The Reform UK figurehead addressed the largest Reform UK public meeting held in Scotland to date, but avoided engaging with local journalists following the event. Instead, newly defected peer the former Conservative donor was left to responding to queries on claims of discriminatory behaviour and anti-Jewish sentiment linked to Farage.
A High-Profile Defection
The leader presented the ex-Tory lord and millionaire donor at a sold-out rally of about 700 supporters in a hotel venue near Falkirk. The businessman, who worked as a junior minister for Scotland in the previous administration and most recently served as the Scottish Tory party's chief financial officer, stated his plan to give up his peerage in order to stand for Reform UK in next May’s Holyrood elections.
The leader stated he was “delighted” to welcome Offord to the party. He called the peer’s defection as “a brave and historic act”.
Avoiding Media Scrutiny
The Reform leader addressed the rally following a difficult period which saw him launch a fierce criticism of the broadcaster for questioning him regarding a report into claimed discriminatory and antisemitic behaviour as a youth. However, Farage dodged a planned media briefing post-rally.
When asked why Farage was not available to address growing claims about his past behaviour, the new recruit responded: “That is a question for him to answer.”
Pressed on whether he believed an apology was necessary for his alleged remarks about Jewish students, Offord said: “I think that’s something he’ll need to consider with his own advisers.”
Defending the Leader
The peer maintained that the leader is “morally fit” to be the country's leader and denied he was employing coded political messaging. While addressing supporters, Farage had doubled down on previous comments 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?”
While Scotland's First Minister criticised the initial comments as “discriminatory”, and Keir Starmer labeled them “toxic and divisive”, Offord maintained that his new leader was “drawing attention to a real concern” that people are talking about on the doorstep”.
A Party on the Rise
The event, 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 ahead of the Scottish vote.
While the Scottish National Party remains ahead, the party has gained significant ground in the past year, securing 26% of the vote in its first Holyrood byelection test. Following Scottish Labour's decline, Reform has regularly pushed it into third place in recent months, with support reaching over a fifth.
Announcing that party membership north of the border had quadrupled in the past year to 12,000 members, a senior party official stated his belief it could win around twenty parliamentary seats in May, which would place Reform in “a powerful situation” in the Scottish Parliament.
Campaign Rhetoric
A Reform councillor, a local representative for the party, elicited loud cheers as he described Farage as “the future PM of the UK”. He told supporters to “prepare for a fight” as we “challenge the ruling class”, warning that “the coming campaign will be difficult”.
Although the party has yet to produce a distinct policy platform for Scotland, speakers from the north-east pledged Reform would “take on the green blob and the net-zero grifters”.
The leader personally underlined his delight at Reform's rise as a significant player in Scottish politics over the past 12 months, confessing to supporters that he was once told he “wouldn’t get 20 people in a room”.
Protests Nearby
As the event was taking place, a few miles west in the heart of Falkirk, anti-immigration and anti-racist protesters assembled for a now-regular weekly standoff outside a local hotel where asylum seekers are now housed.
A group coordinating protests stated they were motivated by a serious local crime. In an interview, Scotland's leader warned that “what the far right do is to apportion the blame … to new arrivals and I think that is the source of a harmful narrative”.
He also made a clear distinction extremist opinions and people with “legitimate points” about pressure on local services or community safety.
