Who's got your back?

Reform UK calls itself the party of working people. So why is its most concrete legislative promise to strip away the protections working people in its own seats overwhelmingly say they want to keep? A large-sample poll of Reform-held constituencies has exposed the gap between Nigel Farage's brand and Richard Tice's policy — and it's a chasm. This is the inadequacy argument with receipts, and it lands today.

The Snake Oil

The problem is what happens when you look at what Reform would actually do in power. Their 'Great Repeal Bill' — their single most concrete legislative commitment — would scrap the Employment Rights Act, the most significant overhaul of worker protections in a generation. We're talking about bans on exploitative zero-hours contracts, an end to fire and rehire, day-one sick pay, and strengthened unfair dismissal protections. These aren't elite abstractions. They're the things that stop your boss replacing you with someone on worse terms the day after you complain. The people most exposed to these practices — workers in exactly the post-industrial and coastal constituencies Reform now represents — are the target audience for both the rhetoric and the betrayal.

🎭 HYPOCRISY WATCH

Reform's business spokesman Richard Tice represents Boston and Skegness, where 86% of his own constituents oppose fire and rehire and 80% want exploitative zero-hours contracts banned. Reform's manifesto promises to 'stop the offshore taxpayer ripoff' — while Tice reportedly operates through offshore family trusts and company structures, according to published reports. He is the public face of a pledge to make it easier for employers to fire workers and rehire them on worse terms. That's not standing up for working people. That's standing on them.

The Grain of Truth

Zero-hours contracts, fire and rehire, and vanishing sick pay aren't invented grievances — they're daily realities for millions of workers in exactly the communities that have swung to Reform. The anger at economic precarity is entirely legitimate and has been building for decades. Where progressives have genuinely failed is in not explaining clearly enough what the Employment Rights Act actually contains and means for real working lives, leaving Reform's 'red tape kills jobs' framing to go largely unanswered in the places that matter most.

Your Move

If challenging directly

"In Nigel Farage's own constituency, 77% of voters want to ban exploitative zero-hours contracts. In Richard Tice's seat, 86% oppose fire and rehire. Reform isn't the voice of working people — it's planning to take things away from them they already have and overwhelmingly want to keep."

If acknowledging the concern

"People are right to feel exposed at work. Reform says they're on your side. Then they promise to rip up the legislation that fixes it. You're not asking for too much. Reform is offering too little — and planning to take away what you've already won."

If exposing the game

"Reform's trick is this: they point at the real problem — insecure work, dodgy contracts, no sick pay — then offer a solution that makes it worse. They call the Employment Rights Act 'red tape.' Your employer calls it 'the thing stopping me from firing you and rehiring you at half the pay.'"

❌ Don't say: "Labour's Employment Rights Act delivers transformative systemic reform to address structural labour market precarity"

✅ Say this: "They want to scrap the law that stops your boss firing you on Friday and rehiring you on worse pay Monday. Ask them why."

Make It Land

Instagram carousel

A constituency-by-constituency carousel showing the gap between what Reform voters want and what Reform has promised to take away from them

One Reform-held seat per slide — Clacton, Boston and Skegness, Ashfield, Runcorn — with one stark stat per card
Bold typography on dark background, receipt-style layout: 'What you want' vs 'What Reform plans'
Clacton slide: '77% of Farage's voters want exploitative zero-hours contracts banned. Farage wants to scrap that.'
Boston & Skegness slide: '86% of Tice's constituents oppose fire and rehire. Tice wants to legalise it.'
Final slide: 'This isn't Labour vs Reform. It's workers vs a party that wants to take things away from them they already have.' Small-print sourcing: polling commissioned by TUC and Hope Not Hate — check their published methodology for full details
Designed as a repost kit — clean enough for a union local, an MP's office, or a campaign account to share without adaptation

Receipts

The Mirror: Reform's 'Great Repeal Bill' pledge to scrap the Employment Rights Act, with constituency-level polling showing majorities of 66–86% in Reform-held seats backing the specific protections Reform has promised to remove — link

TUC / Hope Not Hate (via The Mirror): Large-sample constituency polling across Reform-held seats including Clacton, Boston and Skegness, Ashfield and Runcorn on zero-hours contracts, fire and rehire, sick pay and minimum wage — link

LBC: 'Awful April' cost-of-living pressure on households — council tax up 4.9%, water bills up 5.4%, broadband hikes — providing the economic backdrop Reform is exploiting — link

Know a trade unionist, a campaigner, or just someone who argues with their boss? Send this their way.

Keep It Light

A spokesman for workers named Tice Said fire-and-rehire was nice His constituents said no Eighty-six percent so But who said he'd ask their advice?