“BORED!” Nigel Farage was giving a press conference. “YAWN!” It was an unusual press conference. “UGH!” For a start, while many politicians these days prefer only to take questions from selected reporters, they do all take questions from someone. On Monday, Farage pioneered an interesting political innovation: the questionless press conference.
We had been summoned to the top floor of the National Liberal Club for a “special announcement”. Most parties use language like that as a code to mean something like “the leader is resigning, following the discovery of his secret family in Switzerland”. Reform use it for everything. In recent months, we’ve been promised not just other “special announcements”, but “an important press conference” and “one not to miss”. It’s like being emailed by a political party run by time-share salesmen.
The event kicked off with a swish video showing the tremendous impact of Reform’s five four MPs. This had involved quite a lot of selective video editing. See Nigel, Lee, Richard and the other one marching through Westminster, asking the tough questions, holding the government to account! Had there once been a fifth musketeer? There was no sign of him now. Presumably shooting footage for Reform videos is like being a wedding photographer, trying to work out which of the bridesmaids’ boyfriends should be placed at the edge of the shot for ease-of-cropping in future years. Stalin must have wished he had someone with such skills at his disposal.
Then Farage popped up on stage, furnished and burnished by Florida sun. His demeanour was “Mr Toad upon learning that the speeding charges have been dropped”. He had plenty to say: Reform was on the verge of triumph in local elections! It was well-placed in the forthcoming Runcorn by-election! He was about to unveil a couple of dozen local councillors who had defected to his side! Everywhere he looked, he foresaw triumph!
Three security guards with earpieces were deployed to keep us in line, which is significantly more than prime ministers get
This was quite different from the normal pre-election briefing we get from politicians. Usually, a Tory will earnestly explain to you that their party will be lucky if it holds a single seat, and that Beaconsfield is about to go communist. Behind them a Labour spin doctor will be patiently waiting to run you through figures that show their party will count it a win if none of their candidates have committed hara-kiri before polling day.
Instead, Farage was creating a situation where if Reform doesn’t win hundreds of council seats and the Runcorn by-election, he risks being written up as a failure. Why do this? One explanation is that Farage needs voters to believe that Reform can win. Another is that he’s been inhaling his own fumes.
His triumphalism was mixed with whininess. The last week has of course been dominated by the expulsion of Rupert Lowe from the party. Or, as Farage put it, “we’ve been through a little bit of turbulence”. He wanted to brush that off, but he couldn’t stop himself complaining. Why, he demanded to know, had journalists not written about the “outright overt racism” that had been directed towards Reform chairman Zia Yusuf?
Had people directed racist abuse towards a Labour or Tory MP, he claimed “it would have been a major national story”. This shows a frankly touching naivety about the sort of messages that get sent to MPs every day. Indeed, given that Lee Anderson only joined Reform because of a row about what exactly it is acceptable to say about a Muslim politician, it hints at a certain amount of memory loss.
Is it possible that the people directing online abuse at Yusuf over Lowe’s departure might be adjacent to Reform themselves? Neither Lowe nor Yusuf are household names. Farage has always insisted that racists aren’t welcome in the parties he runs (there have been a couple). There’s quite a lot of evidence that racists don’t believe he means this.
Having finished his complaint to a packed event that he doesn’t get enough coverage, Farage wheeled out his defectors. Stephen Atkinson, leader of Ribble Valley Borough Council, announced the country needed a government that stood up for “Britons” and “patriots” against the “globalist uniparty”, in a speech that felt as though someone had taken out key phrases that would have made his meaning a great deal clearer. Heather Asker of Saffron Walden said she was happy to be joining a party that was “talking up Britain, not talking it down”. Reform’s slogan, it should be noted, is “Britain is Broken”.
And then Farage announced the press conference was over. There would be no chance to question him of his new colleagues on camera, which was a shame, because it was hard to escape the thought that they might have had quite a lot to say.
Instead the press were herded to the back of the room. Three security guards with earpieces were deployed to keep us in line, which is significantly more protection than actual prime ministers get. We were told that the leader would take one question from each of us off-camera.
In the event, that wasn’t quite how it worked out. “Elon Musk,” one questioner began, and Farage immediately yelled “GOOD, GOOD!” at her. She tried again. “Great!” He said, and turned to complain to the Guardian about its reporting. “Rupert Lowe…” asked someone else “Good!” He said. She went on. “I’m BORED!” he yelled, and turned away again. “Do you think that Rupert Lowe…” tried another reporter. “UGH! Sorry,” he said, and theatrically yawned.” He began to walk away. “Rupert did say…” the reporter went on, but Farage was halfway down the room, surrounded by his minders. It was, indeed, a moment not to be missed.
