David Bull has taken over from Zia Yusuf as chairman of Reform UK (Image: Jonathan Buckmaster)

A phone call from Nigel Farage changed David Bull’s life – and now the doctor turned television presenter is criss-crossing Britain on a mission to make the veteran Brexiteer Prime Minister. He has worked in emergency departments across London and he relishes what he sees as a historic opportunity to bring Britain back to full health.

Mr Farage summoned Mr Bull onto the frontline of British politics this month to succeed Zia Yusuf as the new chairman of Reform UK. The party is in first place in the opinion polls and for weeks it has had a double-lead over the Conservatives.

“It’s amazing I’m part of British political history,” Mr Bull says.

This is not the first time Mr Farage has sent him on a life-shaping adventure.

Ahead of the 2019 European election, Mr Bull had just returned from a holiday and was unpacking when he picked up a call from the then-leader of the Brexit Party.

New Reform UK Chairman Says Farage Will Be PM – as He Fights for British Farmers

Nigel Farage’s ambition to become Britain’s next Prime Minister has received a fresh vote of confidence from inside Reform UK, as the party steps up its campaign to win over rural voters and position itself as a major political force at the next general election.

The message is significant because Reform is no longer presenting itself simply as a protest movement. The party has openly begun preparing for government, with Farage declaring that its general election campaign has effectively started and promising a programme of rapid changes if Reform enters Downing Street.

At the centre of that campaign is an increasingly important political constituency: Britain’s farmers.

Reform has identified agriculture and rural communities as areas where it believes established parties have lost touch with voters. Farage has repeatedly attacked what he describes as excessive bureaucracy, taxation and environmental restrictions affecting farmers, while arguing that Britain needs a stronger domestic food-production strategy.

His pitch to farmers has become increasingly prominent as Reform attempts to build support beyond its traditional base.

A Farmers Weekly survey reported in March 2026 found that support for Reform among farmers had risen from 15 per cent to 40 per cent over the previous year. Farage told the publication that the party’s growing rural support reflected its focus on farming, fishing and countryside issues.

For a party seeking national power, that shift matters.

Farage’s Downing Street ambition

Farage has never hidden his ambition to lead Britain.

In an interview with LBC in June, he explicitly explained why he wanted to become Prime Minister, arguing that he had the public rapport and political courage required to challenge the established political system.

By October, that ambition had become even more central to Reform’s strategy.

Launching his “100 Days to Save Britain” tour in Doncaster on October 1, Farage described the next general election campaign as beginning immediately.

He said Reform would be campaigning continuously whether the election took place later in 2026, in spring 2027 or several years later.

That is a very different posture from the one Reform occupied when it first entered Parliament.

The party is now attempting to persuade voters that it is capable not only of challenging Labour and the Conservatives but of forming a government.

That requires a much broader coalition.

Farmers could be an important part of it.

Why farmers matter to Reform

Agriculture has become one of the clearest areas in which Reform is attempting to distinguish itself from the mainstream parties.

The party argues that Britain’s farmers face excessive paperwork, rising costs, taxation pressures and policies that make it harder to maintain profitable family farms.

Reform’s current policy material describes farmers as central to Britain’s food security and promises to reduce what it calls unnecessary bureaucratic burdens. It also opposes what it describes as punitive taxation of family farms and argues that agricultural land should be protected from inappropriate development.

Farage has specifically highlighted inheritance tax as a concern for farmers.

He has also criticised the use of productive agricultural land for solar developments, arguing that food production should remain a national priority.

For farmers who feel that Westminster has prioritised other objectives over the economic viability of agriculture, the message has obvious political appeal.

But the issue is more complicated than a simple dispute between farmers and government.

Agriculture involves competing pressures involving food prices, environmental policy, land use, energy generation, international trade and public finances.

Any government attempting to change the system would therefore face difficult choices.

The inheritance tax battle

One of the most politically sensitive issues is taxation on agricultural assets.

Reform has positioned itself against measures it believes could make it harder for family farms to remain within families across generations.

Farage has repeatedly attacked inheritance-tax proposals affecting agricultural property and has used the issue to portray Reform as an ally of rural communities.

The party’s argument is that family farms should not be forced to sell land simply to meet tax liabilities following the death of an owner.

Critics of Reform’s approach argue that the debate needs to distinguish between genuine working farms and wealthy landowners who could potentially use agricultural tax reliefs as part of broader estate-planning strategies.

That disagreement is unlikely to disappear.

For Reform, however, the political message is clear: the party wants farmers to believe that it understands the financial pressures facing family-run agriculture.

Food security as a national issue

Farage has also connected farming policy to food security.

The argument is that Britain should not become excessively dependent on imports for basic food supplies.

Reform has previously proposed increasing domestic food self-sufficiency and has argued that agricultural policy should place British production at the centre of national strategy.

Farage has also discussed concerns about imported food standards.

Speaking to Farmers Weekly, he addressed worries among farmers about products such as chlorinated chicken and emphasised labelling and the value of British-produced food.

The issue is politically useful because it links farming to a much broader question about Britain’s post-Brexit trading arrangements.

Brexit supporters argued that leaving the European Union would allow Britain to develop its own agricultural and trade policies.

Reform has embraced that argument, presenting itself as the party most committed to maintaining political independence from Brussels.

Rural voters and the wider Reform strategy

The focus on farmers is also part of a broader attempt to expand Reform’s electoral coalition.

A party cannot realistically seek national government by relying on one demographic group.

Reform therefore needs support from rural communities, coastal towns, former industrial areas and parts of suburban Britain.

Agriculture provides a bridge into that wider rural electorate.

The party’s messages about farming are often connected to concerns about rural crime, energy prices, planning restrictions, transport, broadband and the future of village communities.

Farage’s visits to farming communities allow Reform to present these issues as part of a single political argument: that Westminster has imposed policies on rural Britain without sufficiently considering their practical consequences.

Whether voters ultimately agree with that assessment is a matter for the electorate.

But politically, Reform has clearly decided that rural Britain will be an important part of its campaign.

A new chairman’s endorsement

The declaration that Farage will become Prime Minister is therefore more than a personal compliment.

It reflects Reform’s increasingly explicit attempt to behave like a government-in-waiting.

The party’s current platform promises major changes within the first 100 days of a Reform administration, including action on Channel crossings, a higher personal allowance, lower energy bills and reforms to higher education.

Farage has also said that ministers who fail to deliver the party’s promised changes should resign.

Such promises are designed to create a sharp contrast with traditional Westminster politics.

But they also raise the stakes.

Once a party begins promising specific results within a defined period, voters can hold it directly accountable for whether those results are achieved.

That is particularly important for Reform because its political identity has been built around criticism of what it calls the “Uniparty”.

The Conservative challenge

Reform’s growing presence among farmers also creates difficulties for the Conservatives.

The Conservatives have traditionally enjoyed strong support in many rural constituencies and have long presented themselves as the natural party of farmers and landowners.

But that political relationship has been challenged by Reform’s rise.

Current polling shows the Conservatives attempting to recover from their 2024 election defeat while competing directly with Farage for voters on the right. The Financial Times reported this week that the Conservatives remain third in polling on 20 per cent, while Kemi Badenoch faces the challenge of winning back voters who have moved towards Reform and the Liberal Democrats.

That makes agriculture an increasingly important political battleground.

If Reform can persuade rural voters that it offers a stronger programme for farming, the Conservatives could face further pressure in constituencies where agricultural concerns carry significant weight.

From protest party to potential government

The central question for Reform is now whether its political message can survive the transition from opposition to potential government.

It is relatively easy for a party outside government to promise that it would reduce bureaucracy, cut taxes or change agricultural policy.

The harder task is delivering those changes while dealing with budget constraints, international trade agreements, environmental commitments and competing demands for public spending.

That is where Reform’s agricultural promises will eventually face their biggest test.

Farmers will not simply want speeches.

They will want practical results: viable incomes, manageable costs, predictable taxation, access to markets and policies that allow farms to remain productive.

Farage’s increasingly close relationship with farming groups suggests Reform understands that reality.

The road to Downing Street

For now, the party is clearly preparing for a national contest.

Farage has said the election campaign has begun, while Reform’s policy programme is being presented as a blueprint for its first months in government.

The new chairman’s prediction that Farage will be Prime Minister fits directly into that strategy.

But the statement is ultimately a political claim, not an electoral certainty.

Britain’s political landscape remains highly fluid, with Labour, the Conservatives, Reform and smaller parties competing for overlapping groups of voters.

What is clear is that Reform wants farmers to be part of its route to power.

By making agriculture, food security, taxation and rural life central to its message, Farage is attempting to transform Reform’s appeal into something broader than its traditional focus on immigration and Brexit.

For British farmers, the question will be whether those promises represent a credible programme for the future of agriculture.

For Reform, the stakes are even higher.

The party is no longer merely asking voters to send a warning to Westminster.

It is asking them to imagine Nigel Farage walking through the doors of Downing Street.

And its campaign to win Britain’s farmers may become an important part of that argument.