16 February 2023 , 17:00
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Nigel Farage’s latest political vehicle is set to demand more airtime as it surges in polls.
Reform UK, which is targeting Brexiteer and Red Wall voters, wants talks with broadcast bosses so its candidates appear on the airwaves in the run-up to May’s local elections, the Mirror can reveal.
A YouGov poll earlier this month put the party on 6% - the same as the Greens.
A separate “poll of polls” has Reform - backed by Mr Farage and led by millionaire businessman Richard Tice - on 7%, trailing the Lib Dems by just 2%.
Reform beat the Lib Dems into fourth place at last week’s West Lancashire by-election.
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TV chiefs take polling figures into consideration - along with factors such as how many elected representatives a party has and how many candidates it fields at ballots - when deciding who should be given airtime.
Reform UK leader Richard Tice (left) and former UKIP chief Nigel Farage (Getty Images)A Reform UK source said: “Since the peak of UKIP last decade and the emergence of The Brexit Party, broadcasters have been forced to rethink how they cover UK politics.
“This has led to guidelines over the share of political coverage having to reflect present polling over and above outmoded calculations based on past election results - and this of course has left the door wide open for Reform UK to be given far more prominence on mainstream TV and radio than it is currently getting.”
Reform aims to copy the UKIP “playbook” by waging an insurgent campaign, getting its senior figures on TV and hoping for a poll boost.
Insiders said that increased exposure should fuel poll ratings, bolstering the case for its representatives to be given more airtime.
They hope election victories will follow.
They pointed to Mr Farage’s high media profile in the mid-2010s, when he was a regular face on shows like Question Time and other political programmes.
His campaigning was widely credited with forcing then Prime Minister David Cameron to promise a referendum on the UK’s EU membership, in a bid to stop restless Tory supporters backing the anti-Brussels party.
But sources are divided over whether a stronger Reform would do more harm to Labour or the Conservatives.
Some believe disillusioned Tory voters could switch to Reform rather than supporting Labour.
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Sources believe Reform UK will surge in the polls given more exposure (PA)But splitting the right-wing vote may propel Labour to victory - particularly in the Red Wall constituencies of the Midlands and North, where Boris Johnson’s historic 2019 election landslide was forged.
The Mirror revealed in December how Mr Farage, now a presenter on GB News, had not ruled out returning to the political frontline to take the helm of Reform.
While he has no plans for an eighth attempt at becoming an MP - having failed seven times to win a parliamentary seat - insiders believe the publicity-hungry showman could be tempted to throw his hat into the ring if he believed he could win.
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