory in Caerphilly after the previous Labour incumbent Hefin David was found dead in his home in August.
Asked how locals plan on voting, Survation has found that Labour’s support in the valley seat has collapsed as Reform and Welsh nationalists Plaid Cymru are set for a photo finish. Reform is on 42%, up a whopping 40 points since the last election, while Plaid is just behind on 38%, up 10 points. Meanwhile Labour has crashed down by 34 points to just 12%, a level of support once inconceivable in a part of the world previously represented by Labour grandees like Nye Bevan, Neil Kinnock and Michael Foot.
The Tories are down to just 4% support, though ahead of the Greens on 4% and 3% respectively.
Reacting to the poll, a Reform UK spokesman said: “While this poll is encouraging, we can’t afford to take anything for granted.
“The Cardiff Bay establishment is going to throw everything at this to try and prevent real change for the people of Caerphilly.
“Our message to people in Caerphilly is simple: if you want real change, you have to go out and vote for it.”
Pollster Luke Tryl warned Labour that their collapse in Wales mirrors the LibDem-Reform pincer movement that is wiping the Tories out in large parts of southern England.
“A Plaid-Reform pincer movement is doing the same to Labour’s vote in their Welsh heartlands. Electoral map is being drastically redrawn.”
In September the party’s Chairman Dr David Bull told the Express that Reform “will be throwing everything at this election as we build towards next May.”
Laura Anne Jones, Reform UK’s only Senedd member at present, added: “Labour have failed Caerphilly for over 25 years now and the polling is clear, we are now in with a real shout of winning this Labour safe seat.
“Labour have broken Wales, Reform will fix it.”
Polls repeatedly suggest that Sir Keir Starmer is set to be humiliated in the nation-wide Senedd elections next May, with Labour on course to lose power for the first time since the assembly was created in 1999.
In May a YouGov poll found that Plaid Cymru is now leading in Wales on 30%, with Reform just behind on 25%.