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Probably the worst thing that could happen to Nigel Farage this week would be that Reform UK wins all the six regional mayoralties and 37 local and county councils that are up for grabs in Thursday’s elections.
It would force his policy-free populist party of protest into a party of power – and would show this bunch of “fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists”, as someone once called them, to be clueless as they actually are. They don’t have a clue about how to help the people who vote for them – often as not as a fairly desperate protest – and they need to be exposed as the charlatans they really are.
That won’t happen – but Reform will do well, if the polls are to be believed.
The local elections are helpful to them because they can concentrate their still-modest resources on key wards, in a way they can’t so easily in larger, parliamentary constituencies. Such is the fragmentation of voting now that some of their candidates could be in charge of entire cities and counties, on little more than a quarter of possible votes cast, taking into account the traditionally low turnouts – not much more than one in seven of the adult residents in the area.
The first-past-the-post system, which the Tories brought in for the mayoralties, may not do them any favours. Andrea Jenkyns in Lincolnshire and Luke Campbell in Hull and East Yorkshire look to have the best shouts, with Arron Banks having an outside chance of coming through the middle of a split progressive vote in the West of England. They might get into some kind of power-sharing arrangement with the Tories in the counties, too – but Doncaster is Reform’s best bet to overturn Labour control.
And then what?
Reform has no local election manifesto, and the mayors and councillors can’t do anything to “stop the boats” or reduce regular migration. Farage says that they’ll set up Elon Musk-inspired “Doge” operations that will cut waste and, no doubt, sack anyone connected with diversity, equality and inclusivity in local government. Which won’t save much money and will, though the Reform politicians won’t care, make local authorities less open and accessible to minorities of all kinds, not just ethnic groups.
They’ll try and get rid of programmes without knowing what they are, Musk-style, and cause enormous damage in doing so – not least to themselves, because no one is voting Reform UK to make their local services even worse than they currently are.
Do Farage’s ignorant remarks about people with mental health problems and children with special educational needs being “over-diagnosed” mean they’ll try to cut them off – despire a statutory obligation to care for them? And a series of expensive court challenges? One must fear the worst.
Will, in other words, Reform UK be able to balance the books and run services miraculously better than their Labour, Liberal Democrat, Conservative and Green counterparts? Of course not.
The central fact about British local government is that it is skint and being asked to do much with too little by central government – and, as a result, is utterly demoralised. The Reform politicians – and, by definition, they are politicians, not outsiders – now seeking power don’t have access to secret funding to transform social care, to save libraries, to house people, reduce council debts or revitalise town centres. But nor is there any sign that they have the experience, ideas and policies to make what little money there is go that much further.
If they’re sensible – which tends not to be the case – the Reform lot will just get on with the job and stick to the local agenda. If they run rather closer to the form book, they’ll spend their time and energy on stirring up trouble, running campaigns against “migrant hotels”, dividing relatively harmonious populations, creating grievances where there aren’t any handy ones to exploit, and making dangerous fools of themselves.
Contrary to what some Conservatives, such as Robert Jenrick and Ben Houchem would like, the worst thing the Tories could do is to usher Reform into power anywhere, because from that, there is only going to be a downside – financial and administrative chaos, shameful cruelty to the homeless and people with disabilities, and a large dollop of ill-concealed racial hatred, especially Islamophobia, propagated in the name of “free speech”. No self-respecting Conservative should be associated with that, no matter what the balance of power in the council chamber is. Reform should be quarantined, not facilitated.
Reform rule will solve nothing.
If they get in – and no less an authority as Professor John Curtice told the Independent that Reform had “already won” the Thursday elections, and will end up winning “probably a few hundred” seats across the country – Reform politicians will bring themselves and, sadly, their communities into disrepute, and then, if we’re lucky, split on the question of which residents in their area that they’d like to “deport”.
What, for those purposes, is an “illegal immigrant”? Does it include people born here? Does it include refugees who’ve been allowed to settle? To become British citizens? Do these new councillors and mayors agree with Reform’s former MP Rupert Lowe about deporting relatives of those involved in the rape gangs? Do they think incitement to riot or racial hatred should be legalised?
Do they think the NHS should be turned into a safety net for people who can’t afford private treatment or health insurance? How will they afford to take everyone on less than £20,000 out of income tax? Do they want Britain to do what Donald Trump wants? Betray Ukraine to Putin? More Brexit?
Reform UK talks a lot about “Broken Britain”. Well, we might ask ourselves what broke Britain. The answer isn’t “illegal” migration – the numbers are too small – or even the much larger flows of people entering on perfectly legitimate work and student visas, keeping the economy going. What has really broken Britain is Brexit, because it permanently depresses investment and economic growth. It has thus reduced wages and the taxes needed to pay for good public services, including local government.
Farage broke Britain – and now tells us he knows how to fix it. Maybe we should just remind ourselves about what happened the last time Farage and his followers said they had all the answers.
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