Samizdata quote of the day – Reform: a broad church for disillusioned patriots

Perry de Havilland (Prague) · Slogans & Quotations · UK affairs

For Farage and Reform, Musk’s attack is sunlight, the best disinfectant. It clarifies the divide: Reform as a broad church for disillusioned patriots, not a niche for extremists.

– Gawain Towler (£)

August 28th, 2025 |

2 comments to Samizdata quote of the day – Reform: a broad church for disillusioned patriots

• Johnathan Pearce

  August 28, 2025 at 7:01 am

  I admire Musk the spacefaring entrepreneur (another big rocket blasted off the other day); I have mixed views about his auto business ventures (Tesla). DOGE had good ideas but some of the execution was poor, in my view, and discredited cuts in a way that might come back to bite. (That there is a need for root-and-branch reform/cuts to the state apparatus is not in doubt.) He did the right thing, as the author of the OP said, in flagging the rape gangs issue. He irritates a lot of the people I want to see irritated. His purchase of Twitter helped the “vibe shift” against the quasi-Marxist dross that seemed to have spread like a wildfire before and during the pandemic. On balance, he’s one of the good guys.

  I not an uncritical admirer of Farage, and I am sure the more purist-inclined out there can find reasons to have a go at him. But he is (and I hate to break it to a few people) a political animal of the first rank. Unlike our clanking figure of prime minister, Farage knows how to talk to people. His outline of how a Reform UK government would deport illegals and tighten the system had the merit, which I commend him for, of having a degree of detail. He’s said far more on what could and should be done than most other politicians have for many months. Compare and contrast with the Tories on this.

  Sure, there are elements of Reform UK under NF that I worry about, such as how at times he is trying too hard to appeal to Labour voters with stuff about steel nationalisation, etc, although this is not really socialism as a sort of “state capitalism” (think of what Trump has done with Intel, for example). I’d like to see a principled, detailed assault on the Labour side on inheritance taxes, and other taxation of property that appears to be threatened. (If the Tories had a decent set of MPs, they’d have been doing this, but they appear to be useless.)

  There have been internal bust-ups and the break with Rupert Lowe and a few others suggests Farage is not an easy man to work with. Over time I will want to see if RUK can evolve into something more coherent.

  From where I sit I worry about whether those who want to see limited government, open market economies, respect for liberty and property have a political home of any sort. At the moment it is a mishmash of choices. None of the parties are good on all of these things: Labour is terrible; the Conservatives are mixed (as I said the other day, they started a lot of the current troubles); the Liberal Democrats are a joke, and Reform UK has a few good tunes, but one or two duff notes.

  I think putting too much faith in a political force is a mug’s game at this point. Ground-up activism, trying to spread ideas and getting on with whatever projects in private life is as much as many of us can do. Emigration is not an easy option for many, and there are plenty of troubles in other, supposedly nicer parts of the world.

  Back to the original post – I think Farage has his flaws, but I see no other major political figure in the UK today who has his ability to make the weather. No one else comes close. It is, when you think about it, quite remarkable how he has done it.

• DiscoveredJoys

  August 28, 2025 at 7:19 am

  Or maybe Musk is is trying to stiffen the sinews by demonstrating that alternatives do exist?

  …and there are any number of people who dislike Farage and will grasp at any straw to discredit him. Perhaps they hate him for inspiring the Brexit Referendum. Perhaps that hate him for not being a compliant Establishment politician. But – at the moment – Reform appears to be the only party likely to ‘win bigly’ against stultified machine politics. I suspect the anti-Farage clatter will increase as we get closer to a General Election; passengers fear the slowing of the gravy train.

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