‘I intend to lead a political revolt’: Farage stuns with shock UK comeback

London: Nigel Farage, the arch-Brexiter turned TV personality, has dramatically returned to front-line British politics, seizing the leadership of his right-wing populist Reform party and vowing to stand as a candidate in the general election in July.

Farage, having announced just two weeks ago he would not campaign to instead support his friend Donald Trump’s bid to return to the White House, made the shock announcement on Monday (Tuesday AEST) in a major blow to the ruling Conservative Party.

Nigel Farage announced that he will become the new leader of Reform UK and that he will stand as a parliamentary candidate for Clacton.Credit: AP

His move heaps yet more pressure on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, whose party is trailing badly in opinion polls, after a gaffe-prone start to the campaign that appears to be leading to an electoral thrashing on July 4.

Declaring the election, which Labour is set to win, as over and done, Farage said he decided to run because it was so far “the dullest, most boring electoral campaign we have ever seen”.

“I believe in Britain. These boring idiots that lead the Labour and Conservative parties are not worth the space,” he said. “Let’s make Britain great again.”

Farage, a divisive and charismatic figure famed for his communication skills, said he intended to “lead a political revolt” because “nothing in this country works any more”.

His decision to not only run but replace Richard Tice as leader of Reform coincided with a major new opinion poll predicting a Tory wipeout in large parts of the country, and Labour on track for the largest election win in 100 years.

The Sky News-YouGov survey of more than 50,000 people found Labour could win 422 seats – a majority of 194 to the Conservatives’ predicted 140. It would be the highest number of seats won by a party at any election since Tory prime minister Stanley Baldwin won a majority of 208 seats in 1924.

Farage, 60, announced he would contest the Conservative-held seaside seat of Clacton in Essex, where 73 per cent of the constituency voted to leave the European Union in the 2016 Brexit referendum.

He claimed that the Conservatives would be swept away on a wave of disdain for the political establishment and were “on the verge of total collapse”. Millions of people, he said, would feel let down if he didn’t “lead from the front”.

He claimed the encouragement voiced by voters on the campaign trail last week convinced him to about-turn, saying: “I’ve changed my mind and I’m not ashamed of it one little bit”.

Farage said that a rise in immigration over the past decades of Conservative and Labour governments had caused housing problems and a decline in living standards.

“The population explosion has devalued the life of Britons in the most extraordinary way,” he said.

Before taking questions from the media, he finished his speech by alluding to the successful Brexit referendum he had long campaigned for: “I tell you what, I’ve done it before, I’ll do it again. I’ll surprise everybody ... We are going to be the voice of opposition.”

Although most polls forecast that Reform will not win any seats, it is expected to take Tory votes in a way that benefits Labour or the Liberal Democrats.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said he was not worried about Farage standing as an MP.Credit: Bloomberg

It will be Farage’s eighth tilt at trying at a seat in the House of Commons, having first tried in 1994 at the Eastleigh byelection. He was, however, a member of the European Parliament for two decades before Britain quit the EU.

He most recently stood in South Thanet in 2015 where he earned 32.4 per cent of the vote, finishing second to the Conservative candidate.

Farage insisted that, even if he was elected as MP, he would still spend time in America supporting Trump in the US election, but if elected would not be able to spend the amount of time he’d planned.

Speaking earlier, Sunak said he was not worried about Farage standing as an MP.

“At the end of the day on 5 July, one of two people will be prime minister, either [Labour leader] Keir Starmer or me,” he said.

A Conservative spokesman said Farage “risks handing Keir Starmer a blank cheque”.

Both Sunak and Farage have ruled out a pact in the election, preventing a repeat of 2019 where Reform decided to stand down candidates in Tory-held seats and helped Boris Johnson deliver an 80-seat majority for the Conservatives.

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