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What is the real threat from Reform UK?
With far-right parties making major gains recently in Europe, it’s worth paying close scrutiny to Farage’s party and taking the threat it poses seriously, writes DIANE ABBOTT
THE ART OF DEMAGOGY: Reform UK leader Nigel Farage speaking at the Mercure Maidstone Great Danes Hotel in Maidstone Kent last Monday

THERE are only two people who can realistically be prime minister on July 5. One of them is Rishi Sunak and the other is Keir Starmer. For innumerable reasons, I would far rather it was Keir Starmer and fervently hope that is the outcome.

But this is a very strange election. The traditional polling is highly consistent (the MRP polls are a different matter). They generally show the Labour party polling in the low 40s, while the Tories are stuck around 20 per cent. That is around half of their vote recorded in the 2019 general election.

All other parties, bar one, are showing very modest gains or losses except one. That is Reform UK. (Of course in Scotland, the picture is quite a bit different, but that is a separate story).

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