Reform UK

Reform UK
LeaderNigel Farage
Deputy LeaderRichard Tice
ChairmanDavid Bull
Founders
Founded23 November 2018 (2018-11-23) as The Brexit Party Limited
HeadquartersMillbank Tower, 21-24 Millbank, London, SW1P 4QP[1]
Devolved branchesReform UK Scotland
Reform UK Wales
Membership (May 2025)Increase 230,000+[2]
Ideology
Political positionRight-wing[6]
AffiliatesReform Derby[7]
Bolton for Change[8]
Northern Irish affiliationReform UK–TUV alliance
Colours    Turquoise and white
SloganBritain is broken. Britain needs Reform.[9]
House of Commons
5 / 650
House of Lords
0 / 836
Scottish Parliament
0 / 129
Senedd
0 / 60
London Assembly
1 / 25
Directly elected regional mayors in England
2 / 14
Directly elected single authority mayors in England
0 / 13
Councillors[10][11]
837 / 18,645
Councils led[12]
12 / 370
PCCs and PFCCs
0 / 37
Website
reformparty.uk

Reform UK is a right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom. Nigel Farage has been Leader of Reform UK and Richard Tice deputy leader since 2024. It has five members of Parliament (MPs) in the House of Commons and one member of the London Assembly. It also controls twelve local councils. Farage's resumption of the leadership before the 2024 general election led to a sharp increase in support for it and it won the third-largest share of the popular vote, with 14.3 per cent. It is one of the two major right wing parties in the UK, alongside the Conservative Party.

Founded in 2018 as the Brexit Party, advocating a no-deal Brexit, it won the most seats at the 2019 European Parliament election in the UK, but did not win any seats at the 2019 general election. The UK withdrew from the European Union (EU) in January 2020. In January 2021, the party was renamed Reform UK. During the COVID-19 pandemic it advocated against further lockdowns. Since 2022 it has campaigned on a broader platform, pledging to limit immigration, reduce taxation and opposing net-zero emissions.[13][14][15][16]

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, and returned to frontline politics as the leader of the Brexit Party after the 2016 EU membership referendum, which had been called partly in response to UKIP's influence.[17][18][19] The party won 29 seats at the May 2019 European Parliament election, the best result for any single party in the ninth European Parliament. The Brexit Party campaigned for a no-deal Brexit, and there were high-profile defections to it from the Conservative Party, including Ann Widdecombe and Annunziata Rees-Mogg.[20] Following Boris Johnson's election as Leader of the Conservative Party, Farage offered him an electoral pact at the 2019 general election, which Johnson rejected. The Brexit Party decided unilaterally not to stand candidates against sitting Conservative MPs.

By May 2020, with Brexit having taken place, the party focused on the reformation of British democracy. A name change from "Brexit Party" to "Reform Party" was proposed.[21][22][23] The COVID-19 pandemic began in the UK in 2020, and the Conservative government imposed a series of national lockdowns. Farage rebranded it as Reform UK around the end of the year and focused on anti-lockdown campaigning.[24][25] Farage stepped down as leader in 2021 and was succeeded by Tice. In 2024, Lee Anderson, who was elected in 2019 as a Conservative MP, defected to Reform UK, becoming its first MP.[26] On 3 June 2024 Tice announced that Farage would become leader once more, with Tice continuing as chairman.[27] It won five seats at the 2024 general election – the first time that Reform UK had MPs elected to the House of Commons.

  1. ^ "Reform UK Registration". Electoral Commission. Retrieved 1 October 2024.
  2. ^ Akhtar, Parveen (9 May 2025). "Zia Yusuf: the British Muslim driving Reform's transformation into an election winner". The Conversation. Retrieved 15 May 2025.
  3. ^ Boscia, Stefan (27 April 2023). "Trump who? Farage's party cozies up to DeSantis as White House hopeful lands in UK". Politico. Retrieved 27 April 2023.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference BBC, February 2024 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference Associated Press, June 2024 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ [3][4][5]
  7. ^ "Reform Derby – Change Politics for Good".
  8. ^ "View registration – the Electoral Commission".
  9. ^ "BRITAIN IS BROKEN. BRITAIN NEEDS REFORM". Reform Party UK. 23 December 2024. Retrieved 23 December 2024.
  10. ^ "Councillors for Reform UK". Open Council Data UK. Retrieved 8 June 2025.
  11. ^ "Open Council Data UK (Councillors Breakdown by Party Latest)". opencouncildata.co.uk.
  12. ^ "Open Council Data UK". opencouncildata.co.uk.
  13. ^ "All of Farage's Reform UK pledges on immigration – and how the Tories compare". i (newspaper). 14 June 2024.
  14. ^ Curtice, John (16 February 2024). "John Curtice: By-election results leave Tories with mountain to climb". BBC News. Retrieved 7 May 2024.
  15. ^ Scott, Geraldine. "Tories fear Nigel Farage and Reform UK could deliver a red wall rout". The Times. Archived from the original on 14 December 2022. Retrieved 13 December 2022.
  16. ^ Kenyon, Megan (7 May 2025). "Reform faces an uphill battle in power". New Statesman. Retrieved 8 May 2025.
  17. ^ Matthew Goodwin and Caitlin Milazzo (2015), UKIP: Inside the Campaign to Redraw the Map of British Politics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 126.
  18. ^ Matt Reed (2016), "'This Loopy Idea': An Analysis of UKIP's Social Media Discourse in Relation to Rurality and Climate Change", Space and Polity, 20(2), pp. 226–241.
  19. ^ Mammone, Andrea (19 July 2024). "Does Reform UK's election success signal a far-right future for Britain?". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 13 February 2025.
  20. ^ "Rees-Mogg elected Brexit Party MEP". BBC News. 27 May 2019. Archived from the original on 31 January 2021. Retrieved 31 May 2019.
  21. ^ "Could Farage's 'Reform Party' carve him a new role in post-Brexit British politics". ConservativeHome. 25 November 2019. Archived from the original on 19 May 2021. Retrieved 12 May 2020.
  22. ^ "General election 2019: Farage promises Reform Party after Brexit". BBC News. 8 December 2019. Archived from the original on 22 August 2021. Retrieved 12 May 2020.
  23. ^ "Nigel Farage planning to launch new political party". The New European. 6 March 2020. Archived from the original on 10 August 2020. Retrieved 12 May 2020.
  24. ^ Skopeliti, Clea (2 November 2020). "Reform UK: Brexit party to rebrand as anti-lockdown voice". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 18 April 2021. Retrieved 2 November 2020.
  25. ^ "Nigel Farage: Brexit Party to focus on fighting lockdown". BBC News. 2 November 2020. Archived from the original on 6 May 2021. Retrieved 2 November 2020.
  26. ^ "Lee Anderson: Ex-Tory MP defects to Reform UK". BBC News. 11 March 2024. Retrieved 11 March 2024.
  27. ^ "Nigel Farage confirms he WILL stand for Reform in election as he becomes party leader". The National. 3 June 2024.

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