Reform’s newest MP Danny Kruger: ‘On a personal level I deeply regret rejecting the Tory party’
IIt may have been a month since Reform’s newest MP, Danny Kruger, jumped ship to join Nigel Farage’s right-wing camp, but when you walk into the former Conservative Party supporter’s Westminster office, you’d be forgiven for questioning whether that’s actually happening.
Two signs for his office, located deep in the Palace of Westminster’s labyrinth of carpeted corridors and creaking staircases, still list Mr Kruger as the shadow work and pensions minister under Kemi Badenoch.
Then inside, there’s a framed map of Boris Johnson’s landslide election victory in 2019 hanging on the wall alongside Imperial War Museum recruitment posters and a painting by conservative philosopher Roger Scruton.
Tory blue stripes dominate many parts of the United Kingdom. The result of the Brexit-driven snap election not only enabled Mr Kruger, then Mr Johnson’s parliamentary secretary, to return his boss to 10th place, but also gave him his first parliamentary seat as the new MP for Devizes.
“I’m not putting out the 2024 election map,” he jokes. “We need the whole map to turn turquoise, right?” he said with a smile. he adds.
Departures are difficult in all walks of life, but it is clear that for Mr Kruger his departure from the Conservative Party was particularly painful.
“As a member of the Conservative Party for many years, as an employee and as an MP for my entire adult life, I regret to say… I think the time of the Conservatives as the main opposition, the main rival from the right, is over,” explains the married father of three.
His exit, arguably the biggest scalp ever for Reform, was announced at a press conference alongside Mr Farage last month. A few weeks later he wrote a letter to 71,000 East Wiltshire voters explaining his decision.
He said reform, now 14 points ahead of the Conservative Party in recent polls, is now Labor’s new opposition, and lamented the loss of voters’ trust in the Conservatives on issues such as mass immigration and Brexit.
“We now have the opposition we need for Labor – in Nigel Farage’s party – so it’s not just a rejection of the Conservatives, which I’m very sorry to do on a personal level, it’s an active, positive choice to join Reform because I think they represent the change we need,” he says.
I challenge him about the emotional impact of leaving the party he joined more than 30 years ago.
aspect self-describing The Etonian, who was a “terrible little Thatcherite” in his youth, then joined Conservative HQ in 2003 and later worked alongside former Tory leaders Iain Duncan Smith, Michael Howard and David Cameron.
“This is a very painful move,” he says, adding that he is conscious that he has “let down people” in Wiltshire, where party members have worked closely with him since his election victory in 2019. “I feel sad about this,” he says.
Of those in Whitehall, he says: “I have good friends in the Conservative benches who I know feel appalled and betrayed by me.” However, he is grateful that he has not suffered any personal attacks from former colleagues, including Ms Badenoch.
I think the time of the Conservatives as the main opposition with the main rival from the right is over
Danny Kruger
“But in this job, you have to put the interests of your constituents and your country ahead of your personal loyalties,” he says. “Loyalty is important. Parties are important. We could not exist without them, but we must put country before parties, and we must do this in practice, even if it is personally painful.”
Was it an easy political marriage to slide into the Reformation, where the slogan was family, community, country? Mr Kruger says so.
He already knew Reform MP Lee Anderson and said after “informal discussions” he went to speak to Mr Farage about joining the party and was gratefully accepted.
“I predict there will be other MPs who will switch from Conservatives to Reform,” he predicts, but adds rather hesitantly: “That assumes Nigel actually invites them to do so.”
Mr Kruger’s departure from Reform was particularly surprising, especially after some of his recent criticisms of the party.
But in May he accused members of supporting Conservative work During Commons debate He is in a “desperate quest for compliance” on Brexit. In July he said Reformation would “spend money like drunken sailors”. welfare debate.
“Since then, literally, Nigel Farage has stood up at his party conference and decided to make significant welfare cuts,” Mr Kruger says.
“Tax cuts aside, we have to make spending cuts not only for the sake of the public finances, although that necessity is very, very real, but also for the sake of people who are currently deprived of out-of-work benefits.
“It is a scandal, a disgrace and a tragedy that so many people have been written off for life by a welfare system that has a fundamentally inhumane judgment of what people are capable of.”
So what will be the two child allowance limit?
Reform has promised to lift the restriction in a move that could appeal to left-leaning voters but would cost an estimated £3.5bn.
Mr. Kruger supports the idea, but only for working families. “It is right that the public is concerned that people whose livelihood depends on welfare may have large families at public expense,” he says.
Next month, Mr Farage will give a speech on Reformation’s economic plans, seen by the party as a bid to boost its economic credibility after its £90bn tax cut manifesto, including an increase in the tax-free allowance to £20,000, was widely questioned.
“If we’re going to lower taxes, we have to show where the money comes from,” Mr. Kruger says.
Alongside the economy, immigration is at the heart of Reformation policy; Plans were announced last month to deport thousands of legal immigrants and revoke their indefinite leave to remain.
Mr Farage blames the so-called “Boris wave” on immigration following the easing of post-Brexit rules by Boris Johnson. Mr Kruger agrees. “I’m afraid yes, he needs to take responsibility as the leader of the government,” he says.
The party also wants to deport 600,000 refugees while building detention centers for 24,000 people.
When asked where the centers will be, he says: “I don’t want to go into details of where, but we will be able to establish facilities to accommodate all incoming refugees and illegal immigrants.” He insists they won’t be too big.
Next year’s Senedd elections should provide some indication of the future of Reform government in the UK. Scottish Parliament elections are also approaching.
“We are the new national party of the right and my hope is that we can seize power in these countries and show what a Reform government would look like before the general election,” Mr Kruger says.
Gaining power very quickly after being formed – could Mr Farage’s success leading the Brexit referendum be repeated, perhaps further enhanced, with him coming into 10th place within a few years?
Mr. Kruger looks cautious. Such is the state of the economy and Labor, he says, that the election could come “sooner than you think”.
But we have a “tremendous job ahead” of making policy and showing that it can work. “We can’t just show up with a few slogans on the first day and ask the officers to do it for us,” he insists.
There is also the task of bringing together candidates for 650 seats. Mr Kruger says there will be “a very rigorous review”.
“If we play our cards right, we will be in contention for government,” he adds.
After 35 minutes, the meeting ends. Mr. Kruger quickly makes his excuse and leaves for the meeting. This gives me a chance to look through his library.
There among Lisa Nandy All in OneDavid Skelton The New Snobbery and two books on Stonehenge (the ancient monument is located in his constituency), Oliver Letwin’s book How is the apocalypse?, He imagines that a technology-dependent England will be in crisis in 2037.
As the former minister looked to the future, I wondered whether even he could have predicted that a new party would surpass the Conservatives as the party of the right.
This is the unpredictability of today’s politics.
