Nigel Farage has vowed to go “double or quits” on May’s local elections with a spending blitz of £5m.
The Reform UK leader has described the upcoming vote as “the single most important event between now and the general election”, expected in 2029, and acknowledged that “people would ask questions” about his leadership if the party’s poll lead did not translate into election wins.
He also addressed claims from his contemporaries at school that he used antisemitic language, which he has previously denied, saying the reporting might be “solidifying” the party’s support.
Voters will go to the polls on Thursday 7 May for elections for 5,036 council seats across 136 local authorities in England, while voters in Scotland and Wales will elect a new Scottish Parliament and Senedd.
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Reform’s initial internal target for the local elections in England was to win 1,000 seats – but that goal could be stymied after the government announced that it will examine requests from 63 local authorities to delay votes in their areas due to the local government reorganisation plan.
Nonetheless, Mr Farage told The Times newspaper that his party will be throwing everything at winning, saying: “It’s double or quits. As far as I’m concerned we are just going to go for it.
“If we come out of it without a single penny in the bank account and everyone is exhausted … It is the single most important event between now and the general election.
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“On it depends the future of our prime minister, the future of the leader of the opposition and indeed my own relative strength or otherwise as leader of Reform. If we bombed people would ask questions. My entire focus and energy is on the planning and preparation for it.”
Reform UK intends to spend £5m over the next four months on direct mail and social media ahead of the elections – a spending blitz made possible by former Conservative donor Christopher Harborne handing the party £9m, which is one of the largest in political history.
Mr Farage said: “You will see a big emphasis on social media. If you look at where most of our support has come from since the election, the biggest single increase in our vote is from people who did not vote in the general election of 2024.
“Our key audience is people who did not vote, to motivate them to get registered and offer them a fundamental change.”
The broad slogan of the campaign will be “Britain is broken, Britain needs Reform”, and the key themes will be law and order, the cost of living and migration.
The law and order message will be particularly focused on outer London, where it is “the dominant issue”, Mr Farage said.
The Reform UK leader also briefly addressed accusations (that he denies) that he used racist and antisemitic language while at school, saying the reports will not have an impact because the reports in the “mainstream media” are seen as an attack on him.
“It’s having zero effect,” he said. “It’s maybe solidifying our core support.”
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Party leaders under pressure
The focus of all parties has turned very much towards the elections in May, with the outcome potentially pivotal to the future of Sir Keir Starmer’s premiership, and Kemi Badenoch’s leadership of the Conservative Party.
Sir Keir in particular is under pressure, given Labour’s dire position in the polls, and there are suggestions that he could face a challenge from the likes of Health Secretary Wes Streeting, former deputy prime minister Angela Rayner, or Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham – although he would need to win a seat in parliament first.
The prime minister is expected to be public-facing next week to explain what the government is doing to ease the cost of living and improve public services, having vowed in his New Year’s message that the change he promised in July 2024 will finally be delivered.
Ms Badenoch, meanwhile, needs to prove to her party that she is starting to turn around their fortunes following the devastating general election defeat.
In a nod towards May’s critical test, she said in her own New Year’s message: “Things can change, but you also need to vote for the change you want to see in 2026.”
If not, she could face yet more humiliating defections to Reform UK, and potentially a leadership challenge from her former rival and shadow justice secretary, Robert Jenrick.
The Liberal Democrats’ leader, Sir Ed Davey, also needs to show that he has built on 2024’s historic general election success for the party, and can take on Reform UK at the local level.
