Nigel Farage may “positively” change into prime minister on the subsequent normal election, Dominic Cummings has stated.
The previous Quantity 10 aide has suggested the Reform UK chief on go from “one man and an iPhone” to getting into Downing Road.
Listen to the full interview at 5pm on the Sky News Daily podcast – tap here to follow
The revelation got here in a wide-ranging interview with Sky Information, by which the controversial determine, who served as Boris Johnson’s chief adviser from 2019 to 2020, revealed particulars of a gathering between himself and Mr Farage.
Requested if Mr Farage could possibly be prime minister, he stated: “It may positively occur now, yeah, as a result of the outdated system’s simply so fully damaged.
“If he does what I am suggesting, and truly units out a path for a way Reform goes to alter, how Reform goes to herald folks, the way it’s structurally going to change, what it will construct, how it’s going to do coverage, the way it can recruit MPs, and many others.
“If he does that, then there will be an enormous surge of curiosity and assist into the entire thing.”
Politics Hub: Follow live updates from Westminster
Dominic Cummings talking to Sky’s Liz Bates
‘One man and an iPhone’
He added: “Reform has been a one-man band. It has been Nigel and an iPhone.
“They will win 50, 100, 150 seats with Reform as Nigel and an iPhone.
“However they cannot win an general normal election and have a plan for presidency and have a critical group capable of take over in Downing Road and govern and management Whitehall with one man and an iPhone.”
‘Massive cuts’ to fund Reform insurance policies
Nonetheless, Mr Cummings was additionally scathing about Mr Farage’s private attraction, saying it was his celebration, not him, that had change into an outlet for anti-establishment feeling.
“It isn’t precisely correlated with what folks take into consideration Nigel himself.
“Reform is a car for folks to say: ‘We despise you, Westminster. We hate each the outdated events, we hate Whitehall, we hate the outdated media, we hate the entire f***ing lot of you.’
“And Farage going up within the polls is the expression of that core feeling.”
Learn extra from Sky Information:
Farage: Abortion law ‘totally out of date’
Ministers could scrap two-child benefit cap
IMF upgrades UK economic growth forecast
Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings, pictured in Downing Road in 2019. Pic: PA
Badenoch ‘most likely going to go this 12 months’
The ex-Downing Road aide was additionally damning concerning the Conservative Party, declaring it is perhaps “useless”.
“It is fairly doable the Tories have simply, sort of, crossed the occasion horizon and truly aren’t salvageable,” he stated.
“Like, everybody form of assumes that as a result of they’ve all the time been round, then one way or the other there have to be at the least one final probability for them to show issues round, nevertheless it’s doable that probability is of their previous and would not exist.
“It is perhaps useless.”
Kemi Badenoch solely took over as Tory chief late final 12 months. Pic: PA
He additionally predicted the celebration’s present chief, Kemi Badenoch, can be ousted earlier than the tip of the 12 months and claimed plots to take away her are already beneath approach.
“Kemi goes to go most likely this 12 months,” he stated.
“There’s already people who find themselves organising to eliminate her, and I believe that that may work. If it would not work this 12 months, it’s going to positively occur after subsequent Could.
“She’s a goner, so there’s going to be a giant transition there”.
