Nigel Farage spoke to the biggest Reform UK rally so far in Scotland, but avoided engaging with local journalists afterwards. Instead, newly defected member of the House of Lords Malcolm Offord was left to field questions on claims of discriminatory behaviour and anti-Jewish sentiment linked to the party leader.
A High-Profile Defection
The leader presented the former Conservative peer and wealthy businessman during a sold-out rally of roughly seven hundred supporters at a hotel conference centre near Falkirk. Offord, who served as a Scotland Office minister under the last government and most recently served as the Scottish Tory party's chief financial officer, announced his intention to give up his peerage in order to become a candidate for Reform UK in the upcoming Scottish parliament vote.
Farage said he was “extremely pleased” to welcome Offord to the party. He described the switch as “a brave and historic act”.
Dodging the Press
The Reform leader addressed the rally after a turbulent week which included him delivering a tirade against the BBC after they quizzed him regarding a report into alleged racist and remarks from his teenage years. However, the leader avoided a planned media briefing after Saturday’s event.
Questioned why Farage did not make himself available to answer mounting allegations about his past behaviour, the new recruit responded: “That is a question for him to answer.”
Challenged about whether he believed an apology was necessary for his alleged remarks about Jewish students, he stated: “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 dog-whistle politics. During his speech, the leader had reiterated on his remarks about the number of Glasgow schoolchildren who speak English as a second language by asking the rally: “Who authorised the complete transformation of Glasgow's demographics?”
Although Scotland's First Minister criticised Farage’s original remarks as “discriminatory”, and the Labour leader called them “harmful and polarising”, the defector argued that his new leader was “drawing attention to a real concern” that “voters are discussing”.
Growing Confidence
The rally, attended by 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.
While the SNP continues to lead in the polls, Reform UK has gained significant ground in the past year, securing 26% of the vote in its first Holyrood byelection test. After the collapse in support for Scottish Labour, Reform has regularly pushed it into third place lately, with support reaching over a fifth.
Declaring that Reform UK membership in Scotland 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, which would place Reform in “a powerful situation” at Holyrood.
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 instructed the crowd to “man the barricades as we “challenge the ruling class”, warning that “the coming campaign will be difficult”.
Despite not yet publishing a distinct policy platform for Scotland, 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 in the last year, admitting to the audience 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 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, Scotland's leader warned that “what the far right do is to assign responsibility … to asylum seekers or migrants and I think that is the root of the poison”.
He also made a clear distinction extremist opinions and people with “legitimate points” about strain on public services or community safety.
