Farage sidestepping question about Tory switch shows he's a key figure

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There’s no faulting the scale of Reform UK’s ambition – but just how much does this really matter?

Their proposed policies come with a spending tag of an eyewatering £141bn a year – some thirty times the size of Labour’s plans, 10 times the amount of additional spending proposed by the Tories and more than three times the ambition of Liz Truss.

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Energy companies would be partly nationalised in Reform’s Britain, while they would somehow find 30,000 new permanent members of the armed forces and raise the starting rate of income tax to £20,000.

But there is a serious question over whether the 24-page contract is worth the paper it’s written on.

This is no particular disrespect to Reform UK: This is the same issue facing the Greens, Lib Dems and even the Tories.

With little chance of Downing Street beckoning for their respective leaders, why spend so long on policy that will never be used?

Indeed Nigel Farage, the party’s leader, is admirably candid – there is no expectation of a win next month, and therefore he claims these ideas are a blueprint for the 2029 election.

Farage is setting his sights on five years of Reform UK showing its mettle opposing both the expected Labour government and what Farage hopes is a hollowed-out Conservative Party.

That is the claim – at the moment.

But there are even more searching questions awaiting Farage – for now the tormentor in chief of the Tories – after 4 July.