Brexit champion Nigel Farage is “assessing” whether he will make a political comeback before the next general election, Reform UK leader Richard Tice said on Wednesday morning.
At the party’s New Year press conference, Richard Tice cast Reform UK as the only viable party to save the country from the “socialist twins” of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and opposition Labour Party leader Sir Kier Starmer.
Despite rumours to the contrary, Nigel Farage — who originally founded Reform and still serves as an honorary president of the party — did not break any news as to a potential political comeback on Wednesday.
However, when pressed on whether the Brexit leader would return to Reform as a candidate in the next general election, Tice said per The Telegraph: “He is obviously giving a lot of thought as to the extent of the role that he wants to play in helping Reform UK frankly save Britain. And he is still assessing that and as and when we have all collectively come to a decision obviously we look forward to letting everybody know.
“I am not a poker player but I know that a good poker player doesn’t show their hand too early. Nigel is the master of political timing. But I am very clear, the job at hand is so big, to save Britain, the more help that Nigel is able to give in the election campaign, frankly the better, because the crisis facing the country… is really, really serious.”
Besides Mr Farage, Tice said that Reform UK is actively courting disaffected Tory MPs who are tired of the left-wing direction that the party has taken in recent years, saying: “We are getting interesting calls every day now. We are getting calls from chairs of councils and we are getting all sorts of calls.”
The Reform chief went on to say that the party is in talks with Conservative donors as well, saying that there are “a lot of very disappointed, disgruntled former Tory donors who are not going to donate to the Tory Party”.
“Stop staying with the toxic Tories, stop defending the indefensible, be brave, be bold, come on over. We want quality,” he urged.
In addition to seeking to sway Conservative politicians to their cause, the populist right-wing party is threatening to further imperil Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s chances of remaining in office, with a leading pollster predicting that Reform is poised to siphon off Tory voters in the next election.
Polster John Curtice said this week: “If the opinion polls prove to be correct, Reform is already proving to be something for a problem for the Conservatives… the Conservatives are losing votes as heavily to Reform as they are to Labour.”
“That’s one of the problems that faces Rishi Sunak, as he tries to work out how to recover from the slough of eventual despond from which his party has been stuck for the last 15 months.”
On the topic of whether a return of Nigel Farage to the party would have a meaningful impact on the race, Curtice said: “There’s one opinion poll not so long ago that suggested Reform might go up to 14 per cent in the polls, they’re currently running on the average of about nine.”
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