Reform UK’s recent surge in popularity has made the prospect of Nigel Farage as the next Prime Minister increasingly likely according to some polls – but he could be stopped in his tracks by an unlikely opponent. Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner is reportedly calling for Labour to steer the Reform leader into a corner by questioning him on economic policy, rather than his preferred battlegrounds of immigration and crime rates. Reform’s overwhelming success in this month’s local elections may have driven Rayner to take a new tack in challenging Farage’s party, according to reports – one focused on re-aligning Labour with working people and undermining Reform’s reputation with voters.

The adjustment fits with the contents of a leaked memo, published by The Telegraph last week, which saw the Deputy PM recommend heavier taxation of the country’s middle class, especially by restricting their child benefits and cutting tax allowances. Farage declared earlier this month that his party’s local wins marked “the end of two-party politics”, opening the door to Reform winning a majority in 2029. But do you think he could beat Angela Rayner in a general election? Let us know in the poll below.

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Rayner called out her political opponent during a recent interview with Sky News, suggesting that he “comes up with lots of ideas [but] they’re not necessarily good ideas and he doesn’t know how he’s going to pay for them”.

It may have been a first taste of what policy research agency founder James Frayne has described as “a fascinating alternative strategy” in dealing with Farage – by “forcing [him] onto territory favoured by the left”.

Mr Frayne, of Public First, wrote in The Telegraph that Rayner’s leaked memo, if executed, could “negate the need for further spending reductions, as cuts to benefits such as winter fuel payments are blamed internally for Labour’s recent electoral failure”.

Crucially, the new approach could enable Labour to “present itself as the reliable defender of the least well-off” and “finally place Farage on the backfoot”, the consulant wrote, and force him to “explain to his working-class base why his free-market approach would leave them better off”.

“There is no denying that many of the party’s suppoerts would instinctively favour an approach closer to Rayner’s,” he added. “Big-state policies have failed provincial England, but they have a simple attraction.”

Rayner doubled down on the economic argument against Farage reaching Number 10 during her appearance on Sky News last week – suggesting he hadn’t budgeted for policies including the restoration of winter fuel payments and a scrap of the two-child benefit cap.

“It’s not going to alleviate the levels of child poverty,” she said. “There is a number of factors: people’s wages not increasing, their employment being insecure, the cost-of-living crisis that we face, their bills going up and their housing costs [going] up.”

During a speech in London on Tuesday, the Reform leader promised a “genuine political revolution” under his party and pledged to “undo everything Sir Keir Starmer has done in the last fortnight”, including an agreement with the EU and deal on the Chagos Islands.