I have a confession to make. I was supposed to be writing about “Granny Harmer” Keir Starmer, who has decided to scrap Winter Fuel Payments for pensioners and the single-person Council Tax discount – all whilst stuffing £107,145 of gifted Arsenal tickets and designer clothes into his back pocket. The own goals kept on coming, after Starmer claimed his paid-for Arsenal corporate box was saving the taxpayer money on security, were he to purchase a commoner’s seat.
But I’m not writing about Starmer – because Will Kingston-Cox got there first, the little blighter. As Will is technically my boss here at Europinion, I have decided it’s best for me to butt out.
Fear not, however, because this is British politics. So, luckily, on the very same day I was pipped to the post for Starmer’s hospitality pandemonium by the boss, Nigel Farage declared he is giving up ownership of Reform UK.
Reform UK, until this point, was not a political party. It was a private company. Therefore, if you voted for Reform UK at the recent UK General Election, you have done the equivalent of voting for a man with the Greggs logo on his rosette – or Lloyds Bank, or Microsoft, or any other private company you can imagine. If you don’t believe me, you can find all the details on Companies House.
Until now, Farage was the majority shareholder of this company. This meant being a Reform UK party member was utterly pointless because all decisions were made by Farage’s pious inner circle of cronies. You have more power over a company’s direction when you flash your Tesco Clubcard than a Reform UK membership card – which, if it were a currency, would have been worth just enough to buy a solitary pea.
Things have changed. Now, decision-making power rests with the 80,000-odd party members, including shaping the party’s constitution and structure. What convenient timing ahead of Reform UK’s Conference in… [checks calendar] oh yes, approximately 24 hours. Now the members actually have a reason to cough up the entry fee.
All of this means Reform UK has finally become a normal political party, rather than some deeply exclusive private company that may as well have been operating out of an underground Gringotts vault guarded by dragons. Surely this is a good thing for democracy, right? Wrong.
As per usual, Farage is up to his usual tricks of putting on a happy-go-Larry front of sunshine, lollipops and candy lanes when, really, this decision has been expertly calculated to maximise one thing: self-gain.
Becoming a normal, democratic political party gives Reform UK additional authority that it has hitherto lacked. Rival parties have now lost a key weapon in their armoury, as they can no longer dismiss Farage as an egoistical businessman exploiting his cash to play politics. Farage is a democratically elected MP, and he is technically now the leader of a democratically structured party.
But how democratic really is Reform UK?
You see, there’s a gaping hole in Farage’s new democratic façade. To trigger a vote of no confidence in their party leader, at least 50% of Reform UK members must write to the party chairman. That is a gargantuan threshold which will be indefinitely unattainable. I cannot think of any circumstance where this figure could be reached, unless a Daily Mail journalist lands a scoop that Farage is secretly sleeping with one of his nemesis illegal immigrants. To put this enormous asking into perspective, only 15% of Conservative MPs are required to trigger a vote of no confidence in the Conservative Party Leader. Recent history tells us this number is certainly attainable.
This all stinks of Putin’s Russia. Putin claims a democratic mandate every time Russians turn out at the polls because they are all allowed a vote. Of course, there’s a high chance the KGB fiddle the figures to ensure Putin is victorious – and just to make sure, Putin passed a law to keep him in power until 2036.
Now compare. Nigel Farage can now claim a democratic mandate from Reform UK’s party members because they’re all allowed to vote against him if they wish. But Farage has made rules to prematurely suppress such a rebellion by the sheer number of signatures needed on that vote of no confidence letter. Farage is nothing more than Putin disguised in a Great British frock.
Reform UK voters and party members, I now speak directly to you. I hope you’re happy with Nigel Farage as your party leader – because you’re going to be stuck with him for some time. I congratulate you on gleefully following your pied piper through thick and thin, but know this. If Farage doesn’t accidentally take you on a detour through dictatorial Russia, he’ll lead you all off a cliff.
Never forget what Farage opined of Putin during the 2024 General Election leadership debate: “I said I disliked him as a person, but I admired him as a political operator”. Mic drop. Sillett Bang, over and out.
Image: Flickr, Gage Skidmore
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