Disruptors or kingmakers? How rise of Nigel Farage’s Reform could shape next Holyrood election

It has been nearly 12 years since Nigel Farage needed a police escort after being barricaded by protesters inside an Edinburgh pub during a campaign visit to Scotland.

The disastrous stop during a by-election in May 2013 saw him surrounded outside the Canons’ Gait pub on the Royal Mile, just yards from the Scottish Parliament.

But, with an election looming large next year, Reform – the new party led by Farage – looks like it could now disrupt the established order at Holyrood.

Professor Sir John Curtice, a leading polling expert at Strathclyde University, believes the party is currently on track to win around 12-16 seats.

‘Dual risk’ to union

Surveys suggest Scots voters would overwhelmingly back Scottish independence if Farage was to ever become UK prime minister.

But Curtice believes Reform could ­present a double risk to the Union.

Current polling suggests the prospect of a pro-independence majority at next year’s election is on a knife edge.

Curtice believes a victory for the nationalists would see a renewed push for a new independence vote under Labour, while a loss would put the argument on the backburner for the remainder of the next parliament.

One major factor will be whether Reform takes enough votes away from other unionist parties to allow the SNP to sweep a greater number of seats.

Curtice said: “If we’ve got lots of smaller unionist parties and one big nationalist party, then there is a risk that nationalist party ends up in a better situation.

“The fragmentation of the vote means that unionist parties could fail to pick up constituencies because the SNP will be able to win them with a lower share of the vote and end up being over-represented.

“But with the allocation of seats, particularly the last seats, there is an advantage for the largest party. So, depending on how well the SNP is doing, that could take the nationalists over the line to a majority.”

Reform in Scotland has largely been ­riding a wave of popularity growing in the rest of the UK, but Curtice says much will depend on the party’s ability to build a professional structure north of the border.

He believes there is a good chance Reform could make the formation of the next Scottish Government more difficult.

Could Reform decide next first minister?

Polling is split on whether the SNP and Greens will win enough seats to claim a narrow majority but, if they fail, it looks extremely unlikely that Labour and the Liberal Democrats alone will have enough to form a government.

Even with the Conservatives on board – which would be an extremely bitter pill for many Labour supporters – the numbers look unlikely to add up.

So could Reform become the kingmakers? And who could make up their Holyrood cohort that could play such a decisive role?

Glasgow Conservatives were rocked when group leader Thomas Kerr defected to Reform last month.

It was a major blow to the Tories, with Kerr being seen by many as a rising star and someone who has had success reaching out to younger voters in parts of the community often missed by his former party.

Speaking to The Sunday Post, Kerr revealed he almost quit politics in November after feeling “scunnered” following the Tories’ collapse at the last general election, where he says he was bussed away from the central belt to campaign in other areas.

He was persuaded to look again at Reform around Christmas time and was impressed by proposals to raise tax bands for lower-paid workers and scrap net-zero targets.

But he says it was particularly the promise of systematic reform of the wider political system that won his support after being “radicalised from the inside” as a councillor struggling to get the help needed for people in his local area.

Kerr said: “I honestly think the sky is the limit for Reform.

“Right now politics is changing so quickly and what I’m hoping is that enough people are elected to bring about fundamental change in Scotland.

“Then we can force the Scottish Parliament to do what it’s supposed to do, and that’s actually help the people of Scotland rather than talk about pet issues.”

A fast rise in Scotland

Reform’s rise in Scotland has come about quickly. This time last year, it was often not even included inside polling numbers because support was so low.

Around April, it started polling around 2% and then won 7% at the general election.

Now, more than a year out from the next Holyrood election, polls have Reform listed at around 15%.

The same polls have the 
Lib Dems on 9% and the Greens on 5.3%. Alba – the breakaway nationalist party set up by Alex Salmond – is so low it does not get a mention.

Those inside the party are quietly ­hoping Reform can far exceed the 16 seats currently predicted by pollsters.

Attitude surveys consistently show there is a large centre-right vote in Scotland that the Conservatives have struggled to tap into.

© PA Archive/Press Association Ima

Kerr believes the Tories have a “toxic brand” and says Reform will look to capitalise in areas he claims have been ignored since Ruth Davidson’s leadership of the Scottish Conservatives.

He said: “The biggest criticism I have of my former party is that those inroads we started to make in 2017, we tossed them away very quickly to protect establishment figures inside the party in key certain areas, in the north-east and the Borders.

“We took a lot of votes for granted. We abandoned the central belt.

“There is a big centre-right vote out there but they’ve never really had anybody speaking to that. That is why the central belt is so interesting for Reform. I think it offers a massive opportunity to tap into that vote.”

A source inside the Conservative Party told The Sunday Post it is expecting to lose ground to Reform in both the north-east and in Glasgow.

However, the Tories hope to perform ­better in the constituency vote.

Reform came in for criticism at the last election for standing paper candidates in Scotland, including a number who actually lived in other parts of the UK.

But behind the scenes, it has been moving quickly to build a more professional structure, including a network of branches across the UK.

Is more to come?

At Kerr’s first branch meeting, which he attended on the day he announced his defection, he says around 60 people were in attendance – a far cry from the “six people and a dug” he says sometimes attended his previous Tory branch.

Party insiders have hailed the diversity of the groups coming along and point particularly to a younger demographic among their support.

They are hoping to become a problem not just for unionist parties but also for the SNP and the Greens. In the recent Glasgow North East by-election, one in five Green voters put Reform as their second preference.

The party does not intend to take up a similar platform to the Conservatives of campaigning directly against Scottish independence.

However, Kerr revealed he sought – and was given – assurances that no pro-independence candidates will be allowed to stand.

Despite that stance, Kerr is adamant Reform can be more than just a protest vote for disgruntled unionist voters.

He believes the party can reach beyond the debate around a new referendum that has dominated Scottish politics over the past decade.

Kerr said: “If other Unionist parties can’t win votes because Reform is winning them, that’s a problem for them, not us. It’s because they’re not inspiring people to go to them.

“I think that we’ll see over the next year or so that this isn’t just a unionist issue. I think you’re going to see a lot of people who are traditionally SNP supporters but more right-leaning look to Reform.

“If other parties in Holyrood don’t want to work with us, that’s an issue for them because voters will have sent us there with a message and we’ll make sure that’s heard.”