𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

You may need to put your imagination into overdrive, but can you picture Nigel Farage and Kemi Badenoch standing together in the Downing Street garden and announcing a joint programme of government? The Conservative leader has stamped on talk of deals with Reform UK and plenty of people in Mr Farage’s party loathe the Tories, but new polling signals that voters are much more open to the two tribes working together,

When confronted with the possibility of a Labour-Liberal Democrat-Green coalition after the next election, supporters of the Conservatives and Reform are clear they would far rather see their own parties take power together. Polling from Lord Ashcroft shows three out of four Reform voters and two out of three Tory backers would prefer to see their parties in government.

Millions of Right-leaning Britons would be horrified at the policy package that would unite Andy Burnham, Sir Ed Davey and Zack Polanski’s parties in a coalition. Such a government would push the accelerator to the floor on net zero and EU enthusiasts in these parties’ ranks would hope to put Brexit into reverse. The so-called culture war would reach a frenzy with the Left pushing for radically more “progressive” policies in areas such as drugs and crime and justice, and entrepreneurs and investors would fear the fruits of their success would be taxed as never before.

If the SNP gave its support to such a coalition, the price could be another Scottish independence referendum as the 20th anniversary of the last vote nears.

The Conservatives and Reform would not struggle to come up with a policy agenda of their own. They could find common ground on pulling the UK out of the European Convention on Human Rights, in strengthening Britain’s armed forces, encouraging North Sea oil and gas extraction, cutting the benefits bill, bringing down debt and creating an effective deterrent to small boat crossings.

A Government that made progress in these areas would delight Right-leaning Britons and horrify the Left. The Ashcroft polling shows 73% of Labour voters would rather see a Labour-Lib Dem-Green coalition than Mr Farage and Mrs Badenoch’s teams taking control of the country.

The Tories have said Mrs Badenoch’s position is “no deal before an election, no deal during an election, no deal after an election”. She has warned the presence of former senior Tories Robert Jenrick and Suella Braverman in the Reform leadership team makes talk of cooperation a “non-starter”. There is bad blood here, and she has said “even deals post-elections are stitch-ups”.

If Reform was the largest party after the election but lacked an overall majority, Mr Farage (assuming he gets back into Parliament in this week’s Clacton by-election) potentially could lead a minority Government, and the Conservatives could choose to support its legislation on a case by case basis – or vice versa.

But MPs in both parties with clear memories of the post-2017 Brexit wars will remember the chaos, chicanery and paralysis which defined parliament after Theresa May lost her majority. Does the country want to go back to that?

Machiavellian MPs in the smaller party might make the case for letting the bigger outfit go it alone without a coalition partner so it can mess up and be devastated in the following election – but that would trigger accusations of putting party before country. The pressure and temptation to form a coalition which would shut Labour out of government and provide a clear majority would be immense.

To what looked like their own great surprise, David Cameron and the Lib Dems’ Nick Clegg ended up PM and Deputy PM, respectively, in 2010; the coalition offered stability in the wake of the financial crisis and allowed Mr Cameron and Chancellor George Osborne to go to bed each night without fearing the government or the economy would collapse the next morning.

If gargantuan debt interest payments push the Government closer to crisis at each Budget and the prospect of a new party taking power without a majority frightens the markets, advocates of a Tory-Reform coalition could make the case that such a union would be in the national interest. A host of think tanks would leap at the opportunity to draw up policies for what would be the most Right-wing Government in decades.

Anyone daring to make the case for this today at Tory headquarters today will get the shortest of shifts. Among the biggest obstacles to such a link-up is the spectacle of what happened to the Lib Dems when the last coalition ran its course.

Their pulverisation at the polls and years in the wilderness are a cautionary tale for potential junior partners. Mrs Badenoch will not want to go down in history as the Conservatives’ version of Mr Clegg.

She is not auditioning to play second fiddle to Mr Farage. She is in it to win it.