Nigel Farage demands snap general election and declares: 'I'm not frightened of Andy Burnham'

Nigel Farage has demanded a snap general election just moments after Sir Keir Starmer confirmed he will resign as Prime Minister pending a Labour leadership contest.

The Reform UK leader, who is currently leading in the opinion polls, set out why the country should go to the polls in a 1,477-word Substack essay.

Mr Farage opened his essay by blasting Sir Keir as "the most incompetent Prime Minister this country has ever had the misfortune of having" and claimed to have "deposed" him as Labour leader.

The Clacton MP went on to argue he had also "deposed" a number of Tory Prime Ministers, including David Cameron, Theresa May and Rishi Sunak.

Mr Farage, who was dealt a major electoral blow last week when Andy Burnham romped to victory in Makerfield, is now setting his sights on taking down the ex-Greater Manchester Mayor by calling for a general election at the "soonest possible date".

He wrote: "You know as well as I do that the country cannot afford to waste another week drifting from crisis to crisis.

"That’s why millions of you turned out in the local elections to vote for Reform councillors, and it’s why we have led in more than 300 opinion polls for well over a year.

"The British public have made their voices clear in May this year and last: Britain is broken and they want a radical reforming government that will fundamentally fix our country.

"But instead, Westminster wants to crown Andy Burnham off the back of a single by-election."

Directly addressing his disappointment in Makerfield, Mr Farage accused Mr Burnham of "repackaging" Reform UK's "Get Starmer Out" slogan.

He added: "I’m not frightened of Andy Burnham or any of the other Labour Party stooges.

"The same applies to Kemi Badenoch’s Conservative Party, who oppose a General Election and seem to think that it is perfectly acceptable to chop and change Prime Ministers at will.

"This is how the uniparty operates. The truth is that they are frightened of us.

"That’s why they band together at every by-election to attempt to block us from victory, why they tried to cancel the local elections and why they’ll try their very hardest to hold off on a general election for as long as possible."

However, Mr Burnham was told he should be fearful of Reform UK as Mr Farage claimed his party "listens to the desires of working people and offers them solutions".