I’m not the most devoted fan of the Eurovision Song Contest, and I felt that I had been delighted enough when a bearded bloke in a ballgown won it one year, so imagine my surprise when I glanced at the opening ceremony in Basel this year to see that the traditional red carpet had been replaced by one in the exact shade of turquoise as featured on every Reform UK leaflet and rosette.
Those famously biased people with their hands on the tiller of the mainstream media platforms were obviously insinuating a little Reform UK propaganda onto the airwaves, but I somehow doubted that the target audience for Eurovision crossed over with the Reform demographic.
Turning from the lurid and lurex-clad excesses of the gender-fluid contestants in Basel to my favourite radio station—where those of us of a more mature vintage are encouraged to relive the wild days of our misspent youth by listening again to the soundtrack of our youth—I suddenly found myself thinking of Nigel Farage. It was Ruby Tuesday by the Stones that hooked me with the line about “who can pin a name on you”.
Reform UK: A new political force that defies left-right labels - Stephen Pound
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I’d been thinking for a while about the impossibility of pigeonholing Reform UK using the traditional left/right matrix. A typical conversation down my local recently featured some snivelling softy squeaking that Reform was a fascist organisation run by people with freshly ironed black shirts hanging in the wardrobe. At the same time, I heard someone who was very much of the tribal Labour bent saying that some of their policies would fit nicely onto a Labour leaflet.
The fact is that you cannot pin a name on the new force in UK politics, and once you have come to this realisation, you have to admit that a genuinely new and different politics is emerging—wearing a turquoise coat.
Like a lot of old Reds, I like the sound of amputating the House of Lords, nationalising 50% of each of the major utility companies, introducing proportional representation, increasing defence expenditure, massively extending housebuilding, and providing more prison spaces. Increasing the level at which you start to pay income tax to 20%, ending inheritance tax on all properties and estates worth under £2m, abolishing business rates for small businesses on the high street, and removing interest due on student loans will be extremely expensive but may well appeal to a significant constituency.
I’m less enamoured by the idea of 20% tax relief for private healthcare and private education, as this will surely benefit the wealthy more than the many, and the proposal to introduce an NHS voucher scheme really needs to be road-tested before becoming a manifesto commitment.
OPINION: As traditional political boundaries blur, Reform UK emerges with a bold, unconventional platform that challenges the status quo, says Stephen Pound.
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Overall, £141 billion of new expenditure over the term of a parliament is courageous—if rather overambitious.
The point that I arrived at, via the Rolling Stones, was that you simply cannot fit Reform UK into the traditional political template.
Parties are often accused of stealing the best ideas of the other lot, which is why—for example—the current (at the time of writing) leader of the Conservatives has not made any substantial policy announcements since she came out in favour of means testing the winter fuel payment.
To their credit, Reform have produced a very detailed “contract with the nation” that will form the substance of their appeal to the electorate in four years’ time.
Reform can sometimes be accused of being a one-trick pony, with immigration, immigration, immigration being the be-all and end-all of their offer on the doorstep.
I urge those who fall prey to the lazy labelling of the shallow-minded to look a little deeper at that which is emerging from the turquoise haze. As a Labour man to my bootstraps, I should fear the impact of the new kids on the block, but as a democrat I welcome fresh ideas, and while I may well be campaigning against them, I entirely respect the right of Reform to set out a stall which is neither entirely left nor rabidly right—but very different.
