'I won't do a deal' Farage tells voters in Kent he has no trust in the Tories

Farage tells voters in Kent he has no trust in the Tories

- Emine Sinmaz

Nigel Farage grinned as he clutched an inflatable blue lilo at a seaside shop in Ramsgate just hours after holding a press conference about immigration. "It's Reform colours, that's what it is," he joked to the press photographers, possibly amused by its resemblance to the migrant dinghies that wash up on the nearby beaches.

Dressed in a blue suit and £300 Ray-Ban Meta sunglasses with built-in cameras, Farage had embarked on a busy day of campaigning across three towns in Kent, one week before England's local elections.

It was just after 2pm and the sun was shining over Ramsgate where Farage, 61, began his whistle-stop tour by eating cockles and talking to scrap metal workers.

But his walk to the Royal Victoria Pavilion, the largest Wetherspoon's pub in the country, was interrupted several times by people wanting selfies and asking questions.

One man, a former newspaper journalist, questioned him about his assertion that Reform UK could ultimately usurp the Conservatives.

Farage said: "Our voters loathe the Conservative party. [Making a deal with them] is the last thing they'd ever want me to do. And frankly, if I do a deal with someone, I shake their hand, I look them in the eye and I trust them. I don't trust them."

As Farage attempted to move on, drinkers outside the Queen's Head pub cheered and an older man in a high-vis jacket patted him on the arm and said: "You've got my vote."

Farage is a man who likes an audience and Ramsgate is somewhere he wouldn't expect to get a rough ride - and he didn't.

But, to the horror of the Conservative party, and many in Labour too, the signs are that Reform UK is making an impact across the country.

Keir Starmer's government, still less than 12 months into a five-year term, is unpopular. The Tories under Kemi Badenoch appear still in shock from the general election.

Ever the opportunist, Farage has seen the gap and charged in.