Reform Welsh leader dismisses residency reports as ‘smears’

Reform UK’s newly appointed Welsh leader has hit back at reports questioning whether he actually lives in Wales, dismissing them as politically motivated attacks.

Dan Thomas, from Blackwood in Caerphilly county, was confirmed as the party’s Welsh leader by Nigel Farage at a rally in Newport on Thursday. But controversy quickly followed when Nation Cymru reported that the former Conservative leader of Barnet council in north London had bought a house near Bath.

Thomas responded firmly on BBC Politics Wales on Sunday, insisting he has moved back to Wales. “I am living and have been living in Wales,” he said, adding: “It’s quite telling that the smear attempts have already started from the Welsh establishment and their supporters.”

The issue carries legal weight – candidates must live in Wales to stand in May’s Senedd elections. Thomas acknowledged having “a property portfolio” but refused to discuss specific locations, saying this information was being “weaponised against me to try and make out that I’m not living in Wales.” According to BBC Wales, one of his properties is in Bath.

Thomas said he hopes to stand in the Casnewydd Islwyn seat at the Senedd elections, though Reform’s final candidate list hasn’t been finalised yet.

After defecting to Reform in summer 2025, Thomas revealed he moved to Wales in 2024 but continued as a London councillor for over a year. He explained: “So when I left London, I talked to my colleagues at the time, and they asked me not to stand down as a councillor. It would be quite disruptive having a by-election. It [would have] cost the taxpayer about £30,000.”

He continued attending meetings and helping residents with casework before resigning late last year “because I just wanted a fresh start for 2026.”

The Welsh Conservatives seized on this admission, posting on X: “Reform’s Welsh Leader has admitted he spent a year as a councillor in London while living in Wales! Do his priorities lie in London or Wales?”

Thomas outlined his political philosophy, drawing on his time leading Barnet council where he outsourced “back office functions” to the private sector, saving £16m annually and making the authority “more efficient.” Despite criticism at the time, he said he would “do it all over again,” explaining that “reorganising the back office allows you to focus money and retain frontline services such as bin collections.”

Those savings allowed him to cut council tax in 2014 and freeze it for several years. However, asked if he’d apply the same approach to Welsh government budgets, Thomas said he “wouldn’t be looking to make major cuts to local government settlements” but added: “We would be looking for local government to be more efficient.”

He acknowledged Welsh government cannot force councils to make cuts but “can encourage it.”

On education, Thomas said he’d be open to taking schools out of local authority control to create academies as in England, though wasn’t ready to announce “any manifesto commitments now.”

“With education and with the NHS – the theme here is doing things differently – because both the NHS and the education system are failing our residents and the patients,” he said.

Regarding devolution and additional funding from the UK government, Thomas was clear he wouldn’t ask for more money. “We need to get the Senedd getting the basics right first before we ask for more money or powers or anything like that,” he said.

“Reform will take ownership of the Senedd and say, ‘look, this is what we’ve got – let’s do it’. Of course we will stand up for Wales but we will take ownership. What we don’t do is blame any failures on the government, and what’s what Labour and Plaid do.”

Welsh Labour responded: “Both Reform UK and Plaid Cymru say they have a plan for Wales but can’t give any detail. Reform UK’s new Welsh leader is just another Tory defectee trying to get Farage into No10. It’s the same old slogans and simple solutions without substance. They say they’ll make efficiencies but what they mean are cuts and can’t say where the axe will fall.”