FORMER Conservative MP Dame Andrea Jenkyns has joined Reform UK and will run to be mayor of Lincolnshire.

Ms Jenkyns joined Reform UK leader Nigel Farage at a press conference where he announced her defection and said she had become the 100,000th member of his party.

She will run for the newly created role of Greater Lincolnshire Mayor in the May local elections.

Mr Farage said his party has approved more than 1,000 candidates for the elections.

The former Tory minister used a photo of Mr Farage on her election campaign leaflet earlier this year — when campaigning to keep her Conservative seat.

Ms Jenkyns said she has “always respected” Mr Farage and noted her work with Richard Tice during Brexit.

She said: “We are politically aligned. I might not be loyal to prime ministers, as we’ve seen in the past, but I’m loyal to parties.”

Ms Jenkyns was a supporter of Brexit and Boris Johnson.

She submitted a no-confidence letter in former prime minister Rishi Sunak last November.

As a Tory, she called for a manifesto pledge to hold a referendum on whether to leave the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).