• United Kingdom: Meloni and Sunak's political 'crush'

Having survived the perils of the Australian jungle (he came third in 'I'm Famous, Get Me Out of Here!'), Nigel Farage plans a return to the mire of British politics. The former Ukip leader, renamed Mr. Brexit by his friend Donald Trump, aims to campaign with Reform UK and turn the 2024 election into a referendum on mass immigration.

Farage himself, who pocketed €1.2 million for his TV venture, has sparked speculation by openly proclaiming "Never say never" in an interview on ITV in which he also foreshadowed the "total defeat" of the Conservative Party.

Reform UK chairman Richard Tice, who took over from his old friend in 2021 at the head of the party, has made even more arguments: "The more help Nigel can give us, the better for us." Tice acknowledged that it will be very difficult for Farage to "resist the temptation" to return to the forefront of politics, especially in light of Rishi Sunak's immigration policy fiasco and the record 745,000 net migrants in 2022.

According to sources close to the former Ukip leader, quoted by The Observer, Farage would not compete directly for a seat at Westminster in 2024, given his long list of seven attempts and seven failures. His participation would be more as a national campaign cheerleader for the party he himself helped found, on the embers of the Brexit Party, and which in some polls reaches 9%.

37% of Conservative Party voters admit that they would have a "more favourable" view of Reform UK with Farage on board, and that is something that particularly worries Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who has prematurely picked up the challenge with a turn to the hard right, pairing with Georgia Meloni and warning from Rome that mass immigration "will overwhelm our countries and destroy our democracies".

Farage's aim will be precisely to bring immigration back to the forefront, as he did during the Brexit referendum with his controversial "breaking point" sign, in the midst of the wave of refugees from the war in Syria.

"Whether the big parties like it or not, we're going to make this election about immigration, in the same way that the 2019 election was about Brexit," the same sources told The Observer. "We are going to question not only illegal immigration, but also 'legal' immigration. Who voted for this mass immigration?"

Farage is expected to jump on the electoral bandwagon in January, in an act with which Reform UK aspires to set the pulse of the general election, initially scheduled for autumn 2024, although it could be brought forward to May. Immigration is currently the third priority for Britons (behind public health and the cost of living), but 63% think the numbers are "too high".

Sunak, reinforced

As if conscientiously preparing for the competition lurking on the right flank, Rishi Sunak has made it his point to make mass immigration (and not just boats crossing the English Channel) his workhorse for the election campaign. The prime minister has apparently emerged stronger from his standoff with the Tories' hardliners over the Rwanda Act to deport migrants pending the right to asylum.

According to the latest poll by Opinium for The Observer, Sunak would have managed to cut to 13 points (27% to 40%) the gap that separates the Conservative Party from Keir Starmer's Labour Party, which has seen its comfortable 20-point lead maintained for much of the year deflated.

Other polls, such as YouGov (22% to 44%) or Ipsos (24% to 41%) still give a wide lead to the Labour Party, but the trend is to shrink. Sunak has come out visibly strengthened by his reaction to the conflict between Israel and Hamas, while Starmer has been questioned by a majority of his militants for not daring to call for a "ceasefire", something that David Cameron himself is now calling for as foreign secretary.

In a one-on-one head-to-head, Starmer leads Sunak by six points on the inevitable question of who would be the best prime minister. The Labour leader plans to make defending the National Health Service (NHS) his banner in the face of a decade-long austerity that has led to the decline of public services and the stagnation of the economy in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis.

Starmer has anticipated the cancellation of the 'Rwanda plan' if he becomes prime minister, considering it "impracticable", and is in favour of reaching agreements with the EU in exchange for the return of migrants pending asylum who arrive on British shores. Although he has promised to be "twice as tough on criminal gangs to secure our borders", his challenge will be to measure himself in the campaign against the populist rhetoric that Sunak has already begun to use in the hard-right conclave in Rome.

"Our enemies will see that we are incapable of dealing with this problem and will increasingly use immigration as a weapon: deliberately sending people to our shores to try to destabilize our societies."

  • United Kingdom
  • Nigel Farage
  • Rishi Sunak