Nadhim Zahawi Defects to Reform, or: How the Tories’ Rejects Found Their Forever Home
A short guide to Britain’s angriest political afterlife
Fair Warning: I have been politely told to practice how I treat microphones, so this article comes with a voiceover. Listen at your own risk.
Yesterday in what has now really become the weekly Reform UK loud squeal for attention Press Conference, we were informed of what was yet another defection from the Tories.
This time round, it was the fiscally frugal, animal rights champion Nadhim Zahawi who made the move1. Turning his blue rosette in for a turqouise one, Zahawi made an impassioned speech about how he truly, truly believes that Nigel Farage, a man he once had a Twitter tiff about because Farage would likely not consider him a British citizen due to him being born in Iraq, is the man best placed to lead the country.
Now, I would definitely take this particular pronouncement by Zahawi with just a tiny pinch of salt, because this is the same man who two days after becoming Chancellor in 2022 called for Boris Johnson to stand down in light of the Chris Pincher scandal, just to subsequently support for him to come back later that year when Truss spectacularly imploded.
A man of solid convictions, Zahawi is not.
This, to my mind at least, is becoming a bit of a recurring theme when it comes to defections from blue to turquoise, because the current crop of ex-Tories that have made their way over have not been… well, the cream of said crop, to put it lightly.
By and large (with the exception of Lee Anderson, Sarah Pochin and Danny Kruger), none of the newly minted Reform members are, in fact, sitting in parliament, with the vast majority of them having either lost their seats in the 2024 general election, or who chose to not stand at all when they saw that they were going to get their arses roundly handed to them on the back of 14 years of abject fuckery mismanagement.
Now, some people will be pointing out that it is a flow of ex-Tories coming through, but I would carefully point out that this flow2 could be somewhat suspicious when it includes the likes of Jonathan Gullis, who spent much of 2024 telling any camera that would listen that he couldn’t find employment because of being… well, a bit useless, and Nadine Dorries who is best known for not knowing that Channel 4 was not, in fact, a publicly funded broadcaster when she was the Culture secretary.
When you have a closer look at some of the rest of the defections, it really doesn’t get that much better.
Dame Andrea Jenkyns, now Mayor of Greater Lincolnshire was an early Reform adopter, and was best known for her middle-finger like attitude to the media and anyone who would dare to not be to the right of Margaret Thatcher, while Danny Kruger who is an actual sitting MP, is best known for being a bit… uptight about things. I’m not saying that he’s a fundamentalist Christian nutter, but he very likely knows his way around a bit of fire and brimstone aimed particularly at women and homosexuals.
Lee Anderson certainly holds a special place in Reform as he became not only the first defection to the party, but was, in fact the first sitting MP that the party had after he got suspended by the Tories in early 2024 after… checks notes… saying that Sadiq Khan, the three-times mayor of London, had given the city away to his mates, mates he described as islamists3.
One of Anderson’s only defenders at the time, Marco Longhi, best known for being an honorary president of Turning Point UK and opposing the Renter’s Reform Bill because he himself is just a poorly landlord with 10 properties, also joined Reform in January 2025.
Now, if you’re reading this and thinking, “wait a second, there’s a bit of a pattern forming here, isn’t there?”, well, you’re right - and it’s not a very flattering one for Reform.
Because what we’re seeing happen with all these defections isn’t the reinvigoration of Cicero type figures who stepped away from politics for the quiet life, just to then give up tending their fields to step back into the fray - it’s a retirement village with a louder, and slightly more racist speaker system.
Nigel Farage’s party has now become the place for Conservatives to go who find themselves disgruntled, unpopular with the electorate or, just in general, a bit unemployable after the electorate told them in 2024 “no, thank you very much, off you fuck now”, but they still desperately need that relevance. That attention. All those microphones!
In addition to that deep, insatiatable hunger for the spotlight, there’s also another thread that runs through this collection of politicians - grievance. Almost every one of them feel like they’re a victim, and lucky for them, Nige has all the answers!
Lost your seat? Reform.
Couldn’t get selected? Reform.
Said something deeply stupid/racist/legally inadvisable (circle as appropriate)? Reform.
At this stage, it’s not really a party so much as it’s a clearing house.
And this is where the emphasis on numbers and flow misses the point - yes, Reform can list familiar names we’ve all seen in the newspapers and on social media before4, but as soon as you look just a wee bit too closely, all you can see is a roll call of people who were already on the way out. Rejected by voters. Sidelined by colleagues. Quietly encouraged to find a new hobby.
What Reform has here they might want to describe as “momentum”, is to my mind something else entirely - it’s sediment, leftovers. Reform’s message has to a large extent been that they want to completely replace the Tories, but all that seems to have happened so far is that they’ve just inherited the Tories worst habits, their loudest voices and their most rejected ideas - all of whom now stand stripped of responsibility and positively effervescent with bitterness.
Over the coming months, I imagine we will see a lot more of this, and I would put money on it that there will be some high profile names coming through (Crashed the economy and lost all sense of decorum? Reform) - and I say, let them. By all means, defect. Let them posture and hold their weekly press conferences celebrating taking on yet another Conservative castaway.
Because ultimately every ignominious name that moves over from blue to turquoise merely proves one very big thing to me - Reform is not the future of British politics.
No, no.
It’s the afterlife.
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Fiscally Frugal: Tax Avoider
Animal Rights Champion: Heating horses with public money.
When referring to a flow, this could also be a flow of sewage. Just saying.
For the sake of clarity, London is not run by Islamists. I would know. I live here.
Usually not for particularly good reasons.
Can we stop calling Reform a political party. It is a company.
Is Zahawi just looking for another way to get his stables heated at no cost to himself? Perhaps he has turned off the heat and is now facing rebellion from his stablehands during a bit of a nippy winter. I can't imagine he's too enthusiastic at the thought of wielding a muck fork himself somehow.