That is the question being posed by Matthew Goodwin, professor of politics at Kent University. He believes that Boris Johnson is in a very bad place at the moment.

Professor Goodwin said in an article on the Unherd site that those who previously moved to the Tories under Johnson because they were Leave voters are becoming increasingly perturbed by the Tories slide into being a tax and spend party and Johnson’s lunatic obsession with Net Zero. Professor Goodwin believes that a return to front line politics by Nigel Farage by having him increasingly involved in the Reform Party could pull votes away from the Tories.

I tend to agree that Professor Goodwin may well be correct here. There are a lot of people pissed off with Boris Johnson’s government. Even taking out of the equation the way that the Government has handled the pandemic, something that would be a challenge to any government, the current UK government has not performed that well in areas like the economy, culture and security.

Many of us voted for Boris Johnson not only to get Brexit done and break the deadlock that was being caused by the Remainers in the House of Commons, but also to defend Britain’s borders, fight back against the cultural destruction by the far Left, increase freedom of speech and thought and make Britain more secure and run his government for the benefit of all Britons. His government has not done that. His government has done nothing about the invasion of illegals on the south coast, very little to fight back against the Left, has not defended or improved freedom of speech or thought and on everything from military to energy security he and his government have been less than stellar performers.

Professor Goodwin believes that Reform, especially if Nigel Farage got more involved in it, could become a thorn in the side of the Tories especially if Reform start to point out the failings of the Tories in such areas as the lunatic net zero plan, cost of living and border security.

Professor Goodwin said:

Currently averaging 5% in the polls, Reform, under the stewardship of former Brexit Party MEP Richard Tice, is making no secret of its political strategy: it plans to exploit the rapidly growing rift between Boris Johnson and his conservative voters who are today just as likely to come from the Labour heartlands as the Tory shires.

Therein lies a crucial point. Many of the voters on whom Boris Johnson depends are more blue-collar, non-graduate and culturally conservative than those who supported David Cameron just a few years ago. They are more purple than blue, more Faragist than Cameroon.

The Professor makes a good and valid point here. Boris Johnson is in the unenviable position of depending on the votes of those whom he and his government are shafting. That can’t be a good thing.

Professor Goodwin adds that the position for Boris Johnson is even more shaky as voters have got far more used to being politically flexible when it comes to parties than they once were. The public have discovered or rediscovered the power of rebellion and the weakness inherent in being completely loyal to one particular party.

Personally I cannot see Reform unseating Johnsonite MP’s in either by-elections or a General Election, at least not in this election cycle. However they do have the capability to pull so many votes away from the Tories that it could prove advantageous to a currently unreformed Labour Party and to the Janus-faced Liberal Democrats.

I believe that those who say that in order to stay in power and properly represent large portions of the electorate then the Tories have to become a conservative party again. A lot of us are really cheesed off with voting Tory and getting back instead a watery facsimile of the Lib Dems or the Greens.