Reform UK has been polling ahead of both Britain’s ruling Labour Party and the opposition Conservatives in the run-up to Thursday’s local elections, with the anti-immigration insurgents on course to make sweeping gains across England.
Led by pro-Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage, Reform UK has surged in opinion polls largely due to its hardline stance on immigration. The party has vowed mass deportations if it wins the next general election, not due until 2029.
More than 5,000 council seats are up for grabs in Thursday’s vote. According to think tank More in Common, Reform could win between 1,200 and 1,600 seats across England, having already taken a 40 per cent share in 2025’s smaller local polls.
The right-wing party’s mantra of “Vote Reform, Get Starmer out” could help it make inroads into traditional Labour and Conservative strongholds. Polls predict it could inflict a major blow to both Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour Party and the opposition Conservatives.
For months, Reform has led the polls on around 26 per cent, compared to the Conservatives on 19 per cent and Labour on 18 per cent, according to pollsters YouGov. The eco-populist Greens are polling at 15 per cent, higher than in past elections.
Farage won a parliamentary seat in 2024 and the party now holds eight seats in the House of Commons after gaining a host of councils and seats in local elections last year.
In Braintree, a small town in Essex, southeast England, with a population of about 45,000, immigration has become a flashpoint since a nearby former airbase was refurbished to house asylum seekers.
“The UK has been flooded with illegal immigrants that shouldn’t be here. They’re all claiming benefits… It’s costing us an absolute fortune,” said Robert Robinson, 70, a former Conservative voter, who said he was “leaning” towards backing Reform.
The arrival of irregular migrants on small boats across the English Channel has been a hot-button political issue in Britain for years.
Conservative defector Robert Jenrick, a minister in the previous Tory government, has been campaigning on Reform’s distinctive turquoise bus across Essex. Jenrick told AFP people felt the old parties had “failed them massively, let them down”.
“Immigration too high, taxes too high. Nothing seems to be working, from the potholes in the road to waiting lists for the NHS, and they come into Reform for real change,” he said.
Reform is also expected to perform well in Wales and Scotland in Thursday’s vote for the devolved parliaments. “The truth is the Conservative Party will disappear [after the polls] as a national party,” Farage told the Standard.
Still reeling from a historic national defeat to Labour in 2024, the Conservatives have been battling to stem the tide. Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has vowed the party has changed and hit out at Farage, saying he “changes his mind constantly” and “is not someone who plays by the rules”.
Reform has also attracted controversy, with several of its candidates criticised for racist and xenophobic remarks. The party’s track record in office is mixed: in southeastern Kent, run by Reform since 2025, it has been forced to abandon promises to cut local taxes and has faced criticism for trimming certain social spending.
Farage, who openly describes himself as a friend of US President Donald Trump, has also been questioned over an undeclared £5 million (€5.85 million) donation from a cryptocurrency magnate.
