Jess Phillips believes Reform UK MP Lee Anderson will lost his Ashfield seat at the general election (Image: GETTY)
Reform UK will not win a single seat at the next general election, Labour MP Jess Phillips has predicted as she dismissed new recruit Lee Anderson’s hopes of retaining his.
And former Scottish Conservatives leader Ruth Davidson also put the boot in, suggesting the eurosceptic party will not get “anywhere near” their current polling numbers when Rishi Sunak does eventually call a nationwide poll.
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The pair were speaking on Sky’s Electoral Dysfunction podcast, on which they are regular guests alongside host, Sky’s political editor, yesterday.
Asked for her assessment of Reform’s prospects in the light of Mr Anderson’s decision to defect from the Tories on Monday, Ms Phillips, the MP for Birmigham Yardley, said: “The only way that they can capitalise on it is if others walk the floor and put pressure on Rishi Sunak to call a general election
“Where I predict, and I'm willing to eat hats, etc, that Reform will not win a single seat in Parliament.”
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Lee Anderson clashes with Beth Rigby
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Ms Phillips explained: “They are nowhere near as powerful as UKIP were at the height of their power, which was 2015, the first election I ever stood in, and they definitely were at the height of their power then because they also they had an issue.
“I literally, if you were to currently put me under duress, wouldn't be able to tell you what Reform’s policy was on anything.
“And so I very much doubt that my constituents would be able to.”
Paraphrasing the recently elected Workers Party of Britain MP for Rochdale, she added: “I think that Lee Anderson will lose his seat roundly, and watching him sat next to George Galloway, to coin a phrase they, looked at in PMQs, like two cheeks of the same slapped a***.”
Lee Anderson and Richard Tice on Monday (Image: Getty)
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In a reference to Reform UK’s former Scottish leader Michelle Ballantyne, Ms Davidson said: “I had an MSP, who was elected for the Tories when I was leader, and after I left leadership, went independent and then was enticed to join Reform and became the Scottish leader of Reform.
“And then she stood in the south of Scotland in the 2021 election, where she'd been a council leader for us and had been elected as an MSP into the Scottish Parliament for us, and got 0.2 percent of the regional list vote.
“I don't think that I'm being complacent but I do not expect them to get anywhere near their polling numbers when it comes to a general election.
“We haven't even seen it in by elections and that's when you can kick you know, you can kick the incumbents.”
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Former Scottish Tories leader Ruth Davidson (Image: Getty)
Ms Rigby meanwhile raised the subject of Monday’s press conference, at which Reform’s leader Richard Tice unveiled Mr Anderson as their first MP.
She said: “The press conference was extraordinary really because you had Reform absolutely cock-a-hoop that they got their first MP in Lee Anderson, and Lee Anderson absolutely refusing to behave at all in any way that Richard Tice would want him to and Richard Tice looking increasingly uncomfortable on stage as Lee was just so blatantly rude.
“I asked him a question which was something along the lines of ‘You were Labour, then Tory now Reform. What do you say to people who say that the problem isn't the political parties, it's you and actually this is about attention-seeking?’
“He didn't like it and he gave me a three-word answer, which was ‘country, constituency, party’ and then he went ‘next question, Richard’ and I said I’m not having that and I tried to go back we had a bit of a back and forth.”
Lee Anderson campaigning in his Ashfield constituency this week (Image: Getty)
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In a statement shared on X after his announcement on Monday, he said: “Following leaving the Labour Party and joining the Conservative Party I have been very conscious of the perception of me as a politician and being branded a “political journeyman”, and I endeavoured to not move parties again unless there was a serious justification or the party I represented no longer aligned with best serving the United Kingdom and the people of Ashfield.
“The situation I find myself in today is that I am no longer part of the Conservative Party, the party have moved me aside and removed the whip as a result of me speaking the truth of the people, which will never change.
“I therefore today announced that I have joined the Reform Party. Richard Tice is fully aware of the values and the needs of Britain and the people of Ashfield, and he has agreed to support my message and the voices of my constituents which is the most important thing to me as not just a politician, but as a decent and proud British citizen who wants nothing more than to take Britain back and give our country the leadership it deserves.”
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