Nigel Farage spoke to the largest the party's rally so far in Scotland, however avoided engaging with the press corps afterwards. In his place, recently switched peer Malcolm Offord took on the task of field questions on claims of discriminatory behaviour and anti-Jewish sentiment surrounding Farage.
A High-Profile Defection
Farage introduced the ex-Tory lord and wealthy businessman during a sold-out rally of about 700 attendees at a hotel conference centre in central Scotland. Offord, who served as a junior minister for Scotland in the previous administration and most recently served as treasurer of the Scottish Conservatives, announced his intention to give up his peerage in order to stand for the party in next May’s Holyrood elections.
The leader stated 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 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 antisemitic behaviour from his teenage years. However, the leader avoided the expected press huddle after Saturday’s event.
Questioned why Farage was not available to answer mounting allegations about his past behaviour, Offord said: “That is a question for him to answer.”
Pressed on if he thought an apology was necessary for his alleged remarks 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 “morally fit” to be prime minister and denied he was employing coded political messaging. During his speech, Farage had doubled down on his remarks 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?”
Although the first minister, John Swinney condemned Farage’s original remarks as “discriminatory”, and Keir Starmer called them “toxic and divisive”, the defector argued that Farage was “highlighting a factual issue that “voters are discussing”.
Growing Confidence
The rally, filled with an energetic and enthused crowd of predominantly older, white male backers who each paid £6 to attend, 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 in the past year, achieving a quarter 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 lately, polling up to 22%.
Announcing that party membership north of the border had quadrupled over the last twelve months 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” in the Scottish Parliament.
Campaign Rhetoric
Thomas Kerr, one of Reform’s 19 Scottish councillors, elicited loud cheers as he described Farage as “the future PM of the UK”. He told supporters to “prepare for a fight” as we “challenge the ruling class”, warning that “the coming campaign will be difficult”.
Despite not yet publishing any Scotland-specific policies, representatives pledged Reform would “confront climate activists and those profiting from green policies”.
The leader personally expressed his pleasure at the party’s emergence as a force in Scottish politics over the past 12 months, confessing to supporters that in previous years he had been warned he “couldn't fill a small venue”.
Protests Nearby
Meanwhile, not far away in the heart of Falkirk, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters assembled for what have become regular weekly confrontations near a 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 the tactic of the far-right is to assign responsibility … to new arrivals and I think that is the source of a harmful narrative”.
He also made a clear distinction between those who hold far-right views and people with “valid concerns” about pressure on local services or neighbourhood security.
