Skip to main content
Advertise Buy the paper Contact us Shop Subscribe Support us
What is the real threat from Reform UK?
With far-right parties making major gains recently in Europe, it’s worth paying close scrutiny to Farage’s party and taking the threat it poses seriously, writes DIANE ABBOTT

THERE are only two people who can realistically be prime minister on July 5. One of them is Rishi Sunak and the other is Keir Starmer. For innumerable reasons, I would far rather it was Keir Starmer and fervently hope that is the outcome.

But this is a very strange election. The traditional polling is highly consistent (the MRP polls are a different matter). They generally show the Labour party polling in the low 40s, while the Tories are stuck around 20 per cent. That is around half of their vote recorded in the 2019 general election.

All other parties, bar one, are showing very modest gains or losses except one. That is Reform UK. (Of course in Scotland, the picture is quite a bit different, but that is a separate story).

Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
Features / 11 January 2025
11 January 2025
There are unique dangers from Trump’s second term, from his territorial ambitions and corporate power grab to the global emboldening of hard-right forces championed by his consigliere Elon Musk, writes DIANE ABBOTT MP
Features / 28 December 2024
28 December 2024
Britain’s best option after the new president is sworn in in January is to simply opt out of his warmongering and demands for military spending, and make our own trade deals independent of the US for once, writes DIANE ABBOTT MP
Features / 13 December 2024
13 December 2024
For its own good the Labour government should take a radical, progressive approach to investing in public services instead of tinkering around the edges, argues DIANE ABBOTT
Features / 30 November 2024
30 November 2024
DIANE ABBOTT MP condemns the government’s vicious attack on benefits that callously denies the pandemic’s impact on the working class while pushing vulnerable people into unsuitable work through punitive measures
Similar stories
Eyes Left / 10 December 2024
10 December 2024
From boozy banker renegade to man-of-the-people populist, Farage’s evolution continues — if he can win constituencies like the Welsh mining areas, the left will need new and better answers, writes ANDREW MURRAY
Features / 1 August 2024
1 August 2024
In the first of two pieces, NICK WRIGHT examines the rise of Reform UK and its parallels with France’s National Rally, warning of the dangers that lie ahead for a left without convincing answers to rising anti-immigration sentiment
Features / 9 July 2024
9 July 2024
Communist Party leader ROBERT GRIFFITHS dissects the election results, looking at all of the political spectrum, from the hard right to the far left, and assesses the political landscape it reveals