Nigel Farage addressed the largest the party's rally held in Scotland to date, but avoided engaging with the press corps following the event. In his place, newly defected peer Malcolm Offord was left to field questions on allegations of racism and anti-Jewish sentiment linked to Farage.
Welcoming a New Recruit
Farage introduced the ex-Tory lord and wealthy businessman at a packed event of about 700 attendees at a hotel conference centre near Falkirk. Offord, who served as a Scotland Office minister in the previous administration and was until recently treasurer of the Scottish Conservatives, stated his plan to give up his peerage in order to stand for the party in next May’s Holyrood elections.
Farage said he was “extremely pleased” to greet Offord to the party. He called the peer’s defection as “a courageous and significant move”.
Avoiding Media Scrutiny
The Reform leader addressed the rally following a difficult period which included him delivering a tirade against the BBC for questioning him regarding a report into claimed discriminatory and remarks as a youth. However, Farage dodged the expected press huddle post-rally.
Questioned why his new party’s leader did not make himself available to address growing claims concerning his history, Offord said: “You’ll need to ask him that question.”
Challenged about if he thought an apology was necessary for his alleged remarks towards Jewish pupils, he stated: “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 the country's leader and rejected claims of dog-whistle politics. During his speech, the leader had reiterated on previous comments about pupils in Glasgow who are not native English speakers by asking the rally: “Who authorised the complete transformation of Glasgow's demographics?”
While Scotland's First Minister condemned the initial comments as “discriminatory”, and the Labour leader called them “harmful and polarising”, Offord maintained that his new leader was “highlighting a factual issue that “voters are discussing”.
Growing Confidence
The event, filled with an energetic and enthused crowd of predominantly older, white male backers who each paid £6 to attend, showcases Reform's increasing self-assurance ahead of the Scottish vote.
While the SNP continues to lead in the polls, Reform UK has gained significant ground recently, securing 26% of the vote in a recent parliamentary by-election. After the collapse in support for Scottish Labour, Reform has regularly pushed it into third place in recent months, polling up to 22%.
Announcing that Reform UK membership in Scotland had increased fourfold in the past year to a running total of 12,000, 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” in the Scottish Parliament.
Fighting Talk
Thomas Kerr, a local representative for the party, prompted a roar of approval as he referred to the leader as “the future PM of the UK”. He told supporters to “man the barricades as we “challenge the ruling class”, cautioning that “the next five months will be tough”.
Although the party has yet to produce a distinct policy platform for Scotland, speakers from the north-east vowed the party would “confront climate activists and those profiting from green policies”.
Farage himself underlined his delight at the party’s emergence as a force in Scottish politics in the last year, admitting to the audience that he was once told he “wouldn’t get 20 people in a room”.
Local Context
Meanwhile, not far away in the heart of Falkirk, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters were gathering for what have become regular weekly confrontations near a hotel used to accommodate asylum seekers.
The organisers of the demonstrations said it was galvanised by a criminal case involving an asylum seeker. Speaking previously, Scotland's leader warned that the tactic of the far-right is to assign responsibility … to asylum seekers or migrants and I think that is the root of the poison”.
He also made a clear distinction extremist opinions and people with “valid concerns” about pressure on local services or neighbourhood security.
