Nigel Farage will be the next Conservative leader?

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I saw one article suggesting, now he has a seat, he will defect to become Tory leader, and thought it was a joke, but actually there are lots of mainstream media suggesting the same thing.

Tory members will love it and if he'd been insitu yesterday, they may well have won?

For me it's an appalling thought, but it feels scarily possible?

And a stupid electorate.

Beeb has an article suggesting 7 possibles (but stresses no-one has officially said they are going for it).

Interesting to note that of them, only two are white men.

(aside : Farage is a terrible people manager, he can't shmooze, doesn't treat colleagues as equals, doesn't care about compromise, rather narcissitic. I predict he will only show up to Commons to complain but do nothing useful on a single committee, he was a total Grifter when Euro MP.)

I have time for Badenbach. Maybe I'll come to loathe her policies but at least she is thoughtful, she is the annointed heir, say the journos. I could see my right wing son strongly supporting KB.

Farage is a terrible people manager

Farage is a terrible people manager

We could just leave it there really.

He's all talk - he wouldn't be bothered with all the work of party leader. He had the worst attendance as an MEP out of all of them across the continent. He has publicly bemoaned the prospect of having to go to Clacton weekly to listen to his constituents issues. The only things he is interested in are getting his photo taken smoking cigars and drinking beer, or spouting off meaningless soundbites in TV interviews.

No, but neither would they ever vote Labour

Old Nigel is a bit of a try hard isn't he? Not sure if he is an arriviste as the English class system is very opaque and complex , at least from my vantage point
Wonder what that snobbish - but very witty - Tory MP Alan Clark would have made of him. It's almost like he gets the tweed and Barbour out of his dressing up box.

You cannot beat the Right by moving further to the Right. You will never 'outbid' them.
The Conservatives need to become a credible and practical party again. They have to become interested in ordinary people again. Elections in UK are won in the Centre. Not at either edge. [See J Corbyn] or Farage.

They, the Tories, need to be more intelligent and show some spine and reject Boris and Priti useless and Braverman and the win at all costs bollocks.
If they become honest people again they will win back the protest voters who went to Reform and Green and some to the LibDems. That will reduce Reform to a fringe of the scarcely civilised yobs. What used to be the 'Skinhead' mob.

They're trying to bring back wanker Johnson.

I hope they don't succeed 😓

Yep.

He 'achieved' brexit and buggered off without attempting to do any constructive work once the referendum had happened (though probably that was a good thing).

He'll doubtless be a useless constituency MP - in a town that I'm sure needs one.

He's already making excuses about how he won't be able to be in his constituency on Fridays 🤦‍♂️

Has he? I hope he got as much stick as Starmer for saying he wouldn't be free after 6 on a Friday.

My expectation is that he'll be there about as often as he attended when he was an MEP. I hope his constituents hold him to account over it, but I suspect many don't know that their MP is supposed to be in the constituency every Friday. So, I doubt very much he'll get the same stick as Starmer did.

He’s an attention seeker first and a money grubber second. One thing he isn’t is a worker. So no!

Yes he didn't exactly win any gold stars as an MEP.

It is a complete myth that elections are won from the centre. The most popular tory leader was Mrs T (right). Since then john major won (carried on thatcherism) then lost (leftish and Blair initially popular). Cameron didn't win in 2010 although he said he was the heir to Blair (and was) so had to go into coalition. People were sick of blair and wanted something different which he didn't offer. He only won outright in 2015 because he promised the referendum (even he didn't expect to win that election which is why he promised it). Bozo won 80 seats from the right by promising to complete Brexit and reduce immigration. He lied and the Tories have increased immigration and are perceived as incompetent (they are) so lost. The main issue is loss of trust particularly over immigration and incompetence.

Given how many seats reform cost the Tories, a good many members will be unable to forgive them.