He has momentum, money and a message that cuts through. Farage has just launched Reform UK’s manifesto for the Welsh Parliament elections, predicting the contest in May will “end the premiership of Sir Keir Starmer”. He's offering crowd-pleasing pledges such as income tax cuts and new roads, and there'll be plenty more like that as the general election edges closer. But we all know what his big vote-winning pitch will be.

Farage owns the issue that dominates British politics: immigration. He’s the only politician who appears serious about stopping the boats, safeguarding our borders and repairing our broken asylum system. And the money is pouring in. Reform UK received more than £5.4million in large donations in the final three months of last year, more than any other party.

Farage is on a roll. But winning power won’t be easy. Reform will face heavy tactical voting from lefties who loathe him. Reform is the party voters are most likely to tactically vote against, polling by More in Common shows. Yet another huge new threat to Farage is emerging. And it comes from a direction nobody expected.

For the first time in decades, a Labour home secretary is not just talking about fixing Britain’s immigration system but appears serious about doing it. Her name is Shabana Mahmood.

She took a sneaky trip to Denmark recently to study one of Europe’s strictest asylum regimes. The country has tightened family reunion rules, restricted permanent residence and required migrants to integrate and contribute before gaining access to the full welfare state.

And it’s working. Asylum applications have fallen sharply and immigration is far more tightly controlled.

Danishh PM Mette Frederiksen is aiming for “zero asylum” but she isn’t a right-wing populist. She’s leader of the centre-left Social Democrats government.

She’s framed this as a left-wing policy, arguing that uncontrolled migration harms working-class communities most.

Mahmood wants Britain to learn from that model, even if it means shrugging off protests from Labour activists and metropolitan snobs at The Guardian newspaper.

Farage should be terrified. Like most European countries, Denmark had its own populist anti-immigration party, called the Danish People’s Party. Its support once topped 20%. Today it has collapsed to just 2.6%.

Mahmood is taking radical action and if she succeeds, she could neutralise immigration as a political issue, and with it Farage’s most powerful weapon.

That is a very big “if” of course. Some of her ideas are already controversial. Reform chairman Zia Yusuf blasted proposals to pay some asylum seeker families up to £40,000 to leave Britain as “a prize for breaking in illegally”.

Mahmood also faces legal limits. She admits Britain cannot deport failed asylum seekers to countries deemed unsafe, including Afghanistan, Eritrea and Sudan, which are the three biggest sources of asylum claims.

Her biggest challenge will come from inside her own party, where many Labour MPs remain deeply uncomfortable with tougher border controls. As we know, gutless PM Keir Starmer is likely to U-turn at the first whiff of a rebellion.

But if she hangs tough, Nigel Farage could suddenly find his favourite political battlefield looking very different.

One thing may save him. Mahmood is the only grown-up in the Labour cabinet. Idiots like Starmer, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Ed Miliband could still hand the next election to Farage on a plate.