The Reform leader is delivering a major speech in Wales this morning ahead of the local elections in May.
James Davies has joined Reform (Image: Reform)
Nigel Farage has unveiled yet another Tory defector, doubling the party’s representation in the Welsh Senedd.
Speaking in South Wales, Mr Farage confirmed that James Evans, MS, has defected to the party, after being kicked out of the Tories for talking to the insurgent right-wing party.
Two weeks ago, the Tories said they had removed the whip because of him “continuing to engage with Reform representatives about the possibility of defecting to the party”.
At the time, Mr Evans said he would sit as an Independent Member of the Senedd while he considered his political future.
However, just a fortnight later, he’s made the jump to Reform, claiming his warnings that Wales is broken have been ignored by all parties, including the Tories.
Taking to the stage, Mr Evans said: “Let me be straight with you – Wales has had 26 years of Cardiff Bay spin: Britain is broken, and Wales is broken also.
“Not under pressure, not challenged, it is fundamentally broken. And the real failure in Welsh politics is not just the bad outcomes for its people, it’s the refusal by the people in power to admit what everybody else can see.
“I did admit it, I said it openly, and I challenged it inside the Senedd and the Conservative Party. I said that Wales was broken. I said that Britain was broken. And for that honesty, I was kicked out.”
He claimed he was being asked to defend a vision for Wales “that was not a good one”, particularly the Tories’ refusal to rule out a post-election deal with Plaid Cymru, the left-wing pro-independence party.
The defection means Reform has doubled its representation in the Senedd, after Laura Anne Jones also defected from the Tories last summer.
Mr Farage is eyeing big wins in Scotland, which he argues may finish off Keir Starmer for good.
Speaking at the start of the rally, the Reform chief said the ongoing Mandelson scandal “is all the more remarkable, because South Wales really is the birthplace of the Labour Party”.
“From Keir Hardy in Merthyr Tydvill, the Nye Bevans, the Michael Foots, the Neil Kinnocks, many of the great names of the Labour Party have been South Walians. And most of these constituencies have been taken for granted pretty much since 1918.
“But something fundamental has changed, and I think for Labour it will get even worse. That gives us incredible opportunities.”
