LONDON — Don’t let your values get in the way of your victory.
That was the ruthless calculation Keir Starmer’s election-winning campaign team made when deciding how to deal with the new hard-right force in British politics: Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party.
Starmer’s election masterminds knew that Farage’s entry into this year’s contest would do far more damage to the center-right Conservatives than to his Labour Party.
With that in mind, they ordered their candidates and teams on the ground not to waste time trying to fight Farage, even though they regard him as “toxic” for his populist, anti-immigrant and anti-European politics. It was a case of “your enemy’s enemy,” one senior Labour official disclosed.
“It’s not a healthy development for British politics to have Nigel Farage rampaging around the country, whipping up division,” a senior party aide said. “But we also know that in terms of the election, the biggest loser from this is Rishi Sunak and Conservatives.”
The decision was typical of the ruthless focus that characterized Starmer’s election operation. Morgan McSweeney, Labour’s campaign director, studied the methods used to devastating effect by the doyen of Conservative strategists, Lynton Crosby, to deliver a Tory victory in 2015. Deploying Crosby’s playbook of relentless message discipline, resilience, and focus, McSweeney orchestrated the most efficient campaign in history, winning more than 60% of the seats in Parliament with just 34% of the vote.
The insights into Labour’s campaign strategies are revealed in Landslide: The inside story of the 2024 election, a forthcoming book on the July vote that propelled Starmer’s Labour to power and ended 14 years of Tory rule. The authors spoke to individuals involved at all levels of the major parties, many on condition of anonymity to reveal sensitive details about the campaigns.
The result of Labour’s decision to give Farage a free pass was dramatic. Some analysis has suggested Sunak’s Conservatives lost as many as 80 seats in Parliament because Farage’s candidates split the right-wing vote, allowing Labour to win. If those Reform votes had gone to Conservative candidates, Starmer’s majority would have been significantly smaller.
In the end, Reform UK won 4.1 million votes — 14% of the total cast — and five seats in Parliament. For Farage personally, it was a breakthrough moment, winning his first seat after multiple failed attempts in the past. He has now set his sights on overtaking the Tories, who fell to their worst ever defeat, and has even suggested Reform could win the next election in 2029.
Surprise entry
That was quite a score for Farage, who initially wasn’t even supposed to be a candidate.
When Sunak called the election on 22 May, it took almost everyone in British politics by surprise, including the Reform leader. Initially, Farage said he couldn’t stand because he wasn’t ready for a campaign, admitting that Sunak’s snap election had caught him off guard. But less than two weeks later, he had changed his mind.
When news filtered through to Labour HQ at 4.15 p.m. on 3 June that Farage was about to announce his candidacy, Starmer’s team stopped what they were doing and huddled around a TV. As Farage confirmed that he was taking over as Reform UK leader and standing in the Tory-held seat of Clacton-on-Sea, Labour aides gave each other fist-bumps in delight. McSweeney, Starmer’s election director, broke into a wide smile. “Morgan’s face was just a picture,” one of those present said.
Many of Starmer’s senior strategists, including McSweeney, regard Farage’s presence in the national debate as poisonous. They would far rather he had no platform at all. But they put aside their distaste for Farage’s politics and embraced his helping hand to defeat the Tories and allow Labour to win.
According to another senior Labour official, the party was deliberately trying to not make Reform credible: “Moving forward, that won’t be sustainable.”
Asked if they regret not fighting harder against Reform, one senior Labour politician said: “No, I don’t think so. We knew pretty early that Farage was going to win in Clacton. I think our messaging was right.”
During the election, an undercover investigation by Channel 4 News found activists spouting racist and homophobic comments as they worked on Farage’s campaign in Clacton. One of them, Andrew Parker, was recorded suggesting migrants arriving on British shores on small boats should be shot as “target practice” by the Army. He also referred to Prime Minister Sunak as a “fucking P***.”
Another Reform official called the Pride flag “degenerate.”
Farage at the time said he was “dismayed by the reported comments of a handful of people associated with my local campaign.” He said the individuals concerned would be thrown out. Farage later suggested Parker, a part time actor, may have been part of a set-up by the broadcaster, a claim Channel 4 News denied.
For Sunak, the target of the racism, the episode was upsetting especially as his two daughters have to witness the racist slurs. “It hurts and it makes me angry,” Sunak said as he repeated the offensive terms that had been used on TV. “This is too important not to call out clearly for what it is.”
‘Not complacent’
Reform came second in 98 out of the U.K.’s 650 parliamentary seats.
But for Labour election bosses, the key battle is still with the Tories. Starmer’s team point out that in their 100 most marginal seats, the Tories are second in 82.
“I’m not in any way complacent about that kind of politics,” the senior Labour politician quoted above added. The riots that broke out in cities in England over the summer gave Farage an added opportunity to rally support, the person said. “Reform are obviously a factor in U.K. politics and they will try and capitalize on grievance. I am not saying that the next election is going to be the same battle as the last.”
Luke Tryl, from More in Common, which ran focus groups during the election, said Labour’s refusal to fight Farage was “risky.” While Reform won most of its votes among people who would normally back the Tories, Farage also stopped Labour winning back voters who supported Boris Johnson’s Conservatives in 2019 in former industrial heartlands known as the “Red Wall.”
“A good chunk of those Tory voters that Reform took were people who had at some point voted Labour,” Tryl said. “I think it has left Labour on far shakier ground in places like the Red Wall than they would have been if they had targeted Farage directly.”
The other major danger for Starmer is that Reform is in second place in 89 seats currently held by Labour, and Farage’s party is already rising in the polls, Tryl said. “If Labour lose a couple of percent to Reform and the Tories don’t get their act together you’ve got this whole swathe of seats at risk.”
Labour’s decision not to fight Farage was “quite a short-termist approach” and risked dragging politics further to the right and away from Starmer’s progressive priorities on immigration and tax, Tryl said. “I understand the glee they would have felt seeing their opponent suffer because the Farage threat emerged, I’m just not convinced it ultimately benefited Labour as much as they think it did.”
A Labour spokesperson said the party “put forward a positive message to change our country and rebuild our economy” after 14 years of Tory “chaos” and decline. “The British people loudly endorsed Labour’s positive plans all across the country, and with their mandate we are beginning the hard work to fix the foundations, and take the first steps towards change.”
Landslide: The Inside Story of the 2024 election, by Tim Ross and Rachel Wearmouth will be published by Biteback in November.