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Nigel Farage spoke to the biggest Reform UK public meeting held in Scotland to date, but avoided engaging with the press corps following the event. Instead, recently switched peer Malcolm Offord was left to responding to queries on claims of discriminatory behaviour and anti-Jewish sentiment surrounding the party leader.

Welcoming a New Recruit

Farage introduced the ex-Tory lord and wealthy businessman at a sold-out rally of roughly seven hundred supporters at a hotel conference centre near Falkirk. The businessman, who worked as a Scotland Office minister under the last government and was until recently the Scottish Tory party's chief financial officer, 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 “extremely pleased” to welcome Offord to the party. He described the switch as “a brave and historic act”.

Dodging the Press

Farage spoke to the crowd following a difficult period which included him delivering a fierce criticism of the broadcaster after they quizzed him regarding a report into claimed discriminatory and remarks from his teenage years. But, Farage dodged the expected press huddle after Saturday’s event.

Questioned why his new party’s leader was not available to address growing claims about his past behaviour, Offord said: “You’ll need to ask him that question.”

Challenged about if he thought Farage should apologise for the comments he is said to have made about Jewish students, he stated: “That is a matter for him to deliberate on with his team.”

Defending the Leader

Offord insisted that the leader is “ethically suitable” to be the country's leader and denied he was employing dog-whistle politics. While addressing supporters, the leader had reiterated on his remarks about pupils in Glasgow who are not native English speakers by posing the question to the crowd: “Who authorised the complete transformation of Glasgow's demographics?”

While Scotland's First Minister condemned Farage’s original remarks as “racist”, and Keir Starmer labeled them “harmful and polarising”, Offord maintained that his new leader was “drawing attention to a real concern” that “voters are discussing”.

A Party on the Rise

The rally, attended by an lively and passionate audience of largely male, white and middle-aged supporters who each paid £6 to attend, showcases the party’s growing confidence before next May’s elections.

Although 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, polling up to 22%.

Announcing that party membership north of the border had quadrupled 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 very strong position” in the Scottish Parliament.

Fighting Talk

Thomas Kerr, a local representative for the party, prompted a roar of approval as he referred to the leader as “the future PM of the UK”. He instructed the crowd to “man the barricades as we take on the political establishment”, warning that “the next five months will be tough”.

Although the party has yet to produce any Scotland-specific policies, representatives vowed the party would “confront climate activists and those profiting from green policies”.

The leader personally underlined his delight at the party’s emergence as a force in Scottish politics in the last year, admitting to the audience that he was once told he “couldn't fill a small venue”.

Protests Nearby

As the event was taking place, not far away in the heart of Falkirk, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters assembled for what have become regular weekly confrontations near a hotel used to accommodate asylum seekers.

The organisers of the demonstrations said it was galvanised by a criminal case involving an asylum seeker. In an interview, Scotland's leader cautioned that “what the far right do is to assign responsibility … to new arrivals and I think that is the root of the poison”.

However, he differentiated extremist opinions and people with “legitimate points” about pressure on local services or neighbourhood security.