British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak vowed to supplant the Conservatives as the main right-wing party.
London:
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will say on Monday that only his Conservatives can thwart a Labour-led government and that a vote for Nigel Farage’s right-wing Reform UK would hamper any chance of his party forming a strong opposition.
Sunak appears close to conceding defeat before Thursday’s election and will appeal to voters on the political right who are considering voting for Farage’s party in protest against his Conservative government.
The Conservatives appear likely to be removed from office after fourteen turbulent years, marked by Britain’s decision to leave the European Union in 2016 and the cost of living crisis that followed the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Opinion polls have consistently given Keir Starmer’s centre-left Labor Party a lead of around 20 points, with support for reform potentially splitting the centre-right vote and further chipping away at conservative support for the centrist Liberal Democrats.
Sunak will say at a meeting that the reform “simply won’t win enough seats to oppose Labour”, saying the party had previously said it would be good to get a handful of MPs elected.
“Imagine that: hundreds and hundreds of Labor MPs opposed by just ‘one, two, three, four, five elected MPs’,” Sunak will say, according to excerpts from his speech.
“A Labor government would be bad for our country, and an unchecked Labor government would be a disaster from which it would take decades to recover.”
Farage is one of Britain’s most recognizable and divisive politicians. He has spoken out against the establishment and the European Union for decades, and has campaigned for Donald Trump in the United States in recent years.
He took part in the elections in early June and promised to supplant the Conservatives as the main right-wing party.
Polls show that support for the reforms peaked in the second half of June, shortly before Farage said the West had provoked Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Some of his candidates have been ousted for racist or inappropriate comments.
Although the British electoral system allows Reform to win millions of votes, it is unlikely that the party will win more than a handful of seats in parliament. But that could be enough to split the right in many areas and hand victory to Labour.
Britain is likely to elect a centre-left government as much of Europe swings to the right, including in France, where Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally won the first round of parliamentary elections on Sunday.
With polls showing many voters remain undecided, Sunak will make a final appeal to people to limit Labor’s power if Labor comes into government. He says, “We Conservatives will stand up for you and ensure your voice is heard and your values are represented.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
