BORIS Johnson’s former Brexit secretary faces losing the Tory whip amid a row over polling which predicted a Labour landslide at the next General Election, according to reports.

David Frost, the former head of the Scotch Whisky Association who was handed a peerage and Cabinet position under Johnson’s government, has faced disciplinary threats from party leadership after commissioning the poll.

The YouGov survey of some 14,000 people was published earlier in January and suggested a Tory wipeout was on the cards, with the party returning just 169 seats while Labour would pick up 385 – giving Keir Starmer a 120-seat majority.

The poll – which the Times reported would have cost around £40,000 – was commissioned by a largely anonymous group of Tory rebels known as the Conservative Britain Alliance. Frost acted as the intermediary.

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The British Polling Council, of which polling expert Professor John Curtice is the president, looked into the YouGov survey amid concerns about who the client had been. They found “no reason to believe” YouGov had not met its obligations.

But Frost was reportedly called in to be challenged by Nicholas True, the Tory leader of the House of Lords, on his involvement and urged to reveal who had funded the poll.

Frost refused to disclose who the donor was, and was told that he would lose the Conservative whip if it emerged that it had been someone who also backed Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.

The former Brexit negotiator was- reportedly told it would be seen as having collaborated with another party.

One Tory source told The Times that Frost had “been going around claiming that he didn’t know who’s been putting up the money. We now know that’s just not true. He needs to come clean.”

YouGov has said it does not know the identity of the donor.

Frost penned an op-ed for The Telegraph, which published it alongside the results of the YouGov poll, and said the Tories faced “a 1997-style wipeout, if we are lucky”.

He further warned that the poll did not “factor in any further boost for Reform UK”.

He went on: “Just imagine if Nigel Farage delivered on his hints and came back to politics. Two or three extra points for Reform, a bit more tactical voting, and this might start to look like an extinction event.”

A separate poll, conducted by People Polling on January 25, found that Farage is 2019 Conservative voters’ top pick to lead the party after Rishi Sunak.

The results will not be happy reading for Conservatives like Frost concerned about the impact Farage’s Reform could have on their vote.

Farage owns and controls Reform UK as a limited company, but it is officially led by Richard Tice.