It was billed as the “biggest political rally in history”. But as its 6.30pm start time drew near, it became clear that Reform UK’s local-election campaign launch at Birmingham’s Utilita Arena on Friday (28 March) was going to reflect its true position: an insurgent party on the verge of civil war.
Battle lines were drawn up before attendees even reached the arena: given Reform’s anti-immigration stance and Birmingham’s highly diverse and multicultural population, it was unsurprising to see hundreds of protesters outside. It was Nigel Farage’s squirming over the Ukraine war that prompted the most memorable demonstration though, courtesy of the campaign group Led by Donkeys: a projected image of Farage and Vladimir Putin with the caption “Vladimir and Nigel welcome you to Birmingham”.
All this was to be expected. But Reform seemingly tried to use the protests as a smokescreen to disguise its modest turnout. “I must apologise that we are running slightly late,” Dr David Bull, Reform candidate and emcee for the evening told audiences around 60 minutes after the advertised start time. “That is because we have enormous queues around the building as people are packing in to see the next government in action.” That second claim could well turn out to be true, but the first one certainly wasn’t.
By the time the main show started, the 15,000-capacity venue was perhaps a little more than half full. From my lonely view high up towards the back, I could see the rear area of the ground-level stand was completely empty. During the delay, a freelance videographer shooting footage for the party’s social channels told me the organisers had asked them to arrive ahead of time to get some shots of the “massive” crowd. “How can I?” they said. “It’s so patchy.”
Perhaps the missing contingent were those sympathetic to Rupert Lowe, the MP who lost the party whip after allegations that he made threats of physical violence to party chair Zia Yusuf and that he mistreated two female members of his staff. (Lowe denies the claims. On Tuesday, 25 March, an independent lawyer appointed by Reform to investigate the accusations found “credible evidence” Lowe and his staff mistreated their female colleagues in ways that “seem to amount to harassment”.)
Some Lowe loyalists were still in attendance though. “I’m not a fan of how Farage has treated Lowe,” one told me. “Rupert Lowe was their best man so that was quite disappointing,” added another. But – perhaps having squeezed in a few more pints during the prolonged delay – other attendees became less diplomatic as the rally got underway. A few rows near me, one man bellowed Lowe’s name multiple times during deputy leader Richard Tice’s speech. “Bring back Rupert!” he slurred again, before he was surrounded by security.
Bull told the audience that the “electorate has nothing to lose” in voting for Reform at May’s elections. But those I spoke to seemed to believe everything was already lost. “I can’t see any way forward,” one told me. “I know Labour have inherited a lot of the Tories’ mess. But they’re not doing anything better – they’re doing it worse.”
The event’s production values were high, featuring a stage-set synecdoche of broken Britain. There was a high-street barbershop (Keir’z Kutz – cutting everything but tax), a bookie (Labourbrokes), and, in light of the ongoing bin workers’ strike in Birmingham, a pile of overflowing bins and rubbish bags. The latter concealed a series of props later wielded to heavy-handed comic effect: the TV licence Lee Anderson refuses to pay, and a mock-up of Rachel Reeves’s CV.
But it remains unclear if Reform has the answers to any of these local or national crises. Instead, it blames everything on the “uniparty”: the period of Conservative rule that came to an end last summer, and the Labour government’s stuttering start since. They also joke, a lot – in fact too much for this restless audience. After the umpteenth “Rachel from accounts” gag, one audience member shouted: “Stop trashing their position and tell us what you’re going to do!”
Arriving on a JCB and soundtracked by a mini orchestra, Farage himself – initially sounding slightly hoarse, perhaps from his boozy lobby lunch the day before – reduced the crowd to just the occasional outburst. He provided some policy clarity, reiterating the party’s established commitments: abandoning the European Convention on Human Rights; deporting illegal migrants; and creating a “British version of Doge”, the Elon Musk-led cost-cutting department in the US. But most of all he spoke to the condition of Britain, echoing previous speakers’ sentiments about our decaying public realm.
In truth, it sounded not too dissimilar to how Labour spoke about the Conservatives’ record prior to last year’s election. “Just as we know that Britain is broken at so many levels, be in no doubt that local government is broken,” Farage said. He went on to highlight the daily interest charges on the debts of the councils close to financial oblivion: Lincolnshire, £52,000 a day; Cambridgeshire, £89,000; Cornwall, £147,000. “What all these numbers tell me… is that these councils have been asleep at the wheel, they’ve broken their counties. Reform is going to come in and we are going to fix it.”
Populists always capitalise on the broken windows left behind by more mainstream parties. But if they achieve office, they’re expected to fix them. Should Reform perform as expected at May’s elections (it’s currently predicted to win around 700 council seats), its voters will expect delivery and change – much as the nation did after the Conservatives left government. And this is the trap Farage is setting for his party. Excuses of council bureaucracy and constrained budgets will soon sound like shop-worn excuses to those who voted for candidates wearing the slogan: “Your council is broken. Reform will fix it.”
Towards the end of his speech, Farage described the local elections as Reform’s “first big hurdle” since last year’s election of its MPs. His party will face another hurdle soon after: achieving tangible change in the fractured realm of local government, and avoiding accusations that Reform isn’t just another compromising political party. Otherwise, Reform will soon come to be seen as another branch of the “uniparty” it rails against.
[See also: The world according to Reform]
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