Nigel Farage addressed the biggest Reform UK public meeting held in Scotland to date, however avoided engaging with local journalists following the event. Instead, recently switched peer Malcolm Offord was left to field questions on allegations of racism and antisemitism linked to Farage.
Welcoming a New Recruit
The leader presented the ex-Tory lord and millionaire donor during a packed event of roughly seven hundred supporters at a hotel conference centre near Falkirk. The businessman, who worked as a Scotland Office minister 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 become a candidate for the party in next May’s Holyrood elections.
Farage said he was “delighted” to welcome the new member. 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 fierce criticism of the broadcaster for questioning him about an investigation into claimed discriminatory and antisemitic behaviour as a youth. However, Farage dodged a planned media briefing post-rally.
When asked why his new party’s leader was not available to address growing claims about his past behaviour, Offord said: “That is a question for him to answer.”
Challenged about if he thought Farage should apologise for his alleged remarks towards Jewish pupils, Offord said: “I think that’s something he’ll need to consider with his own advisers.”
Defending the Leader
Offord insisted that the leader is “ethically suitable” to be prime minister and rejected claims of coded political messaging. During his speech, Farage had doubled down on previous comments about the number of Glasgow schoolchildren who are not native English speakers by asking the rally: “Who voted for the wholesale change of the population of Glasgow?”
While the first minister, John Swinney criticised the initial comments as “racist”, and the Labour leader labeled them “toxic and divisive”, Offord maintained that Farage was “drawing attention to a real concern” that people are talking about on the doorstep”.
A Party on the Rise
The rally, filled with an lively and passionate audience of predominantly older, white male backers who bought tickets for the event, showcases the party’s growing confidence before next May’s elections.
Although the Scottish National Party remains ahead, Reform UK has gained significant ground in the past year, securing 26% of the vote in a recent parliamentary by-election. Following Scottish Labour's decline, Reform has regularly pushed it into third place in recent months, polling up to 22%.
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 stated his belief it could gain up to 20 MSPs in May, putting the party in “a very strong position” in the Scottish Parliament.
Campaign Rhetoric
A Reform councillor, one of Reform’s 19 Scottish councillors, elicited loud cheers as he referred to the leader as “Britain’s next prime minister”. He told supporters to “man the barricades as we “challenge the ruling class”, warning that “the next five months will be tough”.
Despite not yet publishing any Scotland-specific policies, speakers from the north-east pledged Reform would “confront climate activists and those profiting from green policies”.
Farage himself underlined his delight 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
Meanwhile, a few miles west in Falkirk town centre, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters assembled for a now-regular weekly standoff outside a local hotel where asylum seekers are now housed.
The organisers of the demonstrations stated they were motivated by a criminal case involving an asylum seeker. In an interview, First Minister John Swinney warned that the tactic of the far-right is to apportion the blame … to new arrivals 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 neighbourhood security.
