Nigel Farage was elected Brexit Party leader in 2016. Nigel Farage said that a “new party” led by Jacob Rees-Mogg could take votes from the Conservatives. Speaking in an interview with The Times, Mr Farage said: “It would mean a new party and it would be very serious indeed if Mr Rees-Mogg, who is being spoken about as possibly leader, joined forces with me.” He said if the Conservative Party did not “move away from its current course”, it would be punished at the next election. Mr Farage also said he believed that Jeremy Hunt would make a good prime minister. “I would vote for him tomorrow. I think he is a fine man, I have spent time with him, I know him a bit. He’s bright, charming, good company, good news presenter.” Mr Farage has previously spoken of his ambition to see a coalition between the Conservatives and Brexit Party at the next election. As recently as March he told the BBC’s Andrew Marr that “a vote for us is a vote for the Tories but a vote for them is a vote for the Brexit Party”. On Sunday he also confirmed that he could not run for the role of prime minister if Boris Johnson became the leader of the Tories, in a break with previous comments on the matter. “When the Tories select their candidate I’ll support him or her, but as I’ve said before, the first person I’ll work with is the prime minister and anyone who becomes prime minister will come up to me and ask for help, not the other way round.” “I want to see Boris Johnson as prime minister. I want to see a successful Conservative government. That’s it. I’m not a member of the Conservative Party but I do support them,” he said. He dismissed the idea of taking over the role of prime minister, saying: “If I said that I want to see a vote of no confidence and I want to see me run as a caretaker prime minister and I run the country for nine months, I can tell you now, and I can tell you very frankly, I’d get absolutely murdered.” Mr Farage added: “I think Boris Johnson is the right man to be leader of the Conservative Party and I would work with him to get the things done that the British people want us to do. I want us to leave on 31 October and I think Boris Johnson is the man to deliver on what the British people voted for.” The former Ukip leader announced in March that he would stand for the party’s leadership should the incumbent, Gerard Batten, decide not to stand again. Mr Farage said he will decide on his bid for the leadership after a meeting with Batten this week. “He [Batten] would need to advise me, after our one-to-one, if he wishes to continue or not. I haven’t been in touch with him yet,” he said. “We’ll go into the next couple of weeks and make that final decision as to whether I’m going to run for the leadership.” Batten quit the party in March after he was kicked out of Ukip’s ruling body for bringing the party into disrepute after he shared Islamophobic comments on Twitter. Nigel Farage also said he believed any new Brexit Party members who joined would leave the Conservative Party after doing so, adding: “This is a totally united cause and what I’m hearing from thousands of members of the Brexit Party is that they want to see the Conservative Party defeated.” He has previously said that the party should field an independent candidate if it can’t get into government. The Conservative Party is at loggerheads over the future of Theresa May. Several of its MPs have publicly backed Philip Hammond’s leadership bid to oust Ms May as party leader, but at least 15 have expressed doubts about whether she can be trusted as leader to deliver Brexit. Boris Johnson, Jeremy Hunt, Michael Gove and others are said to be poised to launch bids to be the next leader of the Conservatives, in an internal leadership contest which could be announced as soon as this weekend. Theresa May has faced mounting pressure from Brexiteers within her own party who want to force her out of Number 10 before the UK’s scheduled departure date of October 31. The UK was due to leave the EU on April 12th, but the deadline has been repeatedly extended amid disagreements over a future trade deal and Northern Ireland’s border. As a result of its inability to deliver Brexit, the Conservative Party is expected to suffer a crushing loss at the European Parliament election in the UK on Thursday. Boris Johnson has confirmed he has no leadership ambitions for the Conservative Party.