BIRMINGHAM, England — Nigel Farage’s first party conference speech since he shook up Britain’s election was billed as a warning shot to the established political parties in Britain: the right is coming for you.
In Birmingham’s National Exhibition Centre, legions of fans sporting merchandise backing either Farage’s Reform UK outfit or U.S. Republican Donald Trump filed towards the main stage — many clutching pints of beer before noon as the fun began.
It’s Reform’s first conference since it came third in the popular vote in this year’s general election — racking up 4 million votes and boosting its representation in the U.K. parliament, including a long-coveted seat for Farage himself.
In many places, Reform eclipsed the 200-year-old Conservative Party and is now snapping at Labour’s heels.
The leading Brexit campaigner certainly got top billing. Thousands of supporters were seated at the main stage as Farage was introduced as, in the words of his own announcer, “the most popular leader in the United Kingdom.”
A montage of his career was set to stirring music, equal parts David Miscavige and reality show Big Brother. Farage strode through the crowd to rapturous applause, having selected his walk-on music as “Without Me” by Eminem (key lyric: “we need a little controversy”) in true prize-fighter style.
Pyrotechnics went off around the 60-year-old leader as he sang along — as surreal a moment as you’ll get from any U.K. party conference, and a far cry from the doom and gloom of the current Labour government’s communications.
“The energy, the optimism, the enthusiasm that we’ve got in this room is not something that can be replicated by any other political party in this country,” Farage claimed — and he’s probably not wrong.
There were jibes at Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s recent troubles over clothes given to the Labour leader by a wealthy donor. Putting on a pair of glasses, Farage asked: “Do you like them? Very expensive! But I bought them myself, how about that?!”
“I’m not in bad health, which is down to clean living,” the pint-swilling chain-smoker — who has vowed to quit pubs if a Labour ban on outdoor smoking comes in — smirked. He was absolutely loving it.
Yet, despite the glitzy surroundings, the speech quickly turned into the tedium of party administration. There was much talk of regional managers, limited companies, candidate vetting and constitutions.
The message was that Reform is now taking itself seriously: maybe the rest of Westminster should too.
“We weren’t big enough, wealthy enough, professional enough to vet general election candidates properly,” he said of a campaign that saw Reform hopefuls plunged into race controversies. “That amateurism let us down.”
“We don’t want extremists, we don’t want bigots, we don’t want people that think that way — because we represent the silent decent majority of this great country,” he added. “This weekend is when Reform UK comes of age,” he proclaimed.
Aside from a passing reference to “two-tier policing” — an attack he aimed at Starmer as the state responded to a wave of far-right British riots over the summer — and “Judeo-Christian” values, Farage left the more colorful language to the lieutenants who came before him.
“When they distract you, they control you,” rambled TV hardman and ex-soldier Ant Middleton earlier in the day.
“We have harbored those who hate us, tolerated those who threaten us, and indulged those who weakened us,” proclaimed new MP Rupert Lowe.
“Just because a little boy picks up a doll, it doesn’t make him a girl,” quipped fellow MP Lee Anderson, who ditched the Conservatives after claiming “Islamists” had “got control” of the center-left Muslim mayor of London, Sadiq Khan.
Unlikely Lib Dem praise
Farage brought dull but important changes to the conference. He is giving up some of his shares in the party, which has hitherto been a limited company in his control. There was hard-headed pragmatism in the push.
“I never thought I’d say this, but we have to model ourselves on the Liberal Democrats,” he grinned, to boos from the crowd aimed at the pro-European centrists.
He heaped praise on the Lib Dems’ political operation, from branches to leafletting “despite the fact they’ve not got any policies at all,” and pointed out that they’d managed to win 72 seats in parliament despite winning fewer votes thanks to ruthless targeting.
Now, he told Reform members, is the time to capitalize on disillusionment. “I don’t think there’s ever been a time where there has been greater disenchantment in the two big parties that have dominated our political life for the 100 years,” he said.
Farage pinpointed next year’s English local elections as “our first big test of fire” to push forward toward 2029. “I promise you,[the] sky is the limit,” he added.
Despite saying that he had given the members control of the party, Farage is still its main attraction.
“I’m quite used to being criticized for virtually everything,” he said. “Any major terrible event that happens in the country is clearly my fault. Lucky I don’t care, isn’t it, really? They can write what they like, I don’t care, because I know what I believe in.”
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