Panic rises at lack of Labour plan to sort out Nigel Farage and Reform U | Politics | News | EUROtoday

Panic on the enduring recognition of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK is laid naked in a warning from a New Labour strategist who claims Sir Keir Starmer’s get together lacks a plan and is “caught in the headlights”. Sir Chris Powell, who suggested Labour forward of Tony Blair’s 1997 landslide, warns there is no such thing as a plan in place to cope with the “existential threat” posed by Reform, which enjoys a double-digit lead over all rival events in Politico’s ballot of polls.

Sounding the alarm within the Left-leaning Guardian, he mentioned: “We are at a very dangerous moment. We simply cannot afford to allow Nigel Farage’s Reform UK to have a free run and become established and entrenched as a credible potential government in the minds of disenchanted voters. The longer they go unchallenged, the more unthreatening and risk-free they will seem to voters.

“Just hoping that Reform and Farage implode, or that the Right-wing vote will somehow fracture, is potentially suicidal for our freedom and democracy.”

According to Politico, Reform is in first place within the polls (29%), forward of the Conservatives on 18%, with Labour and the Greens tied on 16% and the Liberal Democrats on 13%.

Pressing for “no-holds-barred thinking”, Sir Chris mentioned Sir Keir “needs to fundamentally change the way he approaches voters and his way of interacting with them”, including: “Voters are fed up, think nothing works – and some are simply angry and feel ignored.”

He referred to as for Labour to tackle Reform on-line with a “semi-autonomous digital narrative unit whose sole mission is to wage and win the daily war for attention”.

Pressing for motion, he warned: “The current situation in the UK is a textbook case of an establishment party caught in the headlights as its populist opponent expertly reacts to voter pain and disenchantment. Relying on containment or a rational ‘hold-your-nose’ vote is a strategy that will eventually fail.

“Labour needs a comprehensive action plan, now. Time is a luxury it can’t afford.”

Reform UK MP Lee Anderson responded to the decision to arms, saying the “Lefties are petrified”.

He added: “The more smears and lies they throw at us, the stronger Reform UK gets. It’s backfiring big time.

“They simply can’t get their head around the fact that calling everyone they disagree with a racist or a fascist doesn’t work. Mr Powell and his ilk can bang on all they want, but the simple fact of the matter is that Reform’s surge is down to decades of betrayal by his Labour Party and the Conservatives.

“The British public are sick to death of being lectured by these out-of-touch elites who have destroyed this country, and they are voting in their droves for Reform to get Britain back on track.”