Revealed: The real extent of Reform’s damage to the Tories

As a miraculous reversal of polling fortunes failed to materialise for the Tories in the opening weeks of the election campaign, the message from Conservative headquarters switched to a warning: “A vote for Reform is a vote for Labour.”

With the results in, the outgoing government has been proven bitterly correct. Nigel Farage’s party gained the third-largest share of the national vote, at 14.3 per cent.

While the mechanics of first past the post turned this into just five seats, Reform’s impact in the House of Commons will perhaps more keenly be felt by the seats not occupied by Conservatives because of them.

Telegraph analysis shows the party’s presence on the ballot may have cost the Conservatives 80 seats.

Ahead of the 2019 general election, Mr Farage announced the Brexit Party – the predecessor to Reform, which he was then the leader of – would not be fielding candidates in the 317 seats the Conservatives had won in 2017.

The move consolidated the pro-Leave vote and is widely credited with securing Boris Johnson’s landslide victory. No such pact existed this time.

On the contrary, in his speech announcing his takeover of the party on June 3 – just a month from polling day – Mr Farage vowed to lead a “political revolt” aimed at toppling the Tories.

A YouGov poll midway through the campaign found that over a third (36 per cent) of Reform UK voters would have backed the Tories if Mr Farage’s party had not been on the ballot. A further 26 per cent would not have voted at all.

Applying this logic to the full results from election night lays bare the toll caused by the splitting of the Right-wing vote.

The total number of seats in Parliament won by the Conservatives could have been 201, rather than the 121 they now have.

Labour’s landslide 411-seat haul drops to 349 without Reform on the ballot paper, reducing their majority by almost three-quarters from 172 to just 48.

Reform had been gaining ground in voting intention polls for months – usurping the Liberal Democrats to rise to third place back in January, the Telegraph’s poll tracker showed – but Mr Farage entering the fray escalated the threat they posed.

Less than two weeks later, it had overtaken the Tories in a YouGov opinion poll for the first time.

Far from consigned to a few select areas of the country, its support on election day proved widespread and robust.

In almost a quarter of seats, they took between 20 and 30 per cent of the vote share in an election where two-fifths of seats were won with less than 40 per cent of all votes cast.

Key seats that likely fell into Labour’s hands because Reform diluted the vote include Chelsea and Fulham, which Sir Keir’s party now holds with a paper-thin 0.3 percentage point majority.

Mr Farage himself prevailed in Clacton, becoming an MP on his eighth attempt. The incumbent Giles Watling took 71.9 per cent of the vote for the Tories in the 2019 general election, securing a 56.3 per cent majority.

The Reform leader now has an 18.3-point majority of his own, taking 46.2 per cent of the vote.

Holding 10 events in the seat – a far higher concentration than any other party leader – over the course of just a month of campaigning paid off.

Richard Tice, the former party leader, also prevailed in Boston and Skegness, albeit by a margin of just 5 points.

Rupert Lowe, a former chairman of Southampton football club, won in Great Yarmouth, and Lee Anderson, the former deputy chairman of the Conservative Party who defected to Reform, bested his rivals to secure a 13.8-point majority.

All of these seats were Conservative before the general election.

After the race in South Basildon and East Thurrock was deemed too close to call, a recount delayed the result until the early hours of Friday evening. Reform’s James McMurdock emerged victorious with a majority of just 0.3 points. The incumbent Tory candidate, who had held the seat since its formation in 2010, was relegated to third place.

The net result is a stark one. While the Tories suffered their worst drop in vote share between elections in history, falling 20.4 percentage points, Reform made its biggest-ever gains to surpass Ukip’s high water mark of 12.6 per cent in 2015.