Nigel Farage declared war on Kemi Badenoch as he staged a huge rally in her constituency tonight.

The Reform UK leader was the last speaker to take to the stage at the event in North West Essex, which came after a row with the Tory leader over his party’s membership numbers.

Speaking about the idea of launching a membership tracker, which was unveiled in December, Mr Farage said his party thought: “Why don’t we have a big push over Christmas, New Year. On Boxing Day we went through 131,860 and that number was significant because that’s the number of ballot papers the Conservative Party sent out in the last leadership election.

“So we can say, without doubt, we now were the second biggest party in the country. What a Boxing Day present that was. Until about 5 o’clock on Boxing Day evening, the right honourable member for North West Essex decided to comment on the situation and she was, I have to say, less than flattering.”

The Reform UK leader went on to read out what Ms Badenoch had said regarding the membership numbers.

In response to this, the Reform UK leader said: “I wasn’t very happy with this.” Revealing that he invited in a plethora of journalists to verify the numbers, the Clacton MP said they used the same software that the Conservatives use to track their numbers too. He added: “Don’t call me dishonest, because I am not dishonest!”

He then said the next best action after suing would be to go and meet his “fake members in the North West Essex constituency”. He joked: “You don’t look very fake to me, you look very real.”

In a thinly-veiled message to Ms Badenock, Mr Farage then said: “The opposition should be bloody scared of you.”

The rally was attended by all five of Reform’s MPs and around 400 members.

It follows an extraordinary spat between Mr Farage and Ms Badenoch over Reform’s membership figures.

The row erupted last month when the Tory leader disputed the insurgent party’s claim that it had overtaken the Conservatives and accused the Clacton MP of “fakery”.

Reform strongly denied the accusation and said it was considering legal action.

Mr Farage later said he was not going to sue but would hold a major rally in Ms Badenoch’s Saffron Walden seat to say “we are coming for you at the next election”.

It comes as opinion polls suggest the rebranded Brexit Party has caught up with or possibly overtaken the Conservatives.

Ms Badenoch earlier insisted she was “not at all” worried about tonight’s rally.

Asked about the polling numbers on a visit to a farm in Cheshire, she said it was “not a surprise that at the moment protest parties are gaining in the polls”.

She added: “The job that the British people have given me is to fight for them, be the leader of the opposition, hold the Government to account.

“That’s why I’m here talking about the family farm tax. It’s really important that we tell people what’s going on with farming and how Labour’s policies are going to destroy it. That’s much more important than having a rally about myself.”