Those demanding the Conservatives address their recent past could do with doing the same themselves
How is this acceptable?
“The Reform Party is nothing but a hotchpotch, a mess, a corpse infested by waifs, strays, weirdos, charlatans and crooks, offering the whole political spectrum from the seriously deranged to the criminally insane”
It’s a spicy line to start with, but before Reformers blow a gasket and accuse me of libel there is something they should know. This line was written by satirist Mark Taverner, in his novel “In the Red” who died in 2007, eleven years before Reform UK were founded – as the Brexit Party – and was actually written in 1989.
In 1989 Nigel Farage was still three years from the founding of UKIP. He was then a commodities broker and metals trader and even he’d admit, probably with a grin, they were a gaggle who had their fair share of ‘charlatans and crooks’. But the quote cannot have meant his current political vehicle, first in the polls, and positioning itself for Government.
Besides, outwardly Farage is Teflon-coated to accusations his outfits are full of misfits.
His reaction in 2004 to the accusation from the then Tory leader, Lord Howard, that UKIP was filled with “cranks and political gadflies” was to have a tie made, adorned with both the tool and the insect, for members of a dining club of the same name, in Brussels!
He is, and always has been very good company socially, whatever you think of his politics. As is Lord Howard for that matter.
Attending one of these events at Nigel’s invitation twenty years ago was how I first met him. He wasn’t leader at the time, but chatting it became clear he would be. However the only ambition he’d admit to was his “own show on LBC, that would be brilliant. Did it before and loved it’” You can hear him saying it.
His ambition now is still to ‘lead Britain’s conversation’ – not from LBC’s studios but 10 Downing Street.
Many of Reform’s outriders have nearly as long an association with Farage. Reform UK may be a new insurgent party but many of its passengers and drivers – those not pushed under the bus for ‘disloyalty’ – are old hands in the insurgency business. Some of them demand the Conservatives don’t just recognise past failings, but crawl in ‘shame’. Arron Banks and newbie Zia Yusuf, a Tory until Aug 2024, like the language of snivelling abasement as the Tory price for sharing the same air!
Imagery aside I’ve said before, they and Tory defector Robert Jenrick make a challenge to the Tories that should not be airily dismissed but addressed. This site has seen Tories argue the same in order to avoid the risk of looking like they don’t need to.
It is bizarre to criticise the Tory Government as ‘a total failure’ whilst simultaneously welcoming some of its players into your ranks but there is still a feeling that – even if changing under Kemi Badenoch – the Conservatives haven’t changed …
How is this acceptable?
“The Reform Party is nothing but a hotchpotch, a mess, a corpse infested by waifs, strays, weirdos, charlatans and crooks, offering the whole political spectrum from the seriously deranged to the criminally insane”
It’s a spicy line to start with, but before Reformers blow a gasket and accuse me of libel there is something they should know. This line was written by satirist Mark Taverner, in his novel “In the Red” who died in 2007, eleven years before Reform UK were founded – as the Brexit Party – and was actually written in 1989.
In 1989 Nigel Farage was still three years from the founding of UKIP. He was then a commodities broker and metals trader and even he’d admit, probably with a grin, they were a gaggle who had their fair share of ‘charlatans and crooks’. But the quote cannot have meant his current political vehicle, first in the polls, and positioning itself for Government.
Besides, outwardly Farage is Teflon-coated to accusations his outfits are full of misfits.
His reaction in 2004 to the accusation from the then Tory leader, Lord Howard, that UKIP was filled with “cranks and political gadflies” was to have a tie made, adorned with both the tool and the insect, for members of a dining club of the same name, in Brussels!
He is, and always has been very good company socially, whatever you think of his politics. As is Lord Howard for that matter.
Attending one of these events at Nigel’s invitation twenty years ago was how I first met him. He wasn’t leader at the time, but chatting it became clear he would be. However the only ambition he’d admit to was his “own show on LBC, that would be brilliant. Did it before and loved it’” You can hear him saying it.
His ambition now is still to ‘lead Britain’s conversation’ – not from LBC’s studios but 10 Downing Street.
Many of Reform’s outriders have nearly as long an association with Farage. Reform UK may be a new insurgent party but many of its passengers and drivers – those not pushed under the bus for ‘disloyalty’ – are old hands in the insurgency business. Some of them demand the Conservatives don’t just recognise past failings, but crawl in ‘shame’. Arron Banks and newbie Zia Yusuf, a Tory until Aug 2024, like the language of snivelling abasement as the Tory price for sharing the same air!
Imagery aside I’ve said before, they and Tory defector Robert Jenrick make a challenge to the Tories that should not be airily dismissed but addressed. This site has seen Tories argue the same in order to avoid the risk of looking like they don’t need to.
It is bizarre to criticise the Tory Government as ‘a total failure’ whilst simultaneously welcoming some of its players into your ranks but there is still a feeling that – even if changing under Kemi Badenoch – the Conservatives haven’t changed …
Those demanding the Conservatives address their recent past could do with doing the same themselves
How is this acceptable?
“The Reform Party is nothing but a hotchpotch, a mess, a corpse infested by waifs, strays, weirdos, charlatans and crooks, offering the whole political spectrum from the seriously deranged to the criminally insane”
It’s a spicy line to start with, but before Reformers blow a gasket and accuse me of libel there is something they should know. This line was written by satirist Mark Taverner, in his novel “In the Red” who died in 2007, eleven years before Reform UK were founded – as the Brexit Party – and was actually written in 1989.
In 1989 Nigel Farage was still three years from the founding of UKIP. He was then a commodities broker and metals trader and even he’d admit, probably with a grin, they were a gaggle who had their fair share of ‘charlatans and crooks’. But the quote cannot have meant his current political vehicle, first in the polls, and positioning itself for Government.
Besides, outwardly Farage is Teflon-coated to accusations his outfits are full of misfits.
His reaction in 2004 to the accusation from the then Tory leader, Lord Howard, that UKIP was filled with “cranks and political gadflies” was to have a tie made, adorned with both the tool and the insect, for members of a dining club of the same name, in Brussels!
He is, and always has been very good company socially, whatever you think of his politics. As is Lord Howard for that matter.
Attending one of these events at Nigel’s invitation twenty years ago was how I first met him. He wasn’t leader at the time, but chatting it became clear he would be. However the only ambition he’d admit to was his “own show on LBC, that would be brilliant. Did it before and loved it’” You can hear him saying it.
His ambition now is still to ‘lead Britain’s conversation’ – not from LBC’s studios but 10 Downing Street.
Many of Reform’s outriders have nearly as long an association with Farage. Reform UK may be a new insurgent party but many of its passengers and drivers – those not pushed under the bus for ‘disloyalty’ – are old hands in the insurgency business. Some of them demand the Conservatives don’t just recognise past failings, but crawl in ‘shame’. Arron Banks and newbie Zia Yusuf, a Tory until Aug 2024, like the language of snivelling abasement as the Tory price for sharing the same air!
Imagery aside I’ve said before, they and Tory defector Robert Jenrick make a challenge to the Tories that should not be airily dismissed but addressed. This site has seen Tories argue the same in order to avoid the risk of looking like they don’t need to.
It is bizarre to criticise the Tory Government as ‘a total failure’ whilst simultaneously welcoming some of its players into your ranks but there is still a feeling that – even if changing under Kemi Badenoch – the Conservatives haven’t changed …
