Reform have the radical approach that can deliver

Once a Tory rising star who basked in Boris Johnson's Red Wall revolution, former Mansfield MP Ben Bradley is now a key player in the drive to ensure Reform leader Nigel Farage is the next occupant of 10 Downing St

- David Williamson

BEN BRADLEY was once a Conservative superstar who blazed the trail for Boris Johnson's Red Wall revolution. Now he is at the heart of the project to make Nigel Farage Britain's next Prime Minister.

A 36-year-old son of a police officer, he ended 94 years of Labour reign in the Nottinghamshire seat of Mansfield when he won it for the Conservatives in 2017 at the age of 27.

His victory was the trailer for Mr Johnson's blockbuster "get Brexit done" election in 2019 which saw swathes of Labour's traditional heartland turn from red to blue.

Serious-minded yet quietly charismatic, this former supermarket shelf-stacker and landscape gardener chaired the Blue Collar Conservatism group and worked to make the Tories the go-to party for working people.

He served in Westminster while leading Nottinghamshire County Council and personified Tory ambitions to end the North-South divide.

Today, he is no less determined to bring radical change to the nation but the former Kemi Badenoch supporter is now on Mr Farage's team.

He describes the Reform leader as "arguably the most influential politician in Britain for the last decade" and wants to put the veteran Brexiteer in control of the levers of power.

His reason for defecting is simple: "Reform are the people with the radical approach that can actually deliver on the stuff that the Conservative Party has talked about but failed to do." Mr Bradley now admits the possibility of joining Reform crossed his mind when his former parliamentary neighbour, Ashfield MP Lee Anderson, joined the party in March 2024.

Mr Anderson, a former Labour activist who became a Tory MP, had been suspended from the Conservatives after claiming Mayor of London Sadiq Khan was in the "control" of Islamists.

"I thought that was a real own goal, a real kind of unforced error from the government at the time," Mr Bradley remembers.