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Nigel Farage addressed the largest Reform UK rally held in Scotland to date, however declined to speak with the press corps following the event. Instead, newly defected member of the House of Lords Malcolm Offord took on the task of responding to queries on claims of discriminatory behaviour and anti-Jewish sentiment surrounding Farage.

A High-Profile Defection

The leader presented the ex-Tory lord and millionaire donor during a sold-out rally of roughly seven hundred attendees at a hotel conference centre near Falkirk. Offord, who served as a junior minister for Scotland in the previous administration 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 “extremely pleased” to welcome Offord to the party. He described the switch as “a courageous and significant move”.

Avoiding Media Scrutiny

The Reform leader addressed the rally following a difficult period which included him delivering a tirade against the BBC for questioning him about an investigation into alleged racist and antisemitic behaviour from his teenage years. But, the leader avoided a planned media briefing post-rally.

Questioned why Farage did not make himself available to answer mounting allegations about his past behaviour, Offord said: “That is a question for him to answer.”

Challenged about whether he believed an apology was necessary for his alleged remarks towards Jewish pupils, Offord said: “That is a matter for him to deliberate on with his team.”

Defending the Leader

Offord insisted that Farage was “ethically suitable” to be prime minister and rejected claims of dog-whistle politics. While addressing supporters, Farage had doubled down on his remarks 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 “discriminatory”, and Keir Starmer labeled them “harmful and polarising”, the defector argued that his new leader was “highlighting a factual issue that “voters are discussing”.

A Party on the Rise

The rally, filled with an lively and passionate audience of largely male, white and middle-aged supporters who each paid £6 to attend, highlights Reform's increasing self-assurance ahead of the Scottish vote.

Although the Scottish National Party remains ahead, Reform UK has made substantial progress recently, achieving a quarter of the vote in a recent parliamentary by-election. 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 quadrupled over the last twelve months to a running total of 12,000, the party chair, David Bull said he believed it could gain up to 20 MSPs in May, putting the party 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 “the future PM of the UK”. He instructed the crowd to “prepare for a fight” as we “challenge the ruling class”, cautioning that “the next five months will be tough”.

Although the party has yet to produce 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 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”.

Local Context

As the event was taking place, a few miles west in the heart of Falkirk, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters were gathering 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 apportion the blame … to new arrivals and I think that is the root of the poison”.

However, he differentiated between those who hold far-right views and people with “valid concerns” about pressure on local services or community safety.