FORMER Conservative culture secretary Nadine Dorries declared that the “Tory Party is dead” today as she announced her defection to Reform UK at the start of its party conference.

The 68-year-old is the highest-profile Conservative to join Reform, following defections by former party chairman Sir Jake Berry, former Wales secretary David Jones and Dame Andrea Jenkyns.

Writing in the Daily Mail, Ms Dorries said: “The time for action is now and I believe that the only politician who has the answers, the knowledge and the will to deliver is Nigel Farage.”

Two other Tory ex-cabinet ministers are also set to attend the conference, with Michael Gove due to interview senior Reform figure Zia Yusuf and Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg joining a panel discussion.

A Labour Party spokesperson said: “Nadine Dorries says the Tory Party is dead — as one of the people who helped to kill it, she should know.

“She backed Boris Johnson through thick and thin, despite the partying in Downing Street during the pandemic while people couldn’t see their loved ones. And now she wants to help unleash the same chaos the Tories inflicted on Britain by joining Nigel Farage’s Reform.”

Ms Dorries stepped down as an MP in 2023, accusing then leader Rishi Sunak of “demeaning his office by opening the gates to whip up a public frenzy” against her and abandoning “the fundamental principles of Conservatism.”

She claimed today that her decision to leave the Tory Party was “possibly the most difficult I’ve ever had to make” and had taken her “12 agonising months to reach,” while adding that her “core beliefs” were the same as when she first joined the Conservatives in 1995.