Reform UK has more members than Tories, Farage says

Reform UK present has much members than the Conservative Party, its person Nigel Farage has said.

A integer tracker connected Reform's website shows its rank numbers person overtaken the 131,680 fig declared by the Conservatives earlier this year.

Nigel Farage thanked those who helped his enactment "make history" and said Reform is present the "real opposition".

A Conservative enactment spokesperson said Reform UK had helped to present a Labour government.

Reacting to the increasing tally connected X, Farage said: "The youngest governmental enactment successful British authorities has conscionable overtaken the oldest governmental enactment successful the world."

Party president Zia Yusuf said Reform had breached the "centuries-long stranglehold connected the centre-right of British authorities by the Tories".

Earlier this year, the Conservative Party said it had 131,680 members eligible to ballot during its enactment contention to regenerate Rishi Sunak.

It was the lowest recorded rank for the enactment and a sizeable driblet from the 2022 enactment contest, erstwhile it boasted astir 172,000 members.

A Conservative spokesperson said Reform had "delivered a Labour authorities that has cruelly chopped wintertime substance wintertime payments for 10 cardinal pensioners, enactment the aboriginal of household farming and nutrient information astatine risk, and launched a devastating raid connected jobs which volition permission moving radical paying the price.

"A ballot for Reform this coming May is simply a ballot for a Labour assembly - lone the Conservatives tin halt this", helium added.

The BBC has contacted Labour for comment.

Membership numbers to each main governmental parties fell past year contempt gearing up for this summer's General Election.

Although it inactive has the astir members of immoderate UK party, Labour saw its numbers dip beneath 400,000 for the archetypal clip since 2015.

Comparing enactment rank numbers tin beryllium "difficult", according to a probe briefing published by the House of Commons Library, arsenic determination is nary azygous explanation of rank oregon mode to show it.

The manager of deliberation vessel More successful Common, Luke Tryl, told the PA quality bureau that the metric is "opaque and murky".

He said Reform UK person "momentum", but indicated that it is not guaranteed whether its rank converts to campaigners.