The Tories “are worried” about the surge in support for Reform UK, party leader Richard Tice has claimed as he made a blistering speech to open up 2023. With some polls putting his party at 9 percent as the Conservatives continue to struggle, Mr Tice even mocked the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak for “rushing” his own press conference forward this afternoon “because he does not want to be left behind by Reform UK.”
Mr Tice believes that his party, which was previously known as the Brexit Party, is now joint third in the popular vote with the Lib Dems and may even be edging ahead of them.
And he insisted that his party’s growing support was a reaction to the Tories “breaking Britain” after 12 years in government.
Mr Sunak is set to announce that he wants people to study maths until they are 18 but Mr Tice described the policy as “unbelievable” at a time when the country is facing a massive wave of strikes, has 5 million on out-of-work benefits and cannot control its borders against the illegal migrant crisis.
He said: We are the party with momentum. You can tell just how worried the Tories are because at the weekend we had [former Brexit minister] Lord Frost no less writing the reasons why you should not vote for Reform.”
Mr Tice noted that Lord Frost could only come up with reasons that Reform did not have the infrastructure or enough volunteers.
He claimed that the Conservatives have broken Britain, noting that the question is which public sector group is “no on strike.”
He also quoted Hoem Secretary Suella Braverman in saying that the asylum system is broken.
And he lambasted policing for only managing to bring charges “not even convictions” to just 5.4 percent of crimes.
But he said that the worst crisis was the five million people on out-of-work benefits and 2 million on in work benefits.
“We are subsidising low pay through the taxpayer,” Mr Tice claimed unveiling a new policy to lift the threshold where the basic rate of income tax is paid from £12,500 to £20,000.
He said: “I have people coming up to me saying ‘Richard, I have people resigning to go on benefits.'”
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