It's been an eventful morning, but this is what we have learned;

• Nigel Farage named Dan Thomas, a former Barnet council leader, as Reform UK's leader in Wales.
• Thomas, from Blackwood, Caerphilly county, said he's "back to where I belong... in the south Wales valleys".
• Farage and Thomas criticised the state of the Welsh NHS and the "war on motorists", adding they would scrap the 20mph speed limit.
• Former Welsh Conservative MS James Evans joins fellow MS Laura Anne Jones in joining Reform from the Tories.
• First Minister Eluned Morgan said Reform was "absolutely packed with Tories jumping ship".
• Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth called Thomas "Farage's Welsh deputy" and said there is "no doubt that Reform UK are simply recycled, washed-out Tories looking for a new political home now the Conservatives are dead in the water."

Thank you for sticking with today's coverage from Newport. To read more about today's event, click here for the full story.

Image source, Getty Images

We have now heard from the Welsh Conservatives' Senedd leader Darren Millar.

He says Dan Thomas "appears to have been parachuted back to Wales to take advantage of the Reform, Labour and Plaid-backed changes to the electoral system" which will see an expanded Welsh Parliament.

He says the changes are "lumbering Welsh taxpayers with 36 extra politicians at a cost of tens of millions each and every year".

Even though we haven't heard anything from the Tories in Wales, the UK party leader Kemi Badenoch has just commented on today's announcement.

She says the announcement of the new Welsh Reform leader comes after the "the last one was sent to prison in November for taking bribes from Russia", referring to Nathan Gill.

"We all know a Reform government would be more of the same. More incompetence. More dodgy appointments. More drama," she adds.

"What this country needs is a serious government."

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Former Tory James Evans has previously been critical of the party that announced him as a member today.

He accused Laura Anne Jones in July of having no principles after she left the Tories and was unveiled by Nigel Farage as the party's first Senedd member.

He told Radio Wales Breakfast at the time: "Laura and I have spoken, and I've made my opinions very clear. I don't think she's made the right decision.

"I am a firm believer, if you are elected as a Conservative member of the Senedd, you owe it to the electorate, you owe it to your party, to see your term of office out as a Conservative."

"Jumping to Reform, it seems that she doesn't have any principles."

Evans also said at the time of Reform: "They're not a credible option and they're not a credible party."

He today joins Jones as a Reform UK MS.

David Deans
BBC Wales politics reporter

The Welsh Conservatives deepened the drama around James Evans, who was announced as a new Reform member today, a few weeks ago when the party ditched the MS.

He was sacked after he told his party's Senedd leader Darren Millar he had been talking to Reform.

At that time Millar had a lot to say. So far today, there has been nothing.

A Senedd spokesperson has told me they have nothing to add at the moment regarding today's events.

Nigel Farage tells the BBC Dan Thomas has not been brought into Reform "from the outside".

"He has voluntarily left London, come back to the valleys, living in Islwyn, come back to his home, and he's done that because he loves Wales.

"He's done that because he wants his children to grow up being Welsh.

"I had lots of other candidates but none with the battle-hardened experience of running big budgets which is exactly what he did when he ran Barnet council."

David Deans
BBC Wales politics reporter

Reform member Elisa Randall, from Pembrokeshire, says she feels "really confident" and "really excited" about the new leader, adding people with a "range of experiences is only a positive thing".

Former MS David Rowlands believes Thomas is an "excellent choice".

He suggests the decision dodged awkward conversations about who might want the job, saying it avoided "people who wanted their own people from the branches and things like that".

Derek Roberts, from the Vale of Glamorgan, says Thomas' speech was "inspiring" adding "he's going to get the Reform party in Wales on the go".

He praised his "experience in politics in London" and added "he's got the back bone to do things".

Thomas is asked by BBC Wales if he would be prepared to do a deal with the Welsh Conservatives to try and get a majority in the Welsh Parliament.

"I don't think there'll be any Welsh Conservative in the new Senedd," he says.

Image source, PA Media

More from Thomas, who describes criticism from opposition parties over his background as a London councillor as "cheap attacks".

He tells BBC Wales: "I've spoken to so many people here today who said exactly the same thing, my kids have had to go to London or to Bristol or whatever it is for work. I'm a symptom of that.

"I want to solve that. I don't want my sons and other young children to think they have to leave Wales to do well in life.

"They can say all they like about what I've been or what I've done. I've come back and I'm leading the fight to them in the Senedd elections."

Dan Thomas tells BBC Wales he is "not thinking now about deals" he might make with other parties after the Welsh Parliament election.

No party has ever won a majority the Senedd - recent polling suggests parties would have to come to an agreement with another to dominate the Senedd.

But Thomas says he is "fighting to win".

"I disagree with the very premise that it's impossible to get a majority."

Reacting to Dan Thomas's unveiling and James Evans joining Reform, First Minister Eluned Morgan tells BBC Wales: "Two former Tories. They are absolutely packed with Tories jumping ship.

"That's what Reform is in Wales and across the rest of the country. They're people who failed in their own Tory party."

She adds that every Tory MP in Wales was "wiped out" in the last general election, and Tories are "jumping ship", "trying to save their own skins" and are not "interested in really doing the best for Wales and their communities".

Image source, Getty Images

Dan Thomas has been announced as the Welsh leader for Reform today - but who is he?

Thomas led the north London borough of Barnet as a Conservative from 2019 to 2022 when Labour won the local election.

He was opposition leader from 2022 until May 2024. Prior to the 2022 election, Barnet Council had been taken by the Conservatives in all but two elections since 1964.

Thomas resigned at the end of last year after 19 years as a councillor, saying he moved away from Barnet so that he and his wife could raise their young sons in the countryside and live closer to their families in south Wales.

Blackwood-born Thomas told the conference in Newport: "After 27 years I’m back home. Raising my two boys in the south Wales valleys. I’ve come back to where I belong."

Image source, Getty Images

David Deans
BBC Wales politics reporter

When Farage entered the conference room in Newport earlier he was met with a round of applause – a better reception, he says, than he thinks Sir Keir Starmer will get.

He started the rally by criticising Sir Keir for appointing Peter Mandelson as US ambassador.

He said the Lord Mandelson scandal is the biggest in British politics for a century, and predicts Sir Keir's chief of staff Morgan McSweeney will be gone quickly.

Farage then joked that he doesn’t know how long Sir Keir will last as prime minister, saying he wants him to remain until Wales's 7 May elections.

More reaction here, this time from the Welsh Liberal Democrat leader Jane Dodds.

"Even Nigel Farage thinks that Reform candidates in Wales aren't up to the job - that's why he's appointed a councillor from London as leader."

David Deans
BBC Wales politics reporter

The unveiling of Reform’s Welsh leader has happened without a vote of the party’s grassroots - something they have in common with rival parties.

We knew before Labour's Eluned Morgan, Plaid Cymru's Rhun ap Iorwerth and the Tories' Darren Millar were anointed that they were interested in the top jobs.

All of them became leader almost by default after no challengers emerged in their respective Senedd groups, all bruised by rows of varying severity and unwilling to face a public fight.

But Reform is different - a list of potential leaders wasn’t public, and the winner has been picked by party HQ, and UK leader Nigel Farage.

Gareth Lewis
BBC Wales political editor

The mood towards the media at big Reform events has definitely changed over the last 15 months or so.

Is that because the party might be closer to power, which ups the pressure?

Is it because Reform feels the media is against it?

Is it because of Reform’s difficult autumn - Caerphilly, Nathan Gill, allegations against Nigel Farage which he denies?

The audience reaction to some of the questions suggests that for the party’s grassroots ‘the media’ is as much the enemy as their political opponents.

The rally has ended with Laura Anne Jones, James Evans and Dan Thomas joining Nigel Farage on stage.

People are now shuffling out of the large room that Reform UK have booked, with media doing interviews on the side-lines.

We're expecting to hear more from Farage and Thomas soon, so stay with us as we bring more reaction today's announcement as well as analysis from our team on the ground.

Responding to Dan Thomas' unveiling, a Welsh Labour spokesperson says: "Nigel Farage says there are no Tories in Wales - that's because they've all jumped ship to Reform UK to save their own skins, with James Evans MS being the latest.

"And now we've got a man who was a London councillor until two months ago telling Wales what it needs."

In a statement, Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth calls Thomas "Farage's Welsh deputy" and says there is "no doubt that Reform UK are simply recycled, washed-out Tories looking for a new political home now the Conservatives are dead in the water."

Farage confirms that television presenter Jeremy Kyle and former Sky anchor Colin Brazier have been doing candidate media training.