Nigel Farage has been accused of leading the “Tory Party in disguise”, as a new database tracks the number of former Conservative politicians making up the ranks of Reform UK.
The platform reveals that defections to Reform UK by ex-Tories rose by 462% in 2025 compared to 2024. Overall, some 81 serving Reform UK councillors previously held office for the Conservative Party, as did the sole Reform UK members of the Scottish and Welsh Parliaments and the Mayor of Greater Lincolnshire. In Westminster, all but one MP from Reform UK’s five-strong parliamentary party were recently members, donors or elected representatives for the Conservatives.
As his resignation from the Conservative Party was in 1992, Nigel Farage himself was not counted but having been a Conservative member and donor as recently as 2018, Richard Tice has been. While they do not currently hold elected office, Reform’s ranks have also been bolstered by previously prominent Conservatives including twelve former Government ministers such as Nadine Dorries, Jake Berry, Maria Caulfield and Nadhim Zahawi.
While he has not been a member of the Conservatives for more than three decades, the horde of Conservatives moving to Reform UK follows an extensive record of tacit cooperation and often vocal support from Nigel Farage for his old party. In the 2019 general election, Farage stood candidates down to help Boris Johnson win an outright majority, while in 2022, he described Liz Truss’ disastrous mini-budget as the ‘best Conservative budget since 1986’.
On policy, Reform UK also echoes the Conservatives having committed to reimplementing austerity, a flagship policy of the last Tory government. Like the Conservatives, Reform UK’s MPs have voted against strengthening workers rights and like some within the Conservative Party, Farage has previously called for changing the NHS to a more US-style insurance model.
Worryingly, on Europe, the Reform UK leader has pledged to undo any deals Keir Starmer agrees with the European Union (EU), and insisted he would “not honour any clause” put in place by Brussels in a bid to prevent this - at yet more unnecessary cost to the UK public.
A recent study undertaken by Best for Britain found that highlighting Farage’s plans for the economy, the NHS and workers rights are the most effective in convincing prospective Reform UK voters to reconsider.
Naomi Smith, Chief Executive of Best for Britain, said:
“Nigel Farage paints Reform UK as a new insurgency party - undoing the mistakes of mainstream politics. Quick to criticise the fourteen years of Tory austerity, mismanagement, and chaos - Farage is even quicker to welcome them into his party with open arms.
“With swathes of former Conservatives joining the ranks and the threat of doubling down on the damage of Brexit, it’s clear Farage is simply running the failed Tory Party in disguise.”