🔗 Share this article Reform UK Leader Addresses Movement's Largest Gathering in Scotland Amid Controversy and Defection Nigel Farage spoke to the largest the party's rally so far in Scotland, however declined to speak with the press corps following the event. In his place, newly defected member of the House of Lords the former Conservative donor took on the task of responding to queries on allegations of racism and anti-Jewish sentiment surrounding Farage. A High-Profile Defection The leader presented the ex-Tory lord and wealthy businessman during a packed event of about 700 supporters at a hotel conference centre in central Scotland. 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 stand for the party in next May’s Holyrood elections. The leader stated he was “extremely pleased” to greet Offord to the party. He called the peer’s defection as “a brave and historic act”. Dodging the Press The Reform leader spoke to the crowd after a turbulent week which saw him launch a tirade against the BBC after they quizzed him regarding a report into alleged racist and antisemitic behaviour from his teenage years. But, Farage dodged the expected press huddle after Saturday’s event. When asked why his new party’s leader was not available to address growing claims concerning his history, the new recruit responded: “You’ll need to ask him that question.” Pressed on if he thought Farage should apologise for the comments he is said to have made towards Jewish pupils, he stated: “That is a matter for him to deliberate on with his team.” Insisting on Fitness 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 his remarks about pupils in Glasgow who are not native English speakers by asking the rally: “Who voted for the wholesale change of the population of Glasgow?” Although Scotland's First Minister criticised Farage’s original remarks as “racist”, and Keir Starmer labeled them “toxic and divisive”, the defector argued that Farage was “drawing attention to a real concern” that people are talking about on the doorstep”. Growing Confidence The event, filled with an energetic and enthused crowd of predominantly older, white male backers who bought tickets for the event, highlights the party’s growing confidence ahead of the Scottish vote. Although the Scottish National Party remains ahead, Reform UK has made substantial progress in the past year, achieving a quarter of the vote in its first Holyrood byelection test. Following Scottish Labour's decline, the party has often relegated it to third lately, with support reaching over a fifth. Declaring that Reform UK membership in Scotland had increased fourfold over the last twelve months to a running total of 12,000, a senior party official said he believed it could win around twenty parliamentary seats in May, which would place Reform in “a powerful situation” in the Scottish Parliament. Fighting Talk Thomas Kerr, a local representative for the party, elicited loud cheers as he described Farage as “Britain’s next prime minister”. He instructed the crowd to “prepare for a fight” as we take on the political establishment”, cautioning that “the next five months will be tough”. Although the party has yet to produce a distinct policy platform for Scotland, speakers from the north-east vowed the party would “take on the green blob and the net-zero grifters”. The leader personally underlined his delight at the party’s emergence as a force in the political scene in Scotland over the past 12 months, confessing to supporters that he was once told he “couldn't fill a small venue”. Protests Nearby Meanwhile, a few miles west in the heart of Falkirk, demonstrators with opposing views assembled for what have become regular weekly confrontations outside a local hotel where asylum seekers are now housed. The organisers of the demonstrations 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 asylum seekers or migrants and I think that is the source of a harmful narrative”. He also made a clear distinction between those who hold far-right views and people with “legitimate points” about pressure on local services or neighbourhood security.