The populist, hard-right Reform UK party has topped a voting intention poll for the first time, sending shockwaves throughout the British political establishment.
A February 3 YouGov poll found that if an election were to be called now in the United Kingdom, 25 percent would vote for Reform UK, 24 percent would vote for the current governing Labour Party, and 21 percent for the Conservatives.
Fourteen percent would vote for the Liberal Democrats and 9 percent for the Green Party, according to the poll.
Founded in 2021 as a relaunch of the Brexit Party, Reform UK has focused on immigration, housing and combating what its party manifesto termed “woke ideology”, according to its party manifesto.
In the July 2024 general election, Reform UK, which is led by Nigel Farage, secured 4.1 million votes – a result widely seen as a triumph given the party’s young age.
The British campaign group against the far right, Hope Not Hate, also recently published a poll surveying 17,000 people and found that Reform UK could take up to 169 seats in Parliament out of 650 and is emerging as “a major political force in Britain”.
“Nigel Farage’s Reform UK is trying to present itself as a fresh alternative by tapping into … disillusionment to push their own extreme agenda. If they succeed, they will drag British politics further towards division, hostility and distrust,” the group wrote on X on Monday.
Meanwhile, the Guardian has reported that some Labour MPs had set up a pressure group in areas where Reform UK came second in the general election to strengthen their base.
One unnamed MP told the news outlet, “One of our main messages to the leadership is we need to do more on illegal migration especially.”
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