Nadhim Zahawi, who served briefly as Chancellor in the last Conservative government, has defected to Reform UK.
His switch was announced by Reform leader Nigel Farage at a press conference today.
Mr Zahawi, who becomes the most senior of the former Tory MPs to move to Reform, was chancellor for just two months under Boris Johnson following the resignation of Rishi Sunak.
Speaking today he said the UK had reached a “dark and dangerous” moment, which was why the UK needed “a glorious revolution”, as he outlined why he was joining Reform.
“Since leaving parliament, I have been reflecting on the successes and failures of my old party’s time in government, and I rue the timidity, even at times the weakness, with which we try to deal with the problems of the country.
“My analysis is that a huge culprit is the over-mighty bureaucratic inertia that now dominates and runs the country, that has taken control of swathes of the economy and, with barely a shrug of the shoulders, restricts the individual liberty of each and every one of us.”
He added: “Failures on mass migration, failure to strengthen our armed forces or even protect special forces from insane government lawyers, and bad virtue signalling legislation that has made us less competitive and less prosperous, to name but a few – these have provided me with painful lessons learnt that will, I hope, benefit this great new team.”
The former MP for Stratford-on-Avon was born in Iraq and will help confirm Reform’s diversity claims.
As well as his two months as Chancellor at the end of Mr Johnson’s time in Downing Street , he was Education Secretary, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Chairman of the Conservative Party.
He was sacked from that last position by Rishi Sunak in January 2023 after the prime minister’s independent ethics adviser found that he had broken ministerial rules by failing to disclose that his tax affairs were under investigation by HMRC.
“The mistake I made was not to be specific about my declarations to the Cabinet Office,” he said. “I absolutely think that politicians should be held to a higher level of accountability but I shouldn’t be precluded from doing the right thing by my country.”
Mr Zahawi was a candidate to succeed Mr Johnson as prime minister in 2022 but only attracted the support of 25 of his colleagues and was eliminated in the first round of the leadership contest which Liz Truss won.
Mr Farage is due to visit Edinburgh this week when he is expected to unveil Malcolm Offord, another former Conservative minister, as the leader of the party in Scotland.
#Chancellor #Zahawi #defects #Reform #Daily #Business