Ex-Tory MP Ann Widdecombe is back on the campaign trail.

This time the former minister under John Major’s Conservative government was the keynote speaker at a rally of the Reform UK party held in the Corn Exchange in Rochester.

Ms Widdecombe, 76, was MP for Maidstone (later Maidstone and the Weald) for 23 years between 1987 and 2010, when she stood down.

Later she joined the Brexit Party and was its Member of the European Parliament for South West England between 2019 and 2020.

Last year she joined the Reform UK party.

She told a hall packed with 250 supporters that: “The other parties have made a complete mess of it and we are the only ones with the message that Britain needs to hear!”

Ms Widdecombe said most voters did not vote for a political party, but against one.

She claimed those who dreaded a Keir Starmer government would vote Tory, while those who hated the Conservatives would vote Labour.

The former Big Brother contestant said the supporters of neither party really believed in that party’s message and said the challenge for Reform UK was to persuade people to vote for what they truly believed “with their heads and the hearts” was right.

Reform UK has already declared its candidates for the General Election in all but two of Kent’s 18 constituencies.

A recent YouGov poll shows its support in Kent is particularly strong.

It is predicted to finish ahead of both the Greens and the Lib Dems in most constituencies.

Businessman Paul Thomas, from Loose, is standing for the party in the new Maidstone and Malling constituency. He described the meeting as a “very rousing occasion”.