Danny Kruger defects to Reform UK from Tories, with Farage putting him in charge of preparing party for government
Nigel Farage has announced that Danny Kruger has defected to Reform UK from the Tories. Kruger, MP for East Wiltshire, is a leading social conservative, and co-chaired the New Conservatives group in the last parliament with Miriam Cates.
Farage said that Kruger would be in charge of preparing the part for government.
Key events
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No 10 accuses Musk of using ‘dangerous and inflammatory’ language at rally on Saturday
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Badenoch suggests her support for two-child benefit cap contributed to Kruger’s decision to defect
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Badenoch rejects claim from Kruger and Farage that Tory party is finished
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Labour says Kruger defection shows Reform UK are ‘Tory tribute act’
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Farage declines to say how his partner was able to afford £885,000 home in Clacton – but stresses proper stamp duty paid
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Farage claims there is ‘almost a competition’ among leftwing parties to be anti-Israel
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Farage declines to repeat suggestion his partner was able to buy £885,000 home in Clacton because she was from wealthy family
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Farage claims Starmer won’t be Labour leader at time of next election, and Burnham would drag party to left
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Kruger says, even if Robert Jenrick took over as Tory leader, he does not think they could now overtake Reform UK
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Farage accuses police of not taking death threats against him on TikTok seriously
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Kruger says he was ‘very disappointed’ by Boris Johnson’s record in government after Brexit
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Farage says vast majority of people attending Tommy Robinson rally in London were ‘good, ordinary, decent people’
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Kruger says Tories were ‘failure’ in office, they are finished as national party, but conservatism ‘isn’t over’
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Danny Kruger defects to Reform UK from Tories, with Farage putting him in charge of preparing party for government
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Musk calls Ed Davey ‘craven coward’ after Lib Dem leader accuses him of ‘dangerous interference in our democracy’
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Mandelson should lose Labour whip in Lords if it is shown he was not ‘frank’ about Epstein relationship in vetting, MP says
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UK and US line up string of deals to build modular nuclear reactors in Britain
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Smith sidesteps question about whether Mandelson should lose Labour whip in House of Lords
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Starmer did not see ‘detail’ of Mandelson’s emails to Epstein until after PMQs, skills minister Jacqui Smith says
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Starmer facing fresh questions over Mandelson emails to Epstein
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Starmer urged to condemn Elon Musk’s ‘fight back or die’ speech to London rally as Labour MPs question his leadership
No 10 accuses Musk of using ‘dangerous and inflammatory’ language at rally on Saturday
Downing Street has accused has accused Elon Musk of using “dangerous and inflammatory” language at rally in London on Saturday organised by Tommy Robinson.
Asked about Musk’s “fight back or die” speech, the PM’s spokesperson said:
The UK is a fair, tolerant and decent country. The last thing the British people want is this sort of dangerous and inflammatory language.
The spokesperson said the language threatened “violence and intimidation on our streets”.
Badenoch suggests her support for two-child benefit cap contributed to Kruger’s decision to defect
Badenoch has also suggested that Danny Kruger defected to Reform UK at least in part because he disagreed with her decision to commit the Tories to keeping the two-child benefit cap.
In her GB News interview, Badenoch said;
One of the things that has caused concern is the strict policies I’m putting in on welfare. We need to live within our means. The Conservative party is the only party, for example, that wants to make sure that we have a two-child benefit cap.
I know Danny had written a paper about how that should be lifted, so there are policy disagreements.
If people are leaving because of policy disagreements, then that means that the message that I’m putting out there is clear.
Kruger was a leading figure in the New Conservatives group operating in the last parliament and believes that government should pursue measures that support family life.
Badenoch rejects claim from Kruger and Farage that Tory party is finished
Kemi Badenoch has rejected the claim from Danny Kruger and Nigel Farage that the Conservative party is finished. (See 11.22am and 11.50am.)
Asked about this in an interview on GB News, she said:
If it was finished, then we wouldn’t be seeing Labour in real trouble with the loss of their ambassador just before they have a state visit. The fact of the matter is the Conservative party is the only opposition. While we were out there pointing out that Labour was bringing in tax rises while the deputy prime minister wasn’t paying her taxes, where was Nigel Farage? In the US telling everyone that our country was North Korea.
I am here acting in the British national interest, not here just doing this because it’s showbiz or because it’s a game. I care about the people in this country. I care about the children that we’re bringing up, what sort of country they’re going to have, what sort of society they’re going to grow up in. And I’m very focused on those issues.
The Conservative party is the only party that can deal with this, and I’m making sure that we’re getting fit for the next election.
Labour says Kruger defection shows Reform UK are ‘Tory tribute act’
The Labour party has said that the Danny Kruger defection shows Reform UK is a “Tory tribute act”. In a statement, a Labour spokesperson said:
Every Conservative who defects to Reform ties Nigel Farage more closely to their record of failure. Nigel Farage can recruit as many failed Tories as he likes – it won’t change the fact that he has no plan for Britain.
The Tories crashed our economy and left public services crumbling. Britain deserves better than Reform’s Tory tribute act that would leave working people paying a very high price.
Farage declines to say how his partner was able to afford £885,000 home in Clacton – but stresses proper stamp duty paid
At the start of the Reform UK press conference Nigel Farage was asked by the BBC’s Chris Mason where his partner, Laure Ferrari, got the money that enabled her to buy a house in Clacton. (See 12.07pm.) Farage replied:
My partner is a private individual. She purchased a house in the constituency. I was pleased that she did. I didn’t particularly want my name down living in the constituency for obvious security reasons.
Lots of questions were asked, which is why I went last week to an independent KC tax expert. I’ve got all the judgment.
The KYC [know your customer] checks were done. The money was legal, the purchase was legitimate, the right level of stamp duty was paid. There have been no laws of any kind broken whatsoever.
As for the source of the money. I’ve said previously what I’ve said, and I’m not going to say any more.
Farage claims there is ‘almost a competition’ among leftwing parties to be anti-Israel
The Royal College of Defence Studies in the UK has decided that it will not accept students from Israel from next year, the Telegraph has reported. Israel’s defence ministry has described the move as “a profoundly dishonourable act of disloyalty to an ally at war”.
At his Q&A Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, was asked about the story. He criticised the decision, suggesting that actions of this kind were close to antisemitism. And he claimed there was “almost a competition” among parties on the left to be anti-Israel.
I don’t think we should be doing that.
We’ve always been a great ally of Israel. It doesn’t mean we support every single thing they do, far from it.
But it seems to me that criticism of Israel, criticism of the Israeli army, criticism of Zionism – quite where that merges with outright antisemitism is perhaps a bigger intellectual debate than we can have right here right now, but it does seem to me that all the pressure is heading in that direction.
There’s almost a competition between the Greens, the Liberal Democrats, Labour, whatever Jeremy [Corbyn] is going to call his outfit – almost a competition, who can be the most beastly [to Israel] …
[There are] an awful lot of Jewish people scared to go out on the streets, given the situation we’re in.
So look, we should be critical friends of Israel, you might say deeply critical for some of the things they’ve done, but they’re in a very, very tight spot.
The last question at the press conference came from my colleague Aletha Adu.
Q: [To Kruger] Do you take back your claim that Reform UK would spend money like drunken sailors?
Kruger said he was confident that the party would be able to come up with fully-costed, workable plans.
He said when he criticised Reform’s spending plans recently, he was referring to their welfare plans. But at the Reform conference, Farage committed the party to welfare reform, he said.
Q: [To Farage] What is your message to the 26 police officers who were left injured after the rally in London on Saturday?
Farage said that was “horrendous”. He claimed it was not as bad as the Notting Hill carnival. He feared this might happen. He was not defending “any of it”, he said. But he said the “vast majority” of people attending the march were good, ordinary, decent people.
Farage ended by saying there would be a press conference next week where “we will show you how we propose to save huge amounts of money”.
Farage declines to repeat suggestion his partner was able to buy £885,000 home in Clacton because she was from wealthy family
At the start of the Q&A Farage said that the purchase of a house in his constituency by his partner was legal, and the correct amount of stamp duty was paid. He said he had a statement from a KC confirming this.
Asked if he was willing to repeat again a statement he gave to the Mirror suggesting about his partner, Laure Ferrari, was able to buy the home himself because she had family wealth, Farage said he was not going to add anything to what he said earlier.
But he said he would advise people “quite strongly” not to say he had broken the law in relation to stamp duty.
Farage is under pressure on this topic because there are suspicions that he gave Ferrari the money that she used to buy the £885,000 home without a mortage. There is nothing unlawful about this at all. But it has opened him up to the charge of hypocrisy, because he criticised Angela Rayner for not underpaying stamp duty and if Farage had bought the Clacton home himself, the stamp duty charge would have been higher than it was for Ferrari.
UPDATE: See 12.43pm for the quote from the start of the press conference.
Farage claims Starmer won’t be Labour leader at time of next election, and Burnham would drag party to left
Q: Do you fear Keir Starmer or Andy Burnham more at the next election?
Farage says:
It’s a very hypothetical question. You know that Keir Starmer will not be leader of the Labour party at the next election. In fact, he might not even last the next year.
If it’s Andy Burnham, you might say he’s very personable, but he also would drag Labour way to the left, and that’s not the direction the centre of gravity in this country is going. It’s going in a different direction, and it’s almost as if Westminster now, this current parliament, is so far detached from where the country is going that it’s almost not true. So I’m not bothered.
Q: Danny, you wrote David Cameron’s ‘hug a hoodie’ speech. Do you still think that?
Kruger says he is still proud of that speech. He says it was profoundly conservative. It stressed that young people need care and support. But it was also strong on the need for proper crime to get a robust response.
Kruger criticises the way the speech was spun by Andy Coulson. He says he learned from that that you cannot expect to get two ideas in a headline.
Farage says he thinks the Conservative party is “nowhere near its electoral floor”. He thinks they will cease to be a national party after the elections next year.
