The Daily Telegraph - Saturday
Against all the odds, Reform UK has turned politics on its head. And it’s just the start
Somewhere in the Midlands is a farmer who fantasised about giving the UK’s fastest-growing political party £1million. He turned up to a meeting in a very fancy tractor which took up half the pub car park and was quite possibly funded by the EU. But it didn’t take much sleuthing to conclude that it was only ever going to be a dream, both for the generous-sounding gentleman and for Reform UK. Very few folk with that kind of money live in a modest cottage, and a bit of due diligence quickly revealed that this knight in shining armour was just a benign attention-seeker.
As it continues to narrow the gap with the Conservatives, triggering an orgy of special pleading from Tory MPs not to field candidates in their seats, the political party my partner has led since 2021 is on a roll. With every migrant boat that crosses the Channel; with every devastating statistical update on legal migration; with every failure to drag the economy off the floor; Reform UK gathers votes. The one thing the party does not have, however, is cash.
Being on various political party mailing lists, in recent weeks, I have received fundraising emails from both Labour and the Conservatives. The way they plead poverty always amuses me, because compared to Reform UK, they are absolutely loaded.
A glance at the latest figures on the Electoral Commission website highlights just how much they rake in. In 2023 alone, the Tory party received some £48million from supporters, while Labour racked up £30million. This is more than enough to meet day-to-day operating costs and maintain a healthy election fighting fund. Even the Lib Dems (a party that has all but vanished from the national political scene under the leadership of Sir Ed Davey) somehow attracted just over £8 million.
As for Reform UK? Last year, it received £1.3million, every penny of which was incredibly gratefully received. The party’s main assets are a 20-year-old open-top bus, which conked out on the way to a press launch, and one non-Ulez compliant taxi. The defection of “30p Lee” Anderson from the Conservatives dramatically improved the bottom line, not least because it attracted
4,000 new party members.
What this tiny budget means is that, while the Tories and Labour are mighty (if malfunctioning) machines, Reform UK is an entrepreneurial, high-growth start up.
There’s no human resources department; no 24-hour press office; no secretaries or executive PAs; no fancy advertising agency or huge social media team. It’s just a handful of phenomenally committed people, working crazy hours, generally for absolutely nothing in return, because they truly, madly, deeply believe in the cause. As for my partner Richard Tice, he has personally kept the party afloat for the best part of three years, with the help of a fantastic chief executive officer who has a tiny office in Leicestershire and a very modest support team.
For most of this period, a commitment to giving voters in this country a credible alternative to Starmer’s socialism and to a Tory party that has come perilously close to destroying this country, has been treated with utter disdain by arrogant
Tory and Labour MPs, who seem to think they have a God-given right to take turns to rule.
Until very recently, members of the sneering Left-leaning establishment, including the BBC, had barely been able to bring themselves to mention Reform UK by name. (Earlier this month, the Beeb showed its true colours by casually describing the party as “far Right,” an insult to millions of decent voters who despair at the state of
Britain and see no realistic prospect of it getting any better under either Starmer or anyone representing the Conservative Party.) Those behind Reform UK just kept going, never
excessive regulation; and an inability to compete with the huge prize money on offer in places like Australia and Dubai. The industry still generates around £3.7billion each year for the UK economy and supports some 85,000 jobs, but spectator numbers are dwindling and some owners are taking their most promising horses overseas.
How marvellous, then, that the sport’s governing body has come up with a new way to ensure the long-term viability of the sport – by becoming more woke. Continuing to attract greater audiences “will require greater consideration of diverse populations”, according to the British Racing Authority, which is putting it about that “less than half ’ of Generation Z “identify with being exclusively heterosexual.”
This claim is highlighted in an letting a shoestring budget limit their ambition.
But according to the latest polls, Reform UK is now the third most popular political party in the country. Expectations of its performance are rising accordingly. The pressure on those responsible for not disappointing existing and potential supporters is immense.
The scale of the threat Reform now poses to a Tory party that likes to boast about being “the most successful election winning force in history”, means it is under hostile scrutiny as never before. The political opportunity is extraordinary, but the perils are
online training course for British racing. Leaked to social commentator James Esses – the writer and cofounder of Thoughtful Therapists, who exposed shocking gender ideologies promoted by the John Lewis Partnership – the “Racing2Learn” course urges participants to take decisive action against colleagues who are guilty of “behaviours which are not inclusive” – including reporting them to the police. In a section on “inclusive actions,” the course highlights England footballers “taking the knee” in support of Black Lives Matter. “Racing cannot be left in the starting stalls,” the training course warns.
OK, OK – but has anybody talked to the horses? As they prepare for the other great fixtures in the British racing calendar this year – the Derby; Royal Ascot – shouldn’t they everywhere: from the dubious figures with links to rival parties and hard-Left groups trying to infiltrate the organisation, to decent-seeming people who sign up as candidates and pass initial vetting procedures, only to reveal unacceptable views on social media after a few drinks.
All political parties have to contend with such characters ( just look at Labour’s disastrous choice as its candidate in the recent Rochdale by-election), but weeding them out is tough with limited infrastructure.
While trying to craft policy; prepare for local and mayoral elections; fight by-elections, and keep on exposing the abject failings of this Government, Reform’s tiny team is now also fielding hundreds of enthusiastic emails every single day. Each and every one of these messages, generally from voters who are furious and despairing about the Tory betrayal, deserves an answer.
So while armchair observers question why the party isn’t devoting more resources to this or that; and critics seize on any indication of “underperformance,” they’d do well to remember that Reform UK is a party built on passion – not tainted money from people trying to buy peerages. It has got where it is today with a whole lot of conviction and very little cash.
Soon traditional Tory donors may begin to realise that continuing to throw money at a party that is hurtling towards the terrible reckoning it deserves is like using bank notes to fuel bonfires. As Reform inches towards level-pegging with the Conservatives in the polls, it looks increasingly as if they are backing the wrong horse.
too be told about Genderfluid Visibility Week; Drag Day; or the “International Day of Pink”? In the interests of inclusivity, it is only right that our four-legged friends are kept in the know. I don’t know how most nags identify (I wouldn’t like to assume) but having galloped my way through the course, I do know that by excluding them from the big modernisation push, they are most certainly being discriminated against here.
Then again, the BRA might learn more from observing how the equines themselves behave at big meets than from this daft online tutorial. Take any racing fixture, and you’ll find horses of all colours and genders competing as equals. Black, brown and grey; colts, fillies and geldings; they all rub along – and may the best competitor win.