Farage isn’t very popular right now
Following criticism of Nigel Farage’s leadership by one of his own MPs, his leadership has also been called into question by Reform UK voters.
A third of Reform voters feel the party would be better off without Nigel Farage at the helm.
A YouGov survey conducted on Sunday and Monday found 21% of Reform UK’s voters believe the party would be doing “a lot better” without Farage, while another 12% think it would be doing a “little better”.
Nonetheless, this is against another third of Reform UK voters (34%) who believe that the party would be doing worse if Farage was not the leader.
A quarter feel that a different leader would not affect the party’s fortunes either way.
In a Daily Mail interview published last Thursday, Reform’s Rupert Lowe publicly criticised Farage’s leadership and voiced doubts about whether he has what it takes to be prime minister.
The next day, Farage suspended Lowe from the party, meaning he will now sit as an independent MP while an investigation is carried out. Reform also reported him to the police for alleged misconduct.
Lowe has been accused of bullying two female colleagues, and, separately, of making threats of physical violence against the party’s chair, Zia Yusuf. He has denied all allegations made against him.
Political commentator Michael Crick has described Farage as a ‘dictator’ of whichever party he leads.
Crick told Times radio that the very public bust up Farage was having with Rupert Lowe is just one example of Farage’s inability to “work with other big leader figures” and his “dictator” style leadership.
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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