The Reform UK figurehead addressed the biggest the party's public meeting so far in Scotland, however avoided engaging with local journalists following the event. In his place, newly defected peer Malcolm Offord was left to field questions on allegations of racism and antisemitism linked to the party leader.
A High-Profile Defection
The leader presented the ex-Tory lord and wealthy businessman at a packed event of about 700 supporters in a hotel venue in central Scotland. Offord, who served as a junior minister for Scotland under the last government and was until recently treasurer of the Scottish Conservatives, announced his intention to relinquish his seat in the Lords in order to become a candidate for the party in the upcoming Scottish parliament vote.
Farage said he was “delighted” to welcome Offord to the party. He called the peer’s defection as “a brave and historic act”.
Dodging the Press
Farage spoke to the crowd following a difficult period which included him delivering a fierce criticism of the broadcaster after they quizzed him regarding a report into alleged racist and remarks from his teenage years. But, Farage dodged the expected press huddle post-rally.
Questioned why his new party’s leader was not available to address growing claims concerning his history, Offord said: “That is a question for him to answer.”
Pressed on whether he believed Farage should apologise for the comments he is said to have made about Jewish students, Offord said: “That is a matter for him to deliberate on with his team.”
Insisting on Fitness
The peer maintained that the leader is “ethically suitable” to be prime minister and denied he was employing dog-whistle politics. While addressing supporters, Farage had doubled down on previous comments about pupils in Glasgow who are not native English speakers by posing the question to the crowd: “Who voted for the wholesale change of the population of Glasgow?”
While Scotland's First Minister criticised Farage’s original remarks as “racist”, and the Labour leader labeled them “harmful and polarising”, the defector argued that Farage was “highlighting a factual issue that people are talking about on the doorstep”.
A Party on the Rise
The event, attended by an lively and passionate audience of largely male, white and middle-aged supporters who bought tickets for the event, highlights the party’s growing confidence ahead of the Scottish vote.
Although the SNP continues to lead in the polls, Reform UK has made substantial progress recently, achieving a quarter of the vote in its first Holyrood byelection test. Following Scottish Labour's decline, Reform has regularly pushed it into third place in recent months, with support reaching over a fifth.
Announcing that party membership north of the border had increased fourfold in the past year to a running total of 12,000, a senior party official said he believed it could gain up to 20 MSPs in May, putting the party in “a powerful situation” in the Scottish Parliament.
Fighting Talk
Thomas Kerr, one of Reform’s 19 Scottish councillors, elicited loud cheers as he described Farage as “Britain’s next prime minister”. He instructed the crowd to “prepare for a fight” as we take on the political establishment”, warning that “the next five months will be tough”.
Although the party has yet to produce any Scotland-specific policies, representatives vowed the party would “confront climate activists and those profiting from green policies”.
Farage himself expressed his pleasure at Reform's rise as a significant player in the political scene in Scotland in the last year, admitting to the audience that he was once told he “wouldn’t get 20 people in a room”.
Protests Nearby
Meanwhile, a few miles west in Falkirk town centre, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters assembled for a now-regular weekly standoff near a hotel used to accommodate asylum seekers.
A group coordinating protests said it was galvanised by a criminal case involving an asylum seeker. In an interview, First Minister John Swinney cautioned 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 strain on public services or community safety.
