Nigel Farage spoke to the largest Reform UK rally so far in Scotland, but avoided engaging with the press corps following the event. In his place, recently switched peer Malcolm Offord was left to responding to queries on claims of discriminatory behaviour and antisemitism surrounding the party leader.
A High-Profile Defection
The leader presented the ex-Tory lord and millionaire donor during a sold-out rally of about 700 supporters at a hotel conference centre near Falkirk. Offord, who served as a Scotland Office minister in the previous administration and most recently served as treasurer of the Scottish Conservatives, stated his plan to give up his peerage in order to stand for the party in the upcoming Scottish parliament vote.
The leader stated he was “extremely pleased” to greet the new member. He described the switch as “a brave and historic act”.
Avoiding Media Scrutiny
The Reform leader spoke to the crowd after a turbulent week which included him delivering a fierce criticism of the broadcaster for questioning him regarding a report into claimed discriminatory and remarks from his teenage years. However, the leader avoided a planned media briefing after Saturday’s event.
Questioned 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.”
Pressed on if he thought an apology was necessary for the comments he is said to have made about Jewish students, he stated: “I think that’s something he’ll need to consider with his own advisers.”
Defending the Leader
The peer maintained that Farage was “ethically suitable” to be prime minister and rejected claims of dog-whistle politics. During his speech, Farage had doubled down on his remarks about pupils in Glasgow who are not native English speakers by asking the rally: “Who voted for the wholesale change of the population of Glasgow?”
Although the first minister, John Swinney criticised Farage’s original remarks as “racist”, and the Labour leader called them “harmful and polarising”, the defector argued that Farage was “highlighting a factual issue that people are talking about on the doorstep”.
A Party on the Rise
The event, attended by an energetic and enthused crowd of largely male, white and middle-aged supporters who bought tickets for the event, highlights Reform's increasing self-assurance ahead of the Scottish vote.
Although the Scottish National Party remains ahead, Reform UK has gained significant ground recently, achieving a quarter of the vote in a recent parliamentary by-election. Following Scottish Labour's decline, Reform has regularly pushed it into third place lately, polling up to 22%.
Declaring that Reform UK membership in Scotland 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 powerful situation” in the Scottish Parliament.
Fighting Talk
A Reform councillor, one of Reform’s 19 Scottish councillors, prompted a roar of approval as he described Farage as “the future PM of the UK”. 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, representatives 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 the political scene in Scotland in the last year, admitting to the audience that in previous years he had been warned he “couldn't fill a small venue”.
Local Context
Meanwhile, not far away in Falkirk town centre, demonstrators with opposing views assembled for what have become regular weekly confrontations outside a local hotel where asylum seekers are now housed.
A group coordinating protests said it was galvanised by a criminal case involving an asylum seeker. Speaking previously, First Minister John Swinney cautioned that the tactic of the far-right is to assign responsibility … to asylum seekers or migrants 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 “legitimate points” about strain on public services or community safety.
