Nigel Farage spoke to the largest Reform UK rally so far in Scotland, however avoided engaging with local journalists afterwards. Instead, recently switched member of the House of Lords Malcolm Offord took on the task of responding to queries on claims of discriminatory behaviour and antisemitism linked to the party leader.
A High-Profile Defection
The leader presented the ex-Tory lord and wealthy businessman at a sold-out rally of roughly seven hundred attendees in a hotel venue in central Scotland. The businessman, who worked as a Scotland Office minister under the last government and was until recently the Scottish Tory party's chief financial officer, stated his plan to relinquish his seat in the Lords in order to become a candidate for Reform UK in the upcoming Scottish parliament vote.
The leader stated he was “extremely pleased” to greet Offord to the party. He described the switch as “a courageous and significant move”.
Dodging the Press
Farage spoke to the crowd after a turbulent week which saw him launch a tirade against the BBC after they quizzed him regarding a report into claimed discriminatory and antisemitic behaviour from his teenage years. However, Farage dodged a planned media briefing after Saturday’s event.
Questioned why his new party’s leader was not available to address growing claims about his past behaviour, Offord said: “You’ll need to ask him that question.”
Challenged about whether he believed Farage should apologise for the comments he is said to have made about Jewish students, Offord said: “I think that’s something he’ll need to consider with his own advisers.”
Defending the Leader
The peer maintained that Farage was “morally fit” to be prime minister and rejected claims of dog-whistle politics. During his speech, the leader had reiterated on previous comments about the number of Glasgow schoolchildren who speak English as a second language by asking the rally: “Who authorised the complete transformation of Glasgow's demographics?”
Although the first minister, John Swinney condemned the initial comments as “discriminatory”, and Keir Starmer called them “harmful and polarising”, the defector argued that Farage was “drawing attention to a real concern” that “voters are discussing”.
A Party on the Rise
The rally, filled with an lively and passionate audience of largely male, white and middle-aged supporters who each paid £6 to attend, highlights the party’s growing confidence before next May’s elections.
Although the SNP continues to lead in the polls, Reform UK has made substantial progress in the past year, achieving a quarter of the vote in its first Holyrood byelection test. Following Scottish Labour's decline, the party has often relegated it to third in recent months, with support reaching over a fifth.
Announcing that Reform UK membership in Scotland had increased fourfold in the past year to 12,000 members, the party chair, David Bull said he believed it could win around twenty parliamentary seats in May, putting the party in “a very strong position” at Holyrood.
Campaign Rhetoric
Thomas Kerr, a local representative for the party, elicited loud cheers as he described Farage as “the future PM of the UK”. He told supporters to “prepare for a fight” as we take on the political establishment”, cautioning that “the coming campaign will be difficult”.
Although the party has yet to produce any Scotland-specific policies, representatives vowed the party would “take on the green blob and the net-zero grifters”.
The leader personally expressed his pleasure at Reform's rise as a significant player in Scottish politics in the last year, confessing to supporters that he was once told he “wouldn’t get 20 people in a room”.
Local Context
As the event was taking place, not far away in the heart of Falkirk, demonstrators with opposing views were gathering for what have become regular weekly confrontations outside a local hotel where asylum seekers are now housed.
A group coordinating protests said it was galvanised by a criminal case involving an asylum seeker. Speaking previously, First Minister John Swinney warned that “what the far right do is to apportion the blame … to asylum seekers or migrants and I think that is the root of the poison”.
However, he differentiated extremist opinions and people with “legitimate points” about pressure on local services or community safety.
