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Has Reform peaked?

(14 Posts)
Cumbrianmale56 Thu 06-Aug-26 08:02:22

I notice Reform UK has gone from 30% in the polls to 23% now. I think revelations about Farage's business dealings and personality have damaged the party, and Labour electing a Northern leader is reducing support for Reform in the North.
While I can understand the frustrations with the two main parties and their unsuccessful governments, Farage is someone who promises too much like sweeping tax cuts and whosr party doesn't seem straight up.
Also on the other side of the spectrum, the Greens seem to be falling back from 17% in some polls in May to 10% now. Perhaps voters have seen that both Reform and the Greens are too extreme and have questionable leaders.

Maremia Thu 06-Aug-26 08:05:21

The Clacton voting patterns may shed some light on this soon enough.

Allsorts Thu 06-Aug-26 08:09:25

I think the answer is peaked and dropping.

fancythat Thu 06-Aug-26 08:09:39

Not sure about that.
There are 34 candidates.
Most are independent.

fancythat Thu 06-Aug-26 08:10:03

To maremia post

Whitewavemark2 Thu 06-Aug-26 08:11:41

Farage will of course be returned, but my bet with a vastly reduced majority.

Most of what this slippery eel has been up to has yet to be revealed, and as the revelations appear his stock will gradually disappear.

I suspect he will once again disappear from politics.

M0nica Thu 06-Aug-26 08:22:28

Farage and Polanski, two of a kind. Chancers who got lucky

Whitewavemark2 Thu 06-Aug-26 08:29:38

Just so. But Farage has been amazingly lucky given his history.

Polenski appears as one of the world innocents - in way above his abilities.

They are very different characters.

Wyllow3 Thu 06-Aug-26 08:36:18

Well Farage has a clear history of starting parties off and then they have faded away or splits have happened. In the meantime he has made a great deal of money as an MP (leaving aside dodgy gifts) with GB news and other ventures and guest appearances here and there when he was supposed to be working as an MP.
I think there is a real chance he will repeat the pattern of the past.

I think thats very perceptive WWM in terms of Polanski. Bright, he does care, but not enough political experience to make best choices for the Greens.

Many I know still stay with the Greens because goodness knows we need action on climate change:

but that lack of experience is not doing good service to the key messages of the "Greens"

Kandinsky Thu 06-Aug-26 08:43:36

Well, we’ve got a new PM now who is going to make everything better and wonderful. No need for anyone else.

NotSpaghetti Thu 06-Aug-26 08:45:11

Independent... or Reform supporters, fancythat!

MaizieD Thu 06-Aug-26 08:48:24

I am still quite puzzled as to why the media, which has given him the very easiest of rides for more than a decade, has turned against him.

Cossy Thu 06-Aug-26 09:02:47

M0nica

Farage and Polanski, two of a kind. Chancers who got lucky

Maybe, but two entirely different people, I don’t class them in the same bracket. In my opinion Polanski’s misdemeanours are foolish and he is totally out of his depth.

For many years Farage has been involved in politics, he has been dishonest and divisive and caused huge rifts in our country.

For me, they are not cut from the same cloth.

MaizieD Thu 06-Aug-26 09:05:14

Kandinsky

Well, we’ve got a new PM now who is going to make everything better and wonderful. No need for anyone else.

Well, to be fair, the same sort of belief seemed to motivate a great many Reform voters; Nigel was going to make everything better. It was, if you like, an equally irrational belief and one that is easily transferable from one politician/party to another.

Where poor old Nige has lost out is that he’s never been in a position where he can make everything better so he’s lost the voters who are happy to transfer that belief to someone who is in a position to do so.

Reflecting on every election of my reasonably long lifetime has usually produced the conclusion that the winner is the one who has convinced enough voters that they are going to make everything better for them; the voters themselves don’t really care how the winner intends to do it.