UK's Starmer takes aim at Nigel Farage as the Trump ally becomes a growing rival

LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer took aim at political rival Nigel Farage on Thursday, saying the hard-right politician would trash the U.K. economy through reckless spending.

In a sign of how Britain’s two-party-dominated political system is changing, the prime minister devoted a speech at a glass factory in northwest England to attacking Farage, an ally of President Donald Trump whose Reform UK party holds just five of the 650 seats in the House of Commons. Starmer’s Labour Party, elected last year in a landslide, has 403 seats, and the center-right Conservatives 121.

In a shift from Labour’s longstanding policy of ignoring Farage as much as possible, Starmer said the Conservative Party “is faltering” and voters might face a choice between Labour and Reform. The next national election is due by 2029.

Starmer branded Farage’s economic plans “ Liz Truss 2.0,” evoking the Conservative former prime minister who rocked financial markets and sent borrowing costs soaring by announcing billions in tax cuts without saying how they would be funded. She resigned after six weeks in office in 2022.

“It’s Liz Truss all over again,” Starmer said. “The same bet in the same casino. …. Using your family finances, your mortgages, the bills, as the gambling chip on his mad experiment.”

Reform got about 14% of the vote in last year’s national election, but it has surged to the top of many opinion polls. Reform made big gains in local elections this month, winning several mayoralties and control of 10 local councils.

Farage's party is targeting working class voters who once backed Labour. Starmer’s popularity has plunged as his government struggles to kick-start a sluggish economy. The government has raised the minimum wage, strengthened workers’ rights and pumped money into the state-funded health system — but also hiked employer taxes and cut welfare benefits.

Farage announced a slew of worker-friendly — and costly — policies this week, saying a Reform government would cut income tax for millions of people and restore a winter payment to help retirees cover heating costs that was cut by Starmer.

Independent think-tank the Institute for Fiscal Studies says the tax pledge alone could cost between 50 billion pounds and 80 billion pounds ($67 billion and $108 billion) a year.

“We know for a fact what happens when politicians say they are going to spend billions and billions of pounds that’s unfunded,” Starmer said.

Reform often contrasts Farage’s beer-loving, man-of-the-people image with the stiff, lawyerly Starmer.

Starmer pushed back on Thursday, stressing his own working-class credentials.

“I know what it means to work 10 hours a day in a factory five days a week, and I know that because that is what my dad did every single working day of his life, and that’s what I grew up with,” Starmer said. “So I don’t need lessons from Nigel Farage about the issues that matter most to working people in this country.”

Farage, who was attending a cryptocurrency conference in Las Vegas on Thursday, posted on X that Starmr was “resorting to dirty tricks” to attack him.

Reform UK chairman Zia Yusuf said the speech showed Starmer “is panicking because his awful government is now trailing Reform” in opinion polls.