BASILDON, England — Britain’s Conservatives used to be able to count on the support of “Essex man.” But Nigel Farage has been spoiling that party.
During a clutch of nationwide elections on May 7, voters in the southeastern England county will elect a new local authority as Farage’s right-populist Reform UK looks to end the quarter-century reign of the center-right Tories, and prove that they really can be the dominant right-wing force in future national elections.
The Tories have enjoyed majority control of the council since 2001. A Farage victory in Essex would be a serious blow to Tory leader Kemi Badenoch’s hopes of rebuilding a Conservative Party hammered at the last election, and further dent her party’s status as Britain’s main right-wing movement.
It would also be symbolic. Despite suffering their worst ever national defeat in 2024, the Tories still hold 10 of Essex’s 18 parliamentary constituencies. Six of the party’s shadow cabinet members — including Badenoch herself and Shadow Foreign Secretary Priti Patel — represent constituencies there.
But Farage is gaining ground. He won the coastal Essex constituency of Clacton in 2024 — boosting Reform’s confidence it can wrap its tentacles around the county.
That raises the stakes for Farage, who is under pressure to show Reform UK hasn’t peaked too soon, and can turn a strong national opinion poll lead into actual votes.
“The key question which Reform will have to answer is whether they are as big a threat this coming year … as they were last year,” Tory peer and pollster Robert Hayward said, referencing Reform’s stunning victory in local elections last year. “Reform would have expected to sweep the county” in 2025, he said.
Teal tanks on blue lawns
Reform UK is once again pitching itself against the establishment as it hits the campaign trail.
“People are desperate for change,” Peter Harris, a senior local politician who will be Farage’s candidate in the Greater Essex mayoral contest in 2028, says. “There’s a lot of anger on the doors with the way that our country is going,” he said over a coffee in Basildon — a London commuter town whose high street contains discount stores, betting outlets and vape shops. By the train station, a locked bike hasn’t got a back wheel. A nearby building development claims to be “illuminating rental communities.”
Reform wants to frame the local elections as a referendum on other parties, and is urging voters to reject the governing Labour nationally, and the Conservatives locally.
“They want a political party that … is not afraid to stand up for British values and for common sense,” Harris says. “Essex will speak loud and clear for the rest of the country that Reform is here.”
That message was echoed by Glen Smith, chair of Reform’s Witham branch, further north in Essex. “There’s no national leadership,” Smith says of Labour. “People are reaching the point where, actually, they just feel that they don’t know what to do.”
Reform backs “alarm clock Britain” who “want to take their kids on holiday and they want to have a good life,” he argues. “And they’re working, they’re pedaling as hard as you can to achieve that.”
Think before you vote
Reform’s opponents, however, say Farage is selling a myth. The Conservatives want to lean on what they see as a strong local record — but still fear the national picture will affect the results.
Shadow Housing Secretary James Cleverly, an MP since 2015 and a former Tory leadership hopeful, admits “there’s still some residual frustration from our time in government,” but says “it’s diminishing, and diminishing fairly quickly.”
“This is going to be a hard fight,” he concedes in his Essex constituency of Braintree, while insisting his party is “still very much in contention.”
The Braintree coffee shop where POLITICO speaks to Cleverly neighbors town houses, Tudor-style pubs and families enjoying the Easter holidays — a picture of Middle England. The town’s patriotism is on display. England flags and Union Jacks flap from almost every lamppost in the town center.
It should be ripe pickings for Farage, who made great play last year of promising to fly only Union Jack, St. George’s and county flags on council buildings.
But Cleverly has a warning for voters tempted to give the Reform boss a try. “You can vote against something or you can vote for something. If you vote against something, it’s a dice roll. You don’t know what you’re going to get next,” he says.
The Tories are keen to spook voters about recent votes for change, citing Labour’s tanking poll ratings after winning a national landslide in 2024, and the challenges facing the Reform-run Kent County Council. Since taking office last year, Reform has lost councilors and come under fire over spending priorities and funding cuts.
Farage is “very good at identifying the zeitgeist,” Cleverly admits, but stresses Essex citizens are “very conscious about money coming in and … money going out,” which extends to local government.
Yet his party still languishes far behind Reform when it comes to voting intentions, even if his leader Badenoch’s personal ratings have improved — something which may buy her some time as leader if the Tories have a bad night.
“I’d much rather have a leader who was ahead of us in the polling nationally than have one that was behind us,” says Andy Barnes, the Conservative leader on Basildon Borough Council. “She’s part of a project to rebuild. That isn’t going to happen over one set of local elections.”
Indeed, many Conservatives may adopt the brace position.
Best of enemies
Reform is optimistic it can win a majority on Essex County Council, and rejects the idea that the party’s limited experience in local government will put voters off.
“If you come in and take over any business, there’s going to be challenges,” Harris says of those criticisms. He draws a contrast between businesspeople representing Reform, and existing councilors who he claims have “gone native” and are “very comfy” with the status quo.
But those barbs may have to be buried after May 7.
Local district elections, held on the same day, could actually test whether rivals on the right can work as an alliance.
Only a third of seats are up for election on Basildon Borough Council and Southend-on-Sea City Council meaning no one party is likely to win a majority.
“I wouldn’t rule anything out at this stage,” says the Tory Basildon leader Barnes of the prospect of working with Reform UK. Many Reform voters are natural Conservatives, he cautions, warning attacking Reform is “counterproductive.”
Badenoch hasn’t blocked Tories from working with Reform locally, arguing councilors know what’s best.
“I don’t think we can idly … stand by and watch Reform, even as a minority administration, take over and crumble us,” argues Tory Southend councilor Colin Campbell, stressing they may need to “do the grown-up thing” by working with their opponents.
That dilemma is especially acute for ex-Tory Tony Cox, who’s now Reform UK’s leader in Southend. “I’m not naive in terms of someone’s got to be leader. Someone’s got to control the council,” he says.
Smith also recognizes that Reform needs to woo Tory voters: “Where are people going to come from? Are they going to come out of thin air and suddenly become Reformers?”
‘Reform is a temporary thing’
Labour also wants to show it’s on the pitch in Essex. It still leads a handful of district councils in pockets of the county.
Gavin Callaghan, the Labour leader of Basildon Council, says following up a win by delivering for voters is crucial for retaining support: “If you want me to start thinking that actually you’ve changed my life, change the fact that I’m no longer living in a sh*thole.”
He also remains optimistic Basildon is full of natural Labour voters who won’t be tempted by Farage if the government provides more investment. “They are working class people who are desperate to come home to Labour. Reform is a temporary thing,” he says.
But Reform believes it really can send shockwaves across Essex.
“There’s a real danger they’ll be wiped out,” Harris says of the Tories.“We’re very confident.”
