Nigel Farage's Reform UK Claims To Now Have More Party Members Than The Tories

Nigel Farage’s party, Reform UK, claimed this morning that it had surpassed 131,680 members.

According to “Britain’s fastest growing political party”, that means it has more members than the Conservatives.

Based on Reform’s website tracker, numbers did skyrocket this week, shooting up from 120,549 at noon on Monday to exceeding 131,774 by 11am on Thursday.

Farage said earlier this week that his party has “all the momentum in British politics, as our membership numbers show”.

“We are growing at an unprecedented rate and will soon surpass the failed Tories, who are being abandoned after 14 years of deception and failure,” the leader said.

But, it may not be quite as straightforward as that.

While the Tories do not release their membership numbers, the Telegraph put the number of party members eligible to vote in the Conservative leadership race at 131,680 in November, after Kemi Badenoch was elected as leader.

But, the newspaper noted this would be a smaller metric than the overall Tory party membership figures, because new members of the party cannot immediately vote in leadership contests.

They have to be part of the Tories for 90 days before the voting deadline, and have been a member when the leadership nominations opened.

However, Byline Times also estimated in August that Tory membership was around 130,000, based on the amount of income the party was receiving from membership fees.

And there is no denying interest in the Tories is waning.

Pollsters at Ipsos UK found 62% Brits said they were not interested in who replaced Rishi Sunak as party leader in August.

Even 52% of those who voted blue in the general election said it did not matter much who won, with 51% saying they felt the party was not very relevant to politics right now.

Meanwhile, Reform have enjoyed a boost in recent weeks amid claims US billionaire Elon Musk is reportedly considering donating to the party.

Reform appears to have capitalised on this interest by offering £10 membership to those aged 25 and under at the weekend.

However, Farage’s party has a long way to go to rival Labour’s membership, even though it’s at its lowest level in a decade.

It lost 37,000 members in 2023, taking total membership to 370,450 last December – far lower than its peak in 532,000 in 2019 under Jeremy Corbyn – but still, almost three times the size of Reform.