Reform UK
Political party in the United Kingdom / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Reform UK is a right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom. It was founded by Catherine Blaiklock with support from Nigel Farage in November 2018 as the Brexit Party, advocating hard Euroscepticism and a no-deal Brexit. It was a significant political force at the 2019 European Parliament election, but failed to win any seats at the 2019 general election. After the UK's withdrawal from the European Union (EU) on 31 January 2020, it was renamed to Reform UK, and it became primarily an anti-lockdown party during the COVID-19 pandemic.[8] Since 2022, the party has campaigned on a platform of broader right-wing populist issues, chiefly surrounding illegal migration and the government’s Net Zero energy policy.[9]
Reform UK | |
---|---|
Leader | Richard Tice |
Chairman | Richard Tice |
Co-Deputy Leaders | David Bull Ben Habib |
Honorary President | Nigel Farage[1][2] |
Founders |
|
Founded | 23 November 2018; 5 years ago (2018-11-23) as the Brexit Party |
Split from | UK Independence Party (UKIP) |
Headquarters | 83 Victoria Street London SW1 0HW[3] |
Devolved branches | Reform UK Scotland Reform UK Wales |
Ideology | Right-wing populism Euroscepticism |
Political position | Right-wing[4] |
Affiliates | Reform Derby[5] Bolton for Change[6] |
Northern Irish affiliation | |
Colours | Turquoise and white |
Slogan | Let’s Save Britain |
House of Commons | 1 / 650 |
Local government[7] | 10 / 18,725 |
Website | |
reformparty.uk | |
Farage had been the leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), a right-wing populist and Eurosceptic party, in the first half of the 2010s. He returned to frontline politics as leader of the Brexit Party during the lengthy Brexit process after the 2016 EU membership referendum, which had been called partly in response to UKIP's influence.[10][11] The Brexit Party campaigned for a no-deal Brexit, and won high-profile defections from the Conservative Party, including Ann Widdecombe and Annunziata Rees-Mogg.[12] It also won some endorsements from some left-wing supporters of Brexit, including George Galloway.[13] Following the election of the leading Brexit campaigner Boris Johnson as Leader of the Conservative Party, Farage offered him an electoral pact at the 2019 general election; the offer was rejected, but the Brexit Party unilaterally decided not to stand candidates in constituencies won by the Conservatives in the previous election. The Brexit Party failed to win any seats at the 2019 general election.
By May 2020, because it had styled itself as being focused on the reformation of British democracy, there were proposals to rebrand the Brexit Party as the Reform Party.[14][15][16] The COVID-19 pandemic began in the UK in 2020, and the Conservative government imposed a national lockdown to slow the spread of COVID-19. Farage rebranded the party as Reform UK around the end of the year to focus on anti-lockdown campaigning.[17][18] He stepped down as the leader in March 2021, and was succeeded by Richard Tice. Lee Anderson, who was elected in 2019 as a Conservative MP, defected to the party in March 2024, becoming the party's first and only Member of Parliament (MP).[19]