29 councillors defect to Reform as Farage attempts to moves on from infighting

Nigel Farage has announced that more than two dozen councillors across the country have defected to Reform UK, as he attempts to put a bust-up in his parliamentary ranks behind him.

The party leader said the fallout with Rupert Lowe had caused “some consternation”, but insisted “that upset is very much at the edges”.

Mr Lowe, who was elected to his Great Yarmouth seat last year, was suspended by Reform UK amid accusations about his conduct, which he has strenuously denied.

The Metropolitan Police has also launched an investigation into “verbal threats” allegedly made by Mr Lowe.

Mr Farage announced more than two dozen councillors had joined the party during the period of “turbulence”, with defections from the Tories and the Liberal Democrats.

“Today, I am going to show you the extent to which we are broadening and deepening the party across the country,” he said.

“In the last two weeks, we’ve not been obsessing about what’s being written in the papers, or being said online.

“We’ve been getting on with the job.”

Addressing the clash with Mr Lowe, the Reform leader added: “You might have noticed that we have been through a little bit of turbulence over the course of the last couple of weeks.

“We’ve been increasingly concerned about the behaviour of one of our Members of Parliament, and when we found out that some serious complaints have gone in, we thought, you know what, let’s just suspend the whip and let’s find out what the truth is, and we will wait … we will get the report from the independent King’s Council.”

Mr Farage said he did not “know exactly when that’s going to be” but that “it might happen during the course of this week”.

He added: “Has it caused some consternation? Of course it has – any argument that’s seen to happen within the family does, but I can promise you that in terms of our progress and our planning, that upset is very much at the edges.”

Speaking to journalists after the announcement, the party leader sought to downplay splits within the party.

It was put to him that Reform was “riven with infighting”, to which he replied: “No, it’s not.

“At the edges there’s concern, but you’ve just seen 29 people, enthused, leaving parties they’ve been elected for or represented, standing for us … I can find you would-be voters that will raise all sorts of concerns, but no, it’s very much at the edges. It’s marginal.”

Mr Farage denied that he “politically assassinates” his rivals following suggestions made by Mr Lowe that he was ousted because he threatened to overshadow the party leader.

“They normally do it to themselves,” Mr Farage said.

Internal splits within the party, which had five MPs elected at the last election, opened up earlier this month when Mr Lowe told the Daily Mail that Reform remained a “protest party led by the Messiah” under Mr Farage.

The party later stripped him of the whip while an inquiry was carried out into allegations about his behaviour.

The 67-year-old has said there is “zero credible evidence” against him and suggested his suspension is linked to his criticism of the party leader.

Elsewhere, Mr Farage hit out at “online abuse” and “outright, overt racism” which he said had been shown against the party chairman Zia Yusuf, saying it would have been a “major national story” if targeted at a member of Labour or the Tories.

“It’s awful, pretty nasty stuff,” he said. “I’m appalled by some of the things that have been said about our chairman.”

It was also put to Mr Farage that Elon Musk, the tech billionaire and key figure in Donald Trump’s White House who was previously rumoured to be considering a significant donation to Reform, was now open to giving money to a different political party.

“Great, thank you,” the party leader said in response.