Former Conservative chancellor Nadhim Zahawi has become the latest – and most senior – Tory to defect to Reform UK.
The ex-MP and vaccines minister during the COVID pandemic said the UK was “drinking at the last chance saloon” and “really does need Nigel Farage as prime minister”.
Having served under the four latest Conservative prime ministers, including as chancellor for two months under Boris Johnson, he is the most senior former Tory MP to join Reform.
He is also the 20th ex-Conservative MP to defect since March 2024.
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Announcing his move at a news conference on Monday, alongside Reform leader Mr Farage, the Iraqi refugee said he switched because the Conservative Party is a “defunct brand” that could no longer form the next government.
A Conservative source told Sky News that Mr Zahawi, who stood down as an MP in 2024, had asked the Tories for a peerage several times, including in the last few months ahead of the most recent political peerages list.
However, he was told this was “never going to happen” as he was sacked as Tory party chairman by then-prime minister Rishi Sunak in 2023 for failing to declare he was being investigated by HMRC over his tax affairs.
Mr Zahawi told Sky News that was “not true” and he has a message “from the top” about wanting to give him a peerage and that Tory leader Kemi Badenoch and her team would contact him in 2026.
He said Ms Badenoch and her team “came for help and advice” and asked him to meet her husband, Hamish Badenoch, twice because he said he is “taking charge at CCHQ (Conservative Campaign Headquarters)”.
The businessman insisted he had been given “no promises at all” about what role he would have in Reform – but did not rule out becoming a Reform MP or peer.
Read more:
Who is Nadhim Zahawi? Former child refugee to top Tory to Reform defector
