Who are the Reform Party, where did they come from and what are their policies? (2024)

Nigel Farage has returned to frontline politics to lead Reform UK and stand as a candidate in Clacton.

Founded in 2021 as the re-launch of the Brexit Party, Reform has grown in popularity in the polls at the cost to the Conservatives.

Reform is on the right of the Tory party and is mainly focused on cutting immigration.

Up until recently it had no MPs - gaining its first in March after former Tory deputy chairman Lee Anderson defected following his suspension over comments he made about London Mayor Sadiq Khan.

Mr Anderson is Reform's most high-profile candidate after Mr Farage, who will now be making his eighth attempt to become an MP.

Richard Tice, the former party leader turned chairman, has previously promised to put up a candidate in every seat in England, Scotland and Wales at the general election.

Sky News looks at what the party stands for, where it came from and who are its key players.

Policies

While Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer have put the economy at the front and centre of their pitch to voters, Mr Farage has said he will fight the election on immigration.

His party has proposed a tax on businesses for employing overseas workers.

This would see firms pay a higher 20% rate of National Insurance for foreign workers, up from the current 13.8%.

But it will not apply to health and social care, a major sector for migrant labour, which raises doubts about how much of a dent the policy would make to net migration figures.

Reform is also opposed to Labour's plans to end private school tax exemptions. Mr Tice, who attended the Uppingham independent school, has told The Telegraph he is prepared to escalate a legal challenge up to the European Court of Human Rights - despite his personal opposition to its powers.

In fact, Reform actually wants the UK to leave the European Convention on Human Rights, which the Strasbourg court oversees, in order to use offshore processing centres for illegal immigrants and prevent them from claiming asylum.

On energy, the party wants to scrap net zero plans and instead increase drilling for gas and oil.

Other policies include offering vouchers to go private if you can't see a GP in three days, scrapping interest on student loans, increasing police numbers, keeping "woke ideologies out of the classroom", abolishing the TV licence fee, reforming the Lords and reducing "wasteful spending".

Sky poll tracker - see the state of the parties

Key figures

Multi-millionaire Mr Tice was a Conservative Party member before Brexit.

He was previously Reform's leader but has stepped aside to allow Mr Farage to take up that role.

Mr Farage, the former head of UKIP, had ruled himself out of standing in this general election but made a U-turn after saying he had a "terrible sense of guilt" for not putting himself forward to be a candidate.

He has ruled out doing a deal with the Tories and has set out his goal of effectively taking them over as the official opposition if Labour gets into government, as expected.

Another well-known Reform UK supporter is Ann Widdecombe, who was previously a Conservative MP and minister.

And former Tory MP Lucy Allen, who is not contesting her seat in Telford, has also quit the Conservatives and thrown her weight behind Reform's candidate in that constituency.

Where did the party come from?

Before the party was called Reform UK, it was known as the Brexit Party.

This was a single-issue party which campaigned for the UK to leave the European Union without a deal.

At the 2019 election, the party struck a deal with the Conservatives where they did not field any candidates in seats the Tories had won in 2017. It did not win any seats - and Mr Farage has since accused the Tories of a "betrayal" for failing to deliver on Brexit.

Read more:
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After the party's re-brand in 2021, Mr Farage and Mr Tice said Reform would pivot away from being a single-issue pressure group on Europe and take on what it saw as "powerful vested interests", identifying the House of Lords and the BBC in particular.

How has Reform fared in the polls?

Reform has had limited electoral success so far, securing just 10 council seats at the last few local elections. It also had no MPs until the defection of Mr Anderson in Ashford earlier this year, with by-elections in which they fielded candidates faring poor results.

However, things started to tick up following the collapse of the Boris Johnson and Liz Truss administrations and Reform has now gone from having less support than the Greens and the SNP to sitting level pegging with the Lib Dems.

In the recent by-election in Blackpool South, which Labour took from the Tories, Reform came in third with just 117 votes less than the ruling party.

If this trend is replicated when voters go to the polls at the general election on 4 July, it means Reform could deny the Tories a win by taking a slice of their support.

And in areas like Clacton where big figures are standing, the party could even win its first MP.