Nigel Farage warned he risks missing best-ever opportunity unless he runs in next election: ‘Voters are exasperated!’

The former Ukip leader led the Brexit Party’s 2019 campaign but Richard Tice led the charge on the ground by standing in Hartlepool.

Despite falling short in 2015 by just 2,815 votes, Farage might yet have his best chance of entering the House of Commons.

JL Partners co-founder James Johnson, who previously ran polling in Downing Street under Theresa May, said: “I do think it is probably the election where it's most likely Farage could gain a seat because people are so exasperated.

“That's not to say that I think it's likely but it is relative to the previous elections. The national message really matters when it comes to general elections. It’s about who you want to be leader. It's about who you want in No10.

“And that obviously makes it much harder if a leader doesn't have that profile nationally. Maybe Tice can build it, maybe there are debates that help him. But he's not a natural firebrand that voters would get behind, at least not at the moment.”

However, Johnson cautioned Farage against standing due to the United Kingdom’s first-past-the-post system.

He added: “If I was Farage, I wouldn't do it because even in favourable circumstances, where Reform could be polling at upwards to 20 per cent, it would still be very hard to win a seat because of the nature of the electoral system.”

Farage and Tice have been pushing for the introduction of proportional representation.

Reform UK is receiving double-digit levels of support in the opinion polls, marginally lower than Ukip’s result in 2015.

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However, the populist party could receive a significant boost if Farage opted to return to the fold.

Farage has kept alive speculation about his involvement in Reform UK’s election campaign, saying last month: “Never say never. I can’t predict now what will happen.”

Tice was forced to address a barrage of questions about Farage’s future at the populist party’s press conference on Wednesday.

“We’ve been talking over the Christmas period and he’s obviously giving a lot of thought as to the extent of the role he wants to play in helping Reform UK frankly save Britain," he said.

“He is still assessing that. Nigel is the master of political timing but I’m very clear the job at hand is so big to save Britain, the more that Nigel is able to give in the election campaign, frankly, the better.”

However, Tice also told GB News: “I think that the least likely thing is that Nigel would stand under a first-past-the-post system in a constituency. He’s consistently said that he wouldn’t and we want proportional representation.”

A former Ukip insider appeared to warn Reform UK would need to professionalise if it had any hopes of returning MPs to Westminster, including Farage.

They said: “I think Nigel understands the complexity of the first-past-the-post system. Ukip were more powerful than Reform currently but still couldn’t make a significant breakthrough.

“It looks like Reform will just use their power to damage the Tories because even they know the chance of winning a seat is pretty much not going to happen.

“If they won seats I’d be very shocked. UKIP won Clacton off the back of several reasons. That was the same for Mark Reckless in Rochester & Strood.

“If Nigel went full pelt then maybe they’d pick up a handful of seats at best. But that would need Nigel, Aaron Banks and a full-operation. Is that happening at the moment? No.”

Addressing speculation about why Farage is unlikely to stand, they added: “I think Nigel would run if he thought he could genuinely win a seat but in the same breath if things are going the way they currently are he can be a power player, bring the Conservatives down and do all the stuff he loves.

“Would he want to risk losing again in a marginal and embarrassing himself? Probably not.

“He’s achieved so much. He is such a big name. Would he give that up to be a backbencher leading a couple of MPs?”

Suzanne Evans, who served as Ukip’s deputy chair under Farage, also voiced concern about Farage’s chances and suggested the former Brexit Party leader would not want to risk his current position at GB News.

She said: “Nigel probably feels he’s got another career outside of politics and he wants to focus on that, plus he probably also recognises the potential damage he could do to Reform if he did stand.

“I also suspect, in his heart of hearts, that he suspects that they can’t win either. How many times has he already stood for Parliament? I’ve lost track. Who wants to do that again?”

However, Ukip’s former economics spokesperson Patrick O’Flynn suggested Farage’s best-bet is to lead Reform without standing in a constituency.

He told GB News: “He led the Brexit Party in 2019 without standing in a seat himself and it doesn’t surprise me that Nigel is unlikely to stand.

“Nigel knows it would turn into a circus. The other parties would pour resources into where he’s standing and also he would compromise his ability to carry on with his GB News programme.”

O’Flynn was more optimistic about Reform UK’s electoral chances but claimed much of that could depend on Farage.

“I think this does depend on Nigel to a large extent,” he claimed.

“They’ve got Richard Tice, Ben Habib, an undercard of quite competent communicators but Nigel’s profile and admiration from a big chunk of the electorate is bigger than all the others put together.

“I think if he was too tentative to fully throw himself back in as leader that would send out a signal that Reform’s not completely serious.

“I think it very much depends on him. That doesn’t have to happen six months before the election, it could just be two months before the general election. But that Farage full re-engagement could be a real-changer.”

O’Flynn also has a “hunch” Tice will stand aside as Reform UK leader to focus his efforts on Hartlepool, while Farage could lead the populist party’s campaign.

He explained: “Richard fought Hartlepool for the Brexit Party in 2019 and got more than 10,000 votes, more than 25 per cent of the vote share.

“I think it’s important that he is standing again in Hartlepool to demonstrate his commitment to Hartlepool that he’s not just a fancy man from the south of England.

“Being party leader, being called away to national things, debates, might make that difficult.

“On the other hand, Nigel knows how to lead a party through an election, he’s got an enormous profile … the impact of him leading Reform would be such a shot in the arm for Reform that it just seems the logical thing to happen to me.”