Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has unveiled former Conservative chancellor Nadhim Zahawi as the party’s latest high-profile defector, delivering another blow to the Tories as the insurgent party seeks to consolidate its momentum.
Zahawi, who served briefly as Chancellor during the final months of Boris Johnson’s premiership, was presented as Reform UK’s newest recruit at a press conference on Monday, January 12th.
The former Stratford-upon-Avon MP becomes the latest in a growing list of more than 20 former Conservative MPs to cross the floor to Farage’s party.
Announcing his decision, Zahawi said Britain
needs Nigel Farage as prime minister.
He painted a bleak picture of the state of the nation, describing Britain as “sick” and warning that the country had reached a “dark and dangerous chapter.”
Blaming what he called failures on mass migration, a lack of investment in defence, and “virtue-signalling legislation,” he said such policies had left the UK in the “last chance saloon.”
The former chancellor said he could have remained in business but felt a duty to support Reform UK, drawing on lessons learned from being in government.
Zahawi’s defection follows other senior Conservatives, including Nadine Dorries, Danny Kruger, and Andrea Jenkyns. Reform UK has topped national opinion polls for much of 2025 and early 2026, with support hovering around 31-32%.
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