Will Reform UK kill off Labour or the Conservative Party first? Nigel Farage may well be asking himself that very question right now.
It’s only five months since Labour won a landslide, so it seems crazy to suggest the party now faces maximum peril. But so loveless was its victory, and so calamitous its first five months in office, that it really is time to ask if Labour could already be on its way to humiliating defeat next time.
Keir Starmer over promised and underdelivered by a country mile. He is the worst prime minister in my lifetime, worse even than the hopeless Liz Truss. Labour has gone from an average poll rating of 44% just before the election to a paltry 28% now. Buyer’s remorse is circulating like a winter vomit virus. Labour is sinking, with no obvious prospect of recovery.
Alright, 2029 is a long way away. Starmer could be replaced by someone with a bit of charisma – Streeting or Rayner. But we need only look across the Channel to see what can happen to a party of the Left that bombs. As recently as 2017, François Hollande of the French Socialist Party (Labour’s equivalent) was President. Just five years later, their new leader, Anne Hidalgo, obtained the worst presidential election result in the party’s history. Just 1.75% of the vote.
So, Labour has no God-given right to represent the Left. But nor can the Tories presume that on the Right. To be fair to Kemi Badenoch, she’s already pulled a smidgen ahead of Labour in about half of the recent polls. But that’s more because Starmer is hopeless. She must up her game.
So, who has momentum? As if we need to ask. Farage’s Reform has had a fabulous few months. They may only have five MPs, but they garnered four million votes, already have 100,000 members, look set to receive an enormous bung from Elon Musk, and sensationally leapfrogged Labour in one recent poll. Not bad for a party that didn’t exist five years ago.
You can’t accuse Reform of downplaying itself. Farage talks of a coming “revolution”, and says “newcomers” will win the next election. His Chairman, Zia Yusuf, predicts that Farage will be prime minister in 2029. They parade defecting Tories like trophies.
But the betting markets have bought into the hype too, placing Badenoch and Farage neck-and-neck in the “next prime minister” stakes, while commentators point to what’s happening elsewhere in Europe and America, with “populists” surging. Each time the net-immigration figures are published, or we read about thousands of illegal channel crossings, Reform alone benefits.
Many ask whether Reform will replace the Tories. I don’t rule that out given how Sunak and co were unceremoniously dumped from power. But it is equally pertinent to ask whether Reform is a big threat to Labour. Consider this: Reform came second to Labour in 89 seats in July. Millions of voters would rather cut off their right arms than vote Tory, but would back Reform. Farage himself says his main target is Labour’s disappointed 2024 supporters, of whom there are millions.
Starmer’s hope will be to claw back enough support to hit the 34% mark again, while praying for another split on the right. Badenoch will aim to rebuild the coalition that carried Boris to victory five years ago, and hope that the Tory brand, though badly tarnished, could still triumph. But it is equally plausible that Reform could surge past both, threatening their existence. Just like in France.
You’d be brave to predict. But what we can say is that Britain’s big two, having dominated for 100 years, now face a gigantic threat. That we can even consider Farage in Downing Street says it all. But, yes, it really could happen.
