Deputy Tory Party Chairman: Reform UK ‘A Bigger Threat to Country Than Labour Party’

Lee Anderson asking Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley questions at the Home Affairs Select Committee in the House of Commons, London on April 26, 2023. PA Wire/PA Images

Deputy Tory Party Chairman Lee Anderson has said that insurgent party Reform is a “bigger threat to the country at the moment” than the Labour Party.

Speaking to GB News on Tuesday, Mr Anderson claimed that Reform will “pick off” Tory MPs.

Founded by Nigel Farage, Reform UK, formerly the Brexit Party, has seen an uptick in memberships.

The party is explicitly critical of net zero policies as well as mass immigration. The Conservatives are currently trailing Labour in the polls, with a general election expected this year.

Mr. Anderson said: “He’s a great figurehead, Nigel. He’s been a great politician, he’s done fantastic things. But Reform is a threat, they are a bigger threat to the country at the moment, I think, than the Labour Party.”

“If Reform do pick off a lot of us Conservative MPs, we’re going to end up with a Labour government, that’s the last thing I want.

“Nigel runs the risk of losing a lot of Tory seats to put some “Remoaners” back in power, that’s a backdoor entrance back into the EU.”

He added that the UK’s electoral system “does not allow smaller parties like Reform to win seats.”

Mr. Anderson said that while he “has a lot of time” for the party’s current leader Richard Tice. But he said that “Nigel is the figurehead. He does a great job.”

Over the past 12 months Reform, has doubled its poll rating with some polling organisations putting it at 10 percent.

The comments preceded a Reform UK party conference on Wednesday, as Mr. Tice took to the podium to launch the party’s election campaign.

Rumours of a Nigel Farage-led return to politics were short-lived, however. Mr. Farage was absent from the conference.

Reform Party leader Richard Tice speaking at a press conference to outline Reform's plans for 2024, dated Jan. 3, 2024. PA Media

Yet to make up his mind on the role he will play in Reform ahead of the general election, Mr. Tice said that Mr. Farage was the “master of political timing.”

“He is still assessing that,” he said.

“Nigel is the master of political timing but I’m 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.”

Instead, Ben Habib was unveiled as Reform’s expected candidate for the Wellingborough by-election.

In the conference, Mr. Tice said that the “Tories have become like the Labour Party, two sides of the socialist coin,” and attacked the former’s policies on economics and immigration.

Mr. Tice reiterated that his party wants to increase the thresholds at which individuals start paying income tax from £12,500 to £20,000.

He also said that “disgruntled former Tory donors” told him that they are not going to donate to the Conservative party and are picking up the phone to Reform asking “How can I help?”

Mr. Tice insisted he would stand candidates in every constituency, unlike in 2019 when his party, then the Brexit Party, stood down candidates to help former Tory Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Mr. Habib said that he expects Reform to “get a dozen or more seats”  in Parliament at the next general election.

“The political environment is extremely febrile, people are extremely upset, no one thought we'd vote for Brexit but we did,” said Mr. Habib.

“The political sands are shifting in a way that they haven’t shifted for years. And it is incumbent, therefore, on Reform, not to be just a destructive force, but to be a constructive one,” he added.

On Mr. Anderson’s comments, Mr. Tice said, “He’s very worried that we’re going to put him out of a job.”