A former Conservative MP who lost his seat to Labour has warned the party must not “rush to do a deal with Reform”.

Peter Aldous said: “Some people could see that as an easy solution. It is actually the wrong solution.”

Mr Aldous was speaking after he failed to secure the seat of Lowestoft, part of Waveney until the electoral boundaries were redrawn, and where he served as its MP for the past 14 years.

He said, rather than move towards Reform UK, the Tories must “come up with sensible policies that appeal to the mainstream” to avoid “going into oblivion”.

Mr Aldous came second to Labour’s Jess Asato, with about 2,000 votes separating them.

Maldon MP Sir John Whittingdale, who comes from Essex and retained his seat, said winning back those Tory voters who went to Reform UK “has to be the priority”.

“We have to win back those Reform voters, that is absolutely clear, and I think we do that by demonstrating that the Conservative Party still stands for the kinds of values they support.

“I don’t think we should be going into discussions with the Reform MPs about whether or not we coalesce with them at this stage.”

On Saturday, Tory Sir Edward Leigh said his party had been “completely trashed in this election because the right-wing vote is divided”.

“But our fundamental mistake was the political mistake of not taking Reform-type voters seriously and we should have delivered properly on Brexit,” he said.