Brexit Party preparing to fight general election after topping European parliament poll, says Farage

‘That work starts this afternoon,’ says leader as he piles pressure on Tories

The Brexit Party is preparing to contest a general election with a full manifesto, its leader Nigel Farage has said.

The nascent grouping won nearly one-third of votes in the European parliament election despite forming just weeks ago.

As the rout of the Tories and Labour became clear on Monday morning Mr Farage piled on the pressure.

He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ”The next date is 31 October. That will become as big a day in people’s minds as 29 March and all I can say is this: if we don’t leave ... then you can expect to see the Brexit Party’s success last night continue into the next general election.”

Asked if he would join forces with a no-deal-supporting Tory leader in any general election, Mr Farage said instead that he wanted his new group to have a seat at the negotiating table before the UK’s planned exit in the autumn.

“I absolutely insist that we do have a mandate to now be part of that team. I want the Brexit Party – we’ve got some businessmen and women of considerable experience, quite happy to help the government get ready for 31 October,” he said.

Pressed further, he added that “whatever any Conservative leader says, why would I believe them? We’ve heard it all before”. He did not believe the Tories would come out with such an unambiguous no-deal message, he said, refusing to be drawn on whether he would oppose the party if it did so.

On his election plans, he added: “I’m not pretending that to set up the infrastructure to fight 650 seats perhaps for an October election is easy, but that work starts this afternoon.”

It came after a dire showing for both the Tories and Labour, who lost 14.9 and 11.3 per cent of their vote share respectively amid anger over Brexit – on both the Leave and Remain sides.

The Green Party and Liberal Democrats, who both advocate staying in the EU, saw a surge in support. The former saw their best results since 1989, with Green groups across Europe combining to take about 10 per cent of the whole parliament.

Combined, the two parties received 32.4 per cent of the vote compared with 31.6 per cent for the Brexit Party.

Poll expert Professor Sir John Curtice told the BBC “the overall message is that this country is deeply divided over Brexit and more or less still evenly divided”.

He added that people were still “deeply polarised and also deeply exercised”, with turnout up and people using the poll to express their views – either in favour of a hard exit or a second referendum and potentially stopping Brexit.