A leading pollster has warned that if Nigel Farage’s Reform UK and the Tories were to form a pact they would be “unassailable” at the next election based on current surveys.
Techne UK’s chief executive Michela Morizzo made her comment as the company’s latest weekly tracker poll for The Independent had close to a three-way split at the top with Labour on 25 per cent (down 1), just one point ahead of the Tories (down 1) and Reform UK (up 1) both on 24 per cent.
It meant that the combined centre right vote in the UK is 48 per cent, which if brought together would reset British politics.
Meanwhile, the Lib Dems were also up one to 13 per cent while the Greens remained level on 7 per cent.
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Ms Morizzo’s observations came less than 24 hours after Reform UK’s former deputy leader Ben Habib became the first senior figure associated with the party to reveal that Mr Farage’s plan has always been to force a merger or pact with the Tories.
He told a podcast with economist Mark Littlewood for Popular Conservatism (Popcon), that Mr Farage’s strategy was to have “a strong negotiating hand” by 2028.
He said: “Nigel’s aim is to set up the best possible negotiating position he can between now and 2028 for the Conservative Party. Take as many Conservative MPs, grassroots, members, candidates, councillors, whatever. Weaken the tory party as much as he possibly can, get to 2028 and then he will try and do a deal. If he succeeds and gets very strong he will do that deal from a position of strength.”
Privately allies of Mr Farage have also told The Independent he wants to “engineer a reverse takeover” of the Tories with Reform UK.
The latest Techne findings have revealed that Reform UK is picking up a lot of support from other parties. This includes more than one in four (26 per cent) Tory voters from the 2024 election, and one in seven (14 per cent) of Lib Dem voters from the election.
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Ms Morizzo described the collapse in Labour’s support just seven months after being elected as almost unprecedented.
She said: “The Labour Party decline continues this week with Sir Keir Starmer’s party losing another point in national vote share dropping down to just 25 per cent. This in itself is an almost unheard of low polling share for a governing party, particularly as it has only held power for just seven months.
“Once again this highlights that Kemi Badenoch is still struggling to give her party a strong and well defined vision. Further to this it is once again Reform UK who are growing in national vote share to 24 per cent. This is now truly a three-way split for these three parties.”
However, she added: “Finally one must also note that the centre right of the Conservatives and Reform UK if placed together hold an unassailable 48 per cent. What will this scenario lead to? Only time will tell.”
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