The Resistible Rise of Nigel Farage (or Something Worse)

Reform and Wales.

In a recent by-election for Torfaen Council, Reform took the seat from Labour with a comfortable majority (47% to 27%). This is their first elected council seat in Wales. (They already have Tory defectors.)

The fear of an overall majority for Reform in next year’s Senedd elections is growing.

Or maybe a Reform and Tory majority.

Or maybe just a large enough Reform group to stop any kind of radical and coherent possibility for dealing with the increasingly fearful mess we are in.

The hierarchy of horror moves in the wrong direction as the weeks and months go by.

There are some who believe that the threat of Reform will quietly peak and decline, or that the nature of Welsh political history and culture will prevent them from getting any serious foothold here.

There have been few times that I have so hoped to be wrong, but a reality check needs to take account of the following:

In UK polls, Farage’s party is now nudging ahead of Labour.

The new electoral system for the Senedd will probably help Reform more than Labour or Plaid.

Analysis of the results of the last General Election applied to each of the 16 new Senedd constituencies starts with some real polling, but all the indications are that things will have changed for the worse since then.

Reform is higher, and Labour lower in the most recent opinion polls.

Reform are winning Labour held seats in Council By-Elections.

In Wales, there is growing resentment of the range of promises that Labour made to Wales before the election and that they are now refusing to implement.

Reform will put a massive effort into the Senedd elections. It is their first chance of establishing a significant base in a legislature.

Depressingly, all the indications are that Rachel Reeve’s ongoing economic policies look as if they have been almost designed to alienate even more Labour voters than they already have.

Any Tories elected will be delighted to go into coalition with Reform if they haven’t already merged.

In the USA, Germany, Hungary, Austria, Holland, France, and more, the far-right populist parties are in power or heading that way. This is not some kind of coincidence. The centre parties have failed and then descended into simply throwing abuse at those who feel left behind.

Of course, there needs to be some honest reflection on how the left allowed this to happen. Many would point to neo-liberal economics. Or a growing obsession with a range of disputes around Political Correctness, rather than the core class matters. Low wages, job insecurity, collapse in social care, the NHS, schools, and housing.

And the Green New Deal to mitigate the existential threat of global warming is starting to look to many as yet another threat to their own communities, jobs and well-being… The situation could and should have been reversed.

There are, and will continue to be, other posts on this site that discuss the massive threat that Reform poses.

All this leads me to the conclusion that we need some kind of left popular front, both organisationally and policy-wise, to deal with these next Senedd elections in May 2026.

A challenging task is going to be made worse by the Closed Lists system that has been imposed.

There is very little chance of anyone on the independent/left/green spectrum getting a seat, and a serious danger that in most of the 16 constituencies an independent, green, true socialist list will allow Reform to take one more seat that could have gone to Labour or Plaid.

Genuinely frustrating as it is, for now, the only electoral show in town is Labour and Plaid.

If we could learn to look instead of gawking
We’d see the horror in the heart of farce
If only we could act instead of talking
We wouldn’t always end up on our arse
This was the thing that nearly had us mastered
Don’t yet rejoice in his defeat you men
Although the world stood up and stopped the bastard
The bitch that bore him is in heat again.

Final lines from The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui
by Bertolt Brecht. First performed in Berlin in 1952