The Reform UK figurehead addressed the largest Reform UK rally so far in Scotland, however declined to speak with the press corps following the event. Instead, recently switched member of the House of Lords Malcolm Offord was left to responding to queries on claims of discriminatory behaviour and anti-Jewish sentiment linked to Farage.
A High-Profile Defection
Farage introduced the ex-Tory lord and millionaire donor at a sold-out rally of roughly seven hundred supporters at a hotel conference centre near Falkirk. The businessman, who worked as a junior minister for Scotland in the previous administration and most recently served as the Scottish Tory party's chief financial officer, announced his intention to relinquish his seat in the Lords in order to stand for Reform UK in next May’s Holyrood elections.
Farage said he was “delighted” to greet the new member. He called the peer’s defection as “a courageous and significant move”.
Dodging the Press
Farage addressed the rally after a turbulent week which saw him launch a fierce criticism of the broadcaster for questioning him about an investigation into alleged racist and antisemitic behaviour as a youth. But, the leader avoided the expected press huddle post-rally.
Questioned why his new party’s leader did not make himself available to answer mounting allegations about his past behaviour, Offord said: “That is a question for him to answer.”
Challenged about whether he believed an apology was necessary for his alleged remarks towards Jewish pupils, he stated: “I think that’s something he’ll need to consider with his own advisers.”
Defending the Leader
The peer maintained that the leader is “morally fit” to be the country's leader and denied he was employing dog-whistle politics. While addressing supporters, Farage had doubled down on previous comments about the number of Glasgow schoolchildren who speak English as a second language by posing the question to the crowd: “Who voted for the wholesale change of the population of Glasgow?”
While the first minister, John Swinney criticised Farage’s original remarks as “racist”, and Keir Starmer called them “harmful and polarising”, Offord maintained that Farage was “drawing attention to a real concern” that “voters are discussing”.
A Party on the Rise
The rally, attended by an lively and passionate audience of largely male, white and middle-aged supporters who bought tickets for the event, highlights Reform's increasing self-assurance before next May’s elections.
While the Scottish National Party remains ahead, the party 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 lately, polling up to 22%.
Declaring that party membership north of the border had quadrupled over the last twelve months 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” at Holyrood.
Fighting Talk
Thomas Kerr, a local representative for the party, elicited loud cheers as he referred to the leader as “Britain’s next prime minister”. He told supporters to “man the barricades as we take on the political establishment”, warning that “the coming campaign will be difficult”.
Despite not yet publishing any Scotland-specific policies, speakers from the north-east pledged Reform 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 in previous years he had been warned he “wouldn’t get 20 people in a room”.
Protests Nearby
As the event was taking place, a few miles west in Falkirk town centre, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters were gathering for a now-regular weekly standoff outside a local hotel used to accommodate asylum seekers.
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 assign responsibility … to asylum seekers or migrants and I think that is the source of a harmful narrative”.
However, he differentiated between those who hold far-right views and people with “valid concerns” about strain on public services or community safety.
