It was a little before 3 a.m that Nigel Farage sauntered in to the spin room at Millbank Tower, where an overnight election party was being hosted for journalists. Reform’s leader reeled off a list of positive areas before declaring: ‘This for me was our Becher’s Brook. If we cleared Becher’s Brook and landed well, we would go on and win the Grand National. And what is very clear is our voters will stick with us, now, all the way through.’

That is a microcosm of the overall election night: Labour trounced, Reform triumphant, with the Tories out the picture across swathes of Britain

That is a microcosm of the overall election night: Labour trounced, Reform triumphant, with the Tories out the picture across swathes of Britain

You can see why Farage is feeling optimistic. In Hartlepool, where voters flew a blimp of Boris Johnson just five years ago, now all twelve councillors are Reform. The Tories have none, with one of the Labour losers being the wife of the MP, Jonathan Brash, who has called on Keir Starmer to go.

That is a microcosm of the overall election night: Labour trounced, Reform triumphant, with the Tories out the picture across swathes of Britain. With his focus on the ‘battle for the north’, Farage is working to rebuild the coalition which........

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