Reform’s Tory defection target breaks silence and takes swipe at attacks against Nigel Farage

Speaking to GB News at the Conservative Party Conference, Mr Rosindell addressed the rumours and fired a warning shot to fellow Tory MPs.

The veteran Tory said: “I’ve made it clear all the way through, and nothing has changed, that I am for the Conservatives and Reform working together.

“We need right-of-centre unity to defeat the left. I am fearful about the future of this country and it’s our duty to make sure there isn’t another Labour, or progressive and left-wing coalition Government in four years’ time.

“If that means the Conservatives and Reform working together, we should do it. I don’t see Reform as our enemies. It’s a split on the right, and we need to come together.”

Mr Rosindell voiced hope at some sort of Tory-Reform alliance on the issue of withdrawing from the European Convention on Human Rights.

“We’re finding common ground,” the 59-year-old European Research Group member explained. “If we can get to the stage that Reform is saying, what we’re saying, in many areas, are similar, then that’s the basis for working together more.”

|

X/RUSSELL QUIRK

GB News understands that a growing number of Conservative MPs are coming around to the idea of an alliance with Reform UK.

However, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch has ruled out a national pact with Reform UK.

Speaking to Welsh Conservatives earlier this year, Mrs Badenoch said: “I have always said that at the national level we are not forming any coalitions or forming any deals or pacts with.”

She added: “Talk of coalitions is politicians talking about how they’re going to win and sort things out for themselves, not for people out there.”

Mr Farage has also ruled out an electoral alliance with the Conservative Party.

The Reform UK leader, who stood down 317 Brexit Party candidates to give sitting Tory MPs a free run against Jeremy Corbyn in 2019, said: “I have never met a more stuck-up, arrogant, out-of-touch group of people, than at least half of the Tory MPs. Stuff, boring old b******s.

“And they should all be in the Lib Dems anyway. They don’t have a single conservative idea among them.”

Despite an alliance on the right remaining unlikely, Mr Rosindell urged his Conservative colleagues to stop hurling insults at Mr Farage and Reform UK.

| PA

Mr Rosindell told GB News: “What we should not be doing is chucking mud at Nigel and there’s too much of that.”

The Romford MP’s warning comes just hours after Shadow Housing Secretary James Cleverly labelled Mr Farage a “socialist” at a late-night drinks reception hosted by the Institute of Economic Affairs.

Directly addressing Mr Cleverly’s attack, the Romford MP said it was a “wholly untrue” allegation and pointed out that the Reform UK leader had been a Tory Party member under Margaret Thatcher’s leadership.

Mr Rosindell is currently expected to lose his seat to Reform UK, recent MRP polls have suggested.

YouGov puts Mr Rosindell just three points behind Reform, with More in Common handing Mr Farage a seven-point advantage.

|

PA

Reform UK’s Romford candidate Philip Hyde finished in third place in the 2024 General Election, securing 9,624 votes.

Meanwhile, Mr Rosindell’s 17,893-vote majority was slashed to just 1,463 as Labour’s vote share increased by five per cent and Conservative support collapsed by 30 per cent.

However, brief speculation about Mr Rosindell potentially defecting to Reform UK comes just weeks after Danny Kruger became the first Tory MP to switch to Mr Farage’s party.

Mr Kruger, who is seen as an intellectual loss to the Tory Party, also joins 17 former Conservative MPs who have switched allegiance to Reform UK.

Mr Farage claimed a defection scalp on the eve of the Conservative Party Conference after veteran London Assembly Member Keith Prince confirmed his decision to join Reform UK on Saturday.