Robert Jenrick boasts that Reform is for the workers, but it’s a class war trap – and Labour shouldn’t fall for it | Polly Toynbee

Though Labour’s voters are more likely to be the educated middle-classes, its focus must be fighting inequality. We know Farage’s party will only enrich the wealthy

Class politics is back, as if it ever went away. Robert Jenrick declares that Tories are toffs and “the divide in British politics has become Reform’s workers party versus the Tory posh party”. He says the Tories are so “out of touch” they are no longer “the party of working people, of provincial Britain, of the towns and cities”. He’s not wrong, says Prof Tim Bale, political analyst: “Reform can claim to be a disproportionately working-class party.”

Considering the social class difference between the two rightwing parties, where does Jenrick belong? As a private school and Cambridge-educated former director of Christie’s auction house, is he too posh for Reform, even though he’s the son of a small businessman and first in his family to go to university? Hardly, since it’s a party founded by zillionaires. It’s a forever political mystery that low-paid/working-class voters will opt for the very wealthy with contrary financial interests. Bale points out that the Tories’ grip on power always relied on backing from a third of working-class voters.

Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist