Nigel Farage has pledged that Reform UK – a party he founded – will field a full slate of candidates at the next general election.
The right-winger said “I didn’t spend 25 years battling for Brexit only to watch the Tories give it away” in a Telegraph column today.
He pledged to put up candidates in all seats at the next election, rather than cutting a deal as they did in 2019 – then the Brexit Party – not to contest the 317 Tory-won seats.
Hitting out at rumours Jeremy Hunt is considering a new Swiss-style deal with the European Union – an arrangement he originally favoured – the former UKIPer said we are close to another “Chequers deal surrender” like the one seen under Theresa May in 2018.
Directing his ire at the “English Channel emergency”, he said: “Most Brexiteers did not vote in 2016 for thousands of people to turn up in the UK uninvited”.
Figures released today show net migration to the UK hit a new high in the 12 months to June 2022, driven largely by non-EU nationals.
In fact, of the 560,000 people estimated to have migrated from the UK, almost half of them – 275,000 – went back to the EU.
Farage says Rishi Sunak is edging towards a Brexit in Name Only (BRINO) deal with the EU, something he believes the “backbench rump” of Brexiteers and fee-marketeers will be powerless to stop.
“All of this means that the conditions for a new insurgency in British politics are ripe”, he said.
Polling for the Sunday Telegraph this month showed there would be good support for a Farage-led party.
The Reform Party has also seen improved polling numbers as right-wing factions of the Tory Party grow disillusioned with the current state of the party.
“As honorary president of Reform UK, I communicate regularly with its leader, Richard Tice, and have been kept up to date with his preparations to field a full slate of candidates at the next general election,” Farage said.
“I can confirm that there will be no more deals, no more standing aside. The Conservative Party needs to understand just how many people in this country now believe that it is the problem and not the solution. Public trust has been frittered away.”
Related: International press document Britain’s Brexit ‘bregret’