Former leading Tory Sir Jake Berry joins Nigel Farage's Reform UK
Speaking to the Sun newspaper, the new Reform member added: 'Old Westminster politics has failed.
'Millions of people, just like me, want a country they can be proud of again. The only way we get that is with Reform in government.'
Britain needs Reform!https://t.co/kNq74pTAeb
— Sir Jake Berry (@JakeBerry) July 9, 2025
Sir Jake is the second former Cabinet minister in a week to join Reform, after ex-Welsh secretary David Jones announced he enrolled as a member.
Other ex-Tories who have joined Reform include Marco Longhi, Anne Marie Morris, Ross Thomson, Aiden Burley and Dame Andrea Jenkyns, now the mayor of Greater Lincolnshire.
The former MP for Rossendale and Darwen lost his seat in the 2024 general election to Labour's Andy MacNae, who had a majority of 6,000 over Sir Jake.
Mr MacNae won with 18,246 votes to Sir Jake's 12,619.
Reform's candidate Daniel Matchett followed in a close third with 9,695 votes.
Since his loss, Sir Jake has worked in broadcasting, hosting a show on Talk TV.
Before serving in Ms Truss's government, he was a minister during both Boris Johnson and Theresa May's premierships, with responsibilities focused on the Northern Powerhouse and levelling up.
In a video published alongside the Sun's reporting, Sir Jake spoke of his time in government.
After claiming that 'Britain is broken', he added: 'I know who broke it because I was there.
'For 30 years I supported the Conservative Party, for 14 years I was one of their MPs, sitting at that Cabinet table twice.
'I want to tell you today my friends that I have come to a decision. The old parties do not have what it takes to transform our country, to build a Britain we can believe in again, and that's why I've decided to join the Reform Party.'
Sir Jake, who opposed Brexit ahead of the 2016 referendum, commended his new party leader Mr Farage for having 'always stuck by his principles, even when it was unpopular'.
Mr Farage 'doesn't change his views, when the political weather changes', Sir Jake said, adding: 'Because you know you can trust him, I can trust him too and that's why I'm going to spend every day campaigning to ensure that Nigel Farage and Reform form the next government of this great United Kingdom.'
A Labour Party spokesperson, said: 'Not content with taking advice from Liz Truss, Nigel Farage has now tempted her Tory party chairman into his ranks.
'It's clear Farage wants Liz Truss's reckless economics, which crashed our economy and sent mortgages spiralling, to be Reform's blueprint for Britain. It's a recipe for disaster and working people would be left paying the price.
'Only our Labour Government is putting more money in people's pockets, boosting British jobs, and delivering the renewal our country needs through our Plan for Change.'
A Conservative Party spokesman said: 'Reform support increasing the benefits bill by removing the two-child cap, and nationalising British industry.
'By contrast the Conservatives, under new leadership, will keep making the case for sound money, lower taxes and bringing the welfare bill under control. We wish Jake well in his new high-spend, high-tax party.'
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mirror
4 minutes ago
- Daily Mirror
'Scrap Tory two-child benefit limit to lift kids out poverty' Neil Kinnock says
In an interview with The Mirror, the former Labour leader Neil Kinnock said the Tories had left the country in a state that would 'make Charles Dickens furious' with 'intolerable' hardship Neil Kinnock has said the controversial two-child benefit limit should be scrapped to lift hundreds of thousands of kids out of poverty. In an interview with The Mirror, the former Labour leader blamed the Tories for undoing Gordon Brown's proud legacy of cutting child poverty. He said after 14 years the Conservatives left the country in a state that would "make Charles Dickens furious" with "intolerable" hardship. Getting rid of the two-child benefit limit - one of the most severe cuts to the welfare state by austerity Chancellor George Osborne - would be the "immediate and direct way of trying to correct the conditions the government inherited," he said. It comes after Mr Brown hit out at the return of 'poverty of 60 years ago'. READ MORE: KEVIN MAGUIRE: 'Labour must find engaging story for the UK - or face election wipeout' The policy, which restricts Universal Credit and Child Tax Credits to the first two children, has been blamed by charities for trapping kids in poverty. Labour MPs are calling on Keir Starmer and Chancellor Rachel Reeves to axe the policy at the Budget in the autumn, or as part of an ongoing child poverty review. Asked whether the government should now scrap the two child benefit-limit, Lord Kinnock, who led Labour between 1983 and 1992, said: "I would want them to do it. They may not be able to do it all at once, but I really want them to move in that direction because the figures are that if that did occur it would mean that about 600,000 kids, fewer, are in poverty." He later added: "Yes, I would say that. It might have to be done in a phased fashion - simply because of the revenue implications - but heading strongly and evidently in that direction is the way to go." The former Labour leader said tackling child poverty - among other issues facing the country - could be paid for by a tax on the assets of the super-rich or a hike in levies on the top 1%. He told The Mirror: "I think people would see the justification of increasing taxes on assets and the very, very highly paid - I'm talking about the top 1% - in order to make the transfer directly to reduce child poverty. "I know it's the economics of Robin Hood, but I don't think there is anything terribly bad about that." Lord Kinnock has previously said a 2% levy on asset values over £10million - a "very big fortune" - could bring in around £11billion for the Treasury. He added: "The thing is we live in a fair country where the instincts are fair, so people approve of the idea of the broadest backs bearing the heaviest burden. "Of course the very rich do make a substantial contribution. It's not enough. And it hasn't kept pace with the increase in their asset wealth. Simple and straightforward as that." Earlier this year official figures showed a record 4.5million children living in poverty. Pressed on what this said about the state of the nation, Lord Kinnock said: "All you've got to do is reflect where we were under Gordon Brown's government when they cut child poverty gigantically by millions. "In 15 years, starting from a position where beneficial change was taking place, we've got to the place that would make Charles Dickens furious. It's been allowed to happen because the kids are voiceless and their parents feel powerless. I defy anybody to see a child in need and not want to help." Keir Starmer has previously vowed to slash the number of kids living in poverty. And Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson, who is leading the child poverty task force alongside Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall, has suggested ending the two-child benefit limit remains on the table. Asked what he would like to see from the taskforce, Lord Kinnock said: "Recognise the basic thing that poverty exists because people haven't got enough money. That's so obvious you almost feel foolish saying it. But unless and until it's recognised in operational policy then it's going to continue." Lord Kinnock made clear he wants to see a reform of the "unjust" tax system. He told The Mirror: "To do it in the name of equity, fairness. "People need to see a demonstration of the fact that things really are changing for the better. We live in a country now where lots of people are utterly fed up. When the encountered reality that whatever happens in the world, whatever happens in Britain, the same people come out on top, always, untouched." Ahead of the autumn Budget, Lord Kinnock also praised the "smart" and "gutsy" Chancellor Ms Reeves. He added: "She's got a very, very difficult task. Last July they [Labour] inherited a phenomenal mess, a gigantic mess, almost of a post-war scale and we haven't had a war. "What we have had is 14 years of continual and chronic underinvestment in crucial areas. Not just the health service and education system, but the care system... virtually eradicated. The support for young families, really smashed to pieces. "The [defence] forces, so underinvested, that we've got a smaller army than we had at the time of the Napoleonic wars. All of that is cumulative and just as in every other sphere in life, demolition is easy. Reconstruction is difficult. "They've got this huge task of reconstruction. It is fundamental. I would actually like them to treat it not only as a terrible challenge, which it is, but also an opportunity that the mess that the Tories left is so big, so wide, that it could be used as an invitation for radical change. "My gut tells me, my brain tells me, that our country needs that."
Telegraph
an hour ago
- Telegraph
Now we have proof free speech is a joke in two-tier Britain
After Labour councillor Ricky Jones stood at a demonstration in Walthamstow decrying 'disgusting Nazi fascists' and telling a crowd through a microphone that 'we need to cut all their throats and get rid of them all', a jury of Mr Jones's peers cleared him of any offence. When Lucy Connolly – married to a Tory councillor – posted on social media 'set fire to all the f-----g hotels full of all the b------s for all I care… if that makes me racist so be it', she chose to plead guilty under apparent pressure from the state. Ms Connolly is currently serving a 31-month prison sentence, at times on a 23-hour lockdown confined to her cell with no privileges, for her ill-tempered words. Others, who stood their ground, walked free. The results were still unpleasant – the process is in part the punishment – but better than they might otherwise have been. It is hard not to feel that the difference between the two cases is less a matter of law than politics. Lucy Connolly was denied bail as Sir Keir Starmer and the judiciary worked on their 'shared understanding' that anyone expressing sentiments that could have encouraged last year's riots needed to be made an example of. Sir Keir himself told the nation that individuals would be held on remand. The Home Office openly risked prejudicing trials by labelling those arrested, charged but not yet convicted as 'criminals'. If there's a lesson here, it may well be that people can say stupid things without the world collapsing around them. And that the public – which did not visibly respond to either exhortation – can be trusted, for the most part, to recognise the distinction between genuinely threatening language and idiocy, both on the streets and in jury deliberations. Unlike our American cousins, British people have only a very qualified right to free speech. While the human rights system appears to go out of its way to undermine attempts to control borders or crack down on crime, protection of speech is heavily caveated. And the British state makes full use of these carve-outs in its attempt to maintain its fragile grip on the country it has built. Its most important aim is to prevent tensions between groups. Speech that might inflame them is subject to stringent oversight and exacting scrutiny by officials terrified of what might spiral out from a frank examination of the country as it is. People on the Left, however, can speak with relative security. The result, in the words of Reform's Zia Yusuf, appears to be 'a country in which those who have the correct 'regime' political views can openly call for their political opponents to be brutally murdered, be filmed doing so, and face no criminal consequences'.
Rhyl Journal
2 hours ago
- Rhyl Journal
Pro-Palestine protesters chant ‘RAF shame on you' at air base demonstration
Hundreds of demonstrators gathered along the barbed wire fence of RAF High Wycombe on Saturday afternoon at the protest organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Protesters held banners that said 'end British military collaboration with Israel' and '61,000+ killed, 600 RAF spy flights'. There were chants of 'RAF you work for us, Israel is not your boss', 'RAF shame, shame – killing children in your name' and 'RAF blood on your hands'. A large Palestine flag was erected in front of a replica Second World War Hurricane fighter plane outside the entrance to the air base, with organisers bussing in protesters from High Wycombe railway station. The demonstrators assembled outside the air base held a large red banner as they chanted 'we are the red line, UK for Palestine', with protesters banging pots and drumming throughout the protest. Thames Valley Police said no arrests were made at the protest. Speaking at the demonstration, Adnan Hmidan, chairman of the Palestinian Forum in Britain, said: 'The RAF is not just a bystander, it is a partner in collective punishment. 'It is a partner in ethnic cleansing and the most important thing is it is a partner in the genocide against the people in Gaza. 'Every war plane that reaches Israel with British parts or British support makes this country complicit in the killing of children.' Addressing the crowds, activist Andrew Feinstein said: 'For the last 22 months, there are more RAF spy planes flying over Gaza than there have been Israeli Air Force spy planes. 'That information then gets relayed to the IDF to inform what they call their targeting decisions, but we know that their targeting is totally indiscriminate. 'So, the people who sit in these buildings are the ones guiding the IDF around Gaza. That is active participation in a genocide. 'The people sitting in these buildings should sit for the rest of their lives in The Hague in prison for their participation in genocide.' The Palestine Solidarity Campaign said: 'On 16th August, as part of our summer of action for Gaza, we will be surrounding RAF High Wycombe, drawing on the legacy of protest at air bases like Greenham Common, and showing the strength of the public demand for an arms embargo.' A spokesperson for Thames Valley Police said: 'We are aware of a protest being planned to take place in High Wycombe today. 'We will work with the organisers, partners and the public to facilitate peaceful protest, balancing the rights of all and to keep our communities safe.' RAF High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire houses Headquarters Air Command and was originally designed to house RAF Bomber Command in the late 1930s. The station is also the headquarters of the European Air Group and the UK Space Command. Last weekend in central London, 15,000 people demonstrated peacefully in support of the Palestinian cause with only one arrest, the Metropolitan Police said, adding that 522 were arrested 'for an illegal show of support for Palestine Action on the same day'. The Metropolitan Police said on Friday that a further 60 people will be prosecuted for 'showing support for the proscribed terrorist group Palestine Action'. The force said this follows the arrest of more than 700 people since the group was banned on July 5, including 522 in central London last Saturday. More prosecutions are expected in the coming weeks and arrangements have been put in place 'that will enable us to investigate and prosecute significant numbers each week if necessary', the Met said. Last week, the Met confirmed the first three charges in England and Wales for offences against section 13 of the Terrorism Act relating to Palestine Action. Palestine Action was proscribed by the UK Government in July, with the ban meaning that membership of, or support for, the group is a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison, under the Terrorism Act 2000.
