A leading political analyst has declared that Nigel Farage’s Reform UK movement is on the brink of orchestrating Britain’s largest political realignment in over a century, as voters prepare for pivotal local elections this week.
Sir John Curtice, a research fellow at the National Centre for Social Research, said the traditional two-party dominance in Westminster is fracturing, with five major parties now vying for influence. In an interview with the Financial Times, Curtice said, “Politics is no longer one-dimensional… The conditions are there for the biggest challenge to the political conventions of British politics since the 1920s,” referencing the historical collapse of the Liberal Party and the rise of Labour representing Britain’s working class.
The backdrop to Curtice’s remarks is Thursday’s elections, where voters will decide over 1,600 council seats and six mayoralties across 23 councils. Reform UK, having captured approximately 15 percent of the vote in last year’s general election, has surged in recent polling as public confidence wanes in both Labour and the Conservative Party to address persistent issues like the cost of living and mass migration—issues that Reform argues are deeply interconnected.
Reflecting the deepening disenchantment with establishment parties, Curtice told The Independent that fewer than half of voters now plan to support either Labour or the Conservatives. “It has never been quite that low before,” he stated.
Despite Reform’s limited national campaign experience, Curtice predicted the party would likely secure “a few hundred” council seats and noted that it had already achieved a major victory by organizing a broad slate of candidates. “Evidently, in the limited number of places we have elections, they have managed to create enough of an organisation to find 1,600 candidates, and they are fighting for more seats than any other party. Ukip never got to fighting more than 75 per cent of the wards in 2013, so they have already won an organisational battle,” he said.
The elections, though affecting only about one-third of voters—after the government delayed many contests until next year—will be the first formal opportunity for the public to respond to the Labour government of Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer since it assumed office last July.
Reform has concentrated efforts on traditionally Labour-leaning working-class constituencies, many of which supported Brexit but have grown disillusioned with Labour’s shift toward appealing to multicultural, urban elites. Farage has emphasized Labour’s struggles with stemming illegal immigration and its record on economic matters, particularly the impact of high taxes and stagnant growth.
In a surprising policy departure, Farage has also endorsed nationalizing key industries to protect British jobs. Following efforts by Chinese owners to close the nation’s last major steel-producing plant, Farage supported nationalizing British Steel to safeguard unionized workers. This marked a significant break from his earlier free-market Thatcherite stance. In an interview with Breitbart News, Farage said, “Thatcherite is irrelevant. It’s half a century old…. What I do think has happened over the last few decades is the power of the big corporate companies has got bigger and bigger. Capitalism is dead, it doesn’t exist, we’re living in corporatism. An unholy alliance of big business, big banks, and big government… I genuinely think we won’t get economic growth if the country is dominated by six giant multinationals, none of whom pay tax on-shore.”
Labour faces additional competition from the Green Party, which has attracted voters dissatisfied with Labour’s handling of cultural issues like transgender rights, and from the Liberal Democrats, who have strengthened their position in affluent southern areas such as Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, and Oxfordshire.
Compounding Labour’s challenges, pro-Gaza independent candidates are contesting seats across the country. Disaffected Muslim voters, frustrated with Labour’s response to the Israel-Gaza conflict, have mobilized candidates after Labour lost five seats last year to similar independents, including that of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who was expelled amid allegations of mishandling antisemitism complaints.
Nevertheless, Labour could still achieve a net gain, largely because Reform has siphoned more support from the Conservatives. Tory pollster Lord Hayward warned that the Conservative Party could suffer a dramatic loss, predicting it might forfeit as many as 525 of the more than 900 seats it currently holds, as he told The Standard.
Such an outcome could destabilize Conservative Party leadership under Kemi Badenoch, who has struggled to establish broad public support. Badenoch also faces an internal challenge from Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick, who advocates a sharper rightward turn on immigration policy.
The results of this week’s elections are expected to signal whether Britain is undergoing a profound political transformation—one with implications not seen in over a century.
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