Nigel Farage spoke to the biggest the party's rally held in Scotland to date, but declined to speak with local journalists following the event. Instead, newly defected member of the House of Lords Malcolm Offord was left to field questions on allegations of racism and anti-Jewish sentiment linked to Farage.
A High-Profile Defection
Farage introduced the former Conservative peer and millionaire donor during a sold-out rally of about 700 supporters at a hotel conference centre in central Scotland. Offord, who served as a Scotland Office minister under the last government and was until recently treasurer of the Scottish Conservatives, stated his plan to give up his peerage in order to become a candidate for the party in next May’s Holyrood elections.
The leader stated he was “delighted” to greet the new member. 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 fierce criticism of the broadcaster for questioning him about an investigation into claimed discriminatory and antisemitic behaviour from his teenage years. But, the leader avoided the expected press huddle after Saturday’s event.
Questioned why Farage was not available to address growing claims about his past behaviour, Offord said: “You’ll need to ask him that question.”
Pressed on if he thought Farage should apologise for the comments he is said to have made towards Jewish pupils, he stated: “That is a matter for him to deliberate on with his team.”
Defending the Leader
Offord insisted that Farage was “morally fit” to be the country's leader and denied he was employing dog-whistle politics. While addressing supporters, Farage had doubled down on his remarks about the number of Glasgow schoolchildren who speak English as a second language by asking the rally: “Who voted for the wholesale change of the population of Glasgow?”
Although the first minister, John Swinney condemned the initial comments as “discriminatory”, and Keir Starmer called them “toxic and divisive”, the defector argued that Farage was “highlighting a factual issue that people are talking about on the doorstep”.
Growing Confidence
The rally, filled with an lively and passionate audience of predominantly older, white male backers who bought tickets for the event, highlights Reform's increasing self-assurance before next May’s elections.
While the SNP continues to lead in the polls, the party has made substantial progress in the past year, securing 26% of the vote in its first Holyrood byelection test. After the collapse in support for Scottish Labour, the party has often relegated it to third lately, with support reaching over a fifth.
Declaring that party membership north of the border had increased fourfold over the last twelve months to 12,000 members, the party chair, David Bull stated his belief it could win around twenty parliamentary seats in May, putting the party in “a powerful situation” in the Scottish Parliament.
Campaign Rhetoric
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 “challenge the ruling class”, cautioning 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 the party’s emergence as a force in the political scene in Scotland in the last year, admitting to the audience that he was once told he “couldn't fill a small venue”.
Protests Nearby
Meanwhile, not far away in Falkirk town centre, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters were gathering 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. Speaking previously, Scotland's leader cautioned that the tactic of the far-right is to apportion the blame … to new arrivals and I think that is the source of a harmful narrative”.
However, he differentiated between those who hold far-right views and people with “legitimate points” about pressure on local services or community safety.
