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Reform’s threat to the mainstream parties is unique in UK political history

01 Jun 2025 5 minute read
Sir Keir Starmer (L). Photo Carl Cort. Nigel Farage. Photo Ben Whitley. PA Images

Martin Farr, Senior Lecturer in Contemporary British History, Newcastle University

Labour’s former shadow chancellor John McDonnell has declared that Keir Starmer’s government has driven “a knife into the heart of what I believed Labour stood for” and called for party members, unions and MPs to take back control.

The text was McDonnell’s, but the pretext was Nigel Farage. Earlier in the week, the Reform leader moved his tanks on to Labour’s lawn by promising to reverse the government’s withdrawal of winter fuel payments to pensioners, and remove the two-child benefit limit, a week after Starmer had committed the most perilous of political allusions: evoking the language of Enoch Powell over immigration.

Starmer has been singed (as was Tony Benn in 1970) by playing with Powell’s incendiarism. The disingenuousness of denials that so irregular a phrase as “an island of strangers” was not Starmer dog-whistling marked another low.

At the centre of Labour’s dilemma is political mutability; how those most elemental, political categories “right” and “left” have blurred into indistinction. Reform UK were ostensibly of the former – nationalist, individualist, authoritarian – but now parade the sacraments of the latter: nationalisation, collectivism, welfarism.

Betrayal

Betrayal narratives follow Labour leaders as night does day, but Sir Keir Starmer’s inconstancy and inability to offer mitigation by counter-narrative at least demonstrates his fidelity to his political hero Harold Wilson. His ministers in the 1960s and 1970s despaired at their electorally successful prime minister’s apparent lack of defining principle.

Of the many issues Reform UK raises, the most intriguing is also the least answerable: individual agency. It will never be known whether Britain would still be in the EU had Farage not survived his 2010 plane crash, but it’s more probable than not. Similarly, had Farage withdrawn, as he promised, from British politics to more lucrative pursuits across the Atlantic, the existential threat to both the Labour government and the Conservative party would have gone with him.

But Farage stayed – and Reform is now a threat of a different order to his previous vehicles. They were significant – UKIP with Brexit; the Brexit party providing Boris Johnson’s 2019 victory – without being serious. They lacked policies (or even policy processes), professionalism, personnel (UKIP was the only party to ban former members of the BNP because it was the only party to have need to).

Reform is now at the tipping point – both financially and electorally – of seriousness. It runs councils. It has mayors. Its triumph in the Runcorn by-election demonstrated discipline, and the importance of a sound candidate.

When parties split

In their public personas, Farage and Starmer are antitheses; the one glib, the other grave; the one with too much personality, the other too little. But charismatic politicians who “make the weather” can also break the party: Farage most recently and repeatedly. But before him Joseph Chamberlain split the Liberals in 1886 and the Unionists in 1903 and David Lloyd George again split the Liberals in 1916. Oswald Mosley caused chaos for Labour in 1931 and David Owen left Labour in the 1980s to form the Social Democratic Party (SDP), which he also later split.

In 1981, the SDP achieved (in alliance with the Liberals) a poll surge of the kind currently being enjoyed by Reform. And in the 1983 general election the SDP/Liberal Alliance won only 675,000 fewer votes than Labour. But thanks to the first-past-the-post electoral system, the Alliance won 186 fewer seats. Labour’s geographical concentration saved it; the Alliance came second all over the country.

In 2024, first past the post delivered what its advocates love, and its critics hate: a clear, and unfair, outcome. Labour won two-thirds of the seats on one-third of the votes. It was the most disproportionate result in history.

Britain’s new multi-party politics may deliver a multi-party parliament at the next election, but through an electoral system designed – insofar as it was designed – for two. With Reform set to breach the 30% threshold, safe seats will be fewer and farther between; marginal seats the norm.

This would present a challenge for a Labour leader much more nimble than Starmer. His dilemma is devilish: ape Reform and yield urban voters to the Greens and Liberal Democrats; repudiate and see the rebuilt red wall razed. There are other places for progressives to go. Indeed, there may soon be another: a new party of the left. McDonnell – who already sits as an independent, having had the Labour whip withdrawn last year – may see it as a lifeboat.

Kemi Badenoch (L) and Robert Jenrick. Photo Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire

Kemi Badenoch – and Robert Jenrick, her most likely usurper – face a strikingly similar problem. Responding to Reform in kind will cede affluent voters to the Liberal Democrats. The Conservative party is the most electorally successful in history in part because it never had a challenger on the right. There’s now another place for conservatives to go. (Or, as it were, to remain.)

Threat

This is the historically unique threat of Reform. In warning of Farage – the most consequential politician since Margaret Thatcher – as a serious threat, Starmer and Badenoch may in overstating augment him, but to not do so is to risk acquiescing. Catastrophising and complacency were evident in 2014, when UKIP came first in the European Parliament elections. Two years later, Britain voted for Brexit.

Reform still has somewhat less than fully thought-out, never mind fully-funded, policies. Its talent pool is a puddle. It’s now in office and will have a record to defend. It’s dominated by one person, and one who repels as much as he inspires. It’s still unlikely that in five years’ time Farage will be in government, much less prime minister. But it is less unlikely than it was, and is likely to become less unlikely still.

This article was first published on The Conversation
The Conversation


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Dai Ponty
Dai Ponty
5 days ago

Not really this situation arose before back in day around the 1920,s there where 2 political Parties Tories and Liberal Parties and along came Labour and pushed out the Liberals so you still had a 2 party system now you have Reform will push out the Tories so on the General elections you will have 2 right wing Parties Tories and Smiling Viper Farage Party reform its the Tories will be the ones that fade away but Reform are a big danger they are FAR RIGHT FASCISTS AND AN ENGLISH NATIONALIST PARTY

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago
Reply to  Dai Ponty

You really are utterly clueless aren’t you? You have no idea what the terms ‘far right’ or ‘fascist’ really mean’. The right to vote should carry an IQ test.

Hal
Hal
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

Trying to deny people the vote is a red flag.

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago
Reply to  Hal

As is trying to overturn a democratically-held referendum.

Hal
Hal
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

As is subverting the result. How did a vote about membership of a political club get turned into permission to throw open the borders?

Adrian
Adrian
4 days ago
Reply to  Hal

It gave us control, of our borders Hal. What politicians then did with that control was beyond the remit of the referendum. We’ve since had successive Tory and Labour governments who have simply allowed anyone in who wants to come.

Hal
Hal
4 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

If only it was as simple as that. We have an ageing population that can only be supported by importing workers. So all that could happen without substantially reducing the cost of older people (any ideas?) is to replace European workers with non-European workers. We also have Churchill’s international rules that ripping up would put us in rogue state territory. We were insulated from the real consequences of that before Johnson took us out of the Dublin deterrent. And of course there was the political choices of libertarians on top of that too. They hate government getting in the way… Read more »

Dai Ponty
Dai Ponty
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

You have your opinion sunshine and i have mine i have met and know supporters of Farage who where in the Army with me and they are far right Fascists

Steve D.
Steve D.
5 days ago

There is much dread over the next GE – which is four years away. However, the biggest threat is to the Senedd and maybe even the existence of Cymru as the nation we know, next year. It’s language and culture decimated by far right English policies. It’s a far more plausible prospect than Farage as PM. The Welsh public have to know, to be shown, Farage is a fake, someone using their woes for personal gain and has no interest in Cymru before it’s too late.

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago
Reply to  Steve D.

What do you expect? The left in Wales has had nearly three decades to prove its worth and failed, spectacularly, by every metric. The Welsh electorate are not so stupid as to keep doing the same thing whilst expecting a different result.

Llyn
Llyn
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

For all Reform’s warm words about Welsh voters at the moment, it’ll be interesting to see what they say if come next year the Welsh electorate vote for a left of centre government? Maybe a move to a Franco style abolition of the Welsh Parliament to stop the Welsh electorate having a say again?

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago
Reply to  Llyn

Ah – the ‘far-right’ tropes just flow like water as usual. You can now compare, in real time, the performance of Reform-controlled councils to their ‘mainstream’ neighbours. No need to wonder.

Llyn
Llyn
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

Well of course nobody wants to be called far-right. However I’m not politically correct and here are some reasons why the English Nationalist, anti-multiculturalism, anti EU, anti-immigrant, climate denying Reform UK is most certainly a far-right party. The far-right believe the nation is in decay or crisis and radical action is required to halt or reverse it by attacking enemies within. For Reform UK these are asylum seekers, Muslims and Islam more generally. The far-right right considers society to be separated into two homogeneous and antagonistic groups, the pure people and the corrupt elite, and which argues that politics should… Read more »

theoriginalmark
theoriginalmark
4 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

We are watching in real time, and they are failing miserably, a lot of them appear to not understand what being a councillor means, which isn’t really surprising, & we have faridge making statements in Scotland that are simply blatant lies and at last being called out by journalists.

Mab Meirion
Mab Meirion
5 days ago

Beer and Fags in the Con Club Kremlin…

Works every time Brexit mk2

Twmp 1-Fat Shanks Twmp 2-Farage connection…?

BBC…

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago
Reply to  Mab Meirion

If only people were as clever as you eh?

Mab Meirion
Mab Meirion
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

Now Now Narnia…

Mab Meirion
Mab Meirion
5 days ago
Reply to  Mab Meirion

Farage or Cromwell, you takes your choice as to impact…

John Ellis
John Ellis
5 days ago

Personally I’m not so much exercised by Starmer’s reference to the possibility of Britain becoming ‘an island of strangers’, because – unless you happen to live in a certain sort of small close-knit village, or in a quiet recess of a certain sort of suburb where people tend to settle and stay a long time – most city dwellers do in fact pretty much live in an island of strangers. Because in our large modern cities, with their concentrations of miles of residential roads and streets and their very mobile populations, we are, realistically, living very largely as strangers to… Read more »

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago

I wonder when it’ll dawn on the lefty press that Reform IS the mainstream party.

Hal
Hal
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

It’s the Tory party reinventing itself again. Nothing more. They’ll rejoin when the work is done.

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago
Reply to  Hal

The Tory party has now descended into a wet Lib-Dem-style farce: hence the emergence of a credible centre-right party. Maybe some tories will get on board, but most will just slink off.

Hal
Hal
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

It’s the Conservative party that’s falling apart. Conservatives and Tories are very different creatures. One preserves, the other destroys.

Llyn
Llyn
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

Reform UK is a popular party but that doesn’t make a far-right English nationalist party, who’s leader admires the murderer Putin and Andrew Tate and who campaigns for the AFD and the Front National in France mainstream.

Johnny
Johnny
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

I would like to know who are the lefty press.With the exception of the Guardian and Daily Mirror who may be classed as Centre Left, you certainly can’t include the Daily Mail, Telegraph and The Sun in that bracket. As for the BBC I remember how they vilified Jeremy Corbyn and his allies under Corbyns leadership of the Labour Party. Nowadays Most people tend to get their news from other Mainstream sources GB News,Talk TV and Tousi TV which are certainly far from the Left of politics. The only well known Left Wing commentator I can think of is Owen… Read more »

Peter J
Peter J
5 days ago

The author is probably right: in recent history, the threat posed by reform is unprecedented. However, when one considers the the past 200 years; UK politics has always been shaped by the poor state of public finances. The post-Napoleanic war era, the chartist movement, the general strikes, and post-WW2 were all heavily shaped by high public debt or Gvmt-driven austerity programs. That’s the reality we’re seeing again today. Since 2019, Gvmt debt repayments have doubled and now account for circa. 10% of total government spending, and rising. Combined with high inflation, nearly 15% of government real terms expenditure has effectively been… Read more »

Adrian
Adrian
5 days ago
Reply to  Peter J

A thoughtful post, but it’s based on the premise that the incumbents, and their predecessors, know/knew what they were doing, and are able to put this country into some sort of order. I’m afraid that we now have decades of evidence that shows otherwise. The reality is that the Tories, Labour the Lib Dems, and PC in Wales are populated with witless career politicians, most of whom have never had a job outside politics or the publics sector, and have no idea what they’re doing. Strategic voting is quite probably going to be Labour’s strategy as they see democracy as… Read more »

Peter J
Peter J
5 days ago
Reply to  Adrian

Thank you very much. On your first point, I’m sure the Plaid/Reform supporters won’t agree with me, but I’ve felt Labour and even the Sunak gvmt are simply doing the best of a very bad situation. Things aren’t good but “Putting your country in order” is challenging when faced with far less spending power to recruit more police, border guards, fill in pot holes, rebuild schools than you had even 5 years ago, let alone 25 years. I certainty agree with you that we need to be more active in society in identifying people outside of politics who can be… Read more »

Ian Michael Williams
Ian Michael Williams
5 days ago

The state of politics in Wales with a veritable merry-go-round of political leaders. Welsh Labour welcomed two new leaders in a six-month period, Wales had had three different First Ministers, and then the Welsh Conservatives got in on the action too by ending their year with a swift but brutal switch at the top. Plaid leadership in the Senedd was another merry go round just over a bit longer period. Reform UK will make inroads in Wales at the 2026 Senedd elections. How far can they Go? Well, time will tell, and many things can happen until that election…the real political… Read more »

Rob
Rob
5 days ago

Yes Farage, is popular, but he hasn’t said a word at PMQs. (Hansard)Is he terrified of Starmer?
All Farage does is release press statements, that could have been written by anyone, with no opportunity for rebuttal. Three years to make às much cash as he can and then gone.

Ian Michael Williams
Ian Michael Williams
4 days ago
Reply to  Rob

Rob…you just cannot speak when you want to, you have to be called! They are cutting him out.

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