The UK should be alarmed about Reform

In the local elections that took place here in the UK, Reform made sweeping gains taking one seat from Labour and nine from the Tories out of the ten councils in which they gained control. Not as many people are talking about this as they should; fewer still are alarmed by it. This is how fascism takes over a country. It is rarely the end of a cinematic overthrow of ideologies or power structures or establishments. It is a cancerous change that creeps up on society only to be recognised when it is too late.

First, many people on the left or around the centre are hesitant to call Reform what they are—classless fascists—for fear of appearing distasteful themselves. Ironically, as the American Republican senator Michael McCaul helpfully reminded the then-president Obama, “Churchill didn’t dance around the Nazis, he called it fascism”. Farage is the man who plastered a lie on a bus to catalyse Leave votes for Brexit then claimed he never did it. Soon after winning the Durham council he warned “anybody who’s working for Durham County Council on climate change initiatives or Diversity, Equity and Inclusion or… thinks that you go on working from home, I think you all better really be seeking alternative careers very, very quickly.” And if such needlessly targeted attacks come as a let down to anyone who voted for him, the man had promised to do just that a fortnight before the election.

Second, we must all remind ourselves about the ethics of dealing with intolerance. Remaining tolerant, while seemingly the superior moral stance, will only fuel the growth of intolerance. While tolerance to differences is key, when those differences threaten the very core of decency and humanity, the only effective approach to dealing with such intolerance is intolerance itself—to smother the flames of division and jingoism. This is not a new idea. When Karl Popper first examined this in detail he called it, rather pointedly, ‘The paradox of tolerance’. The ‘paradox’ itself arises when we accept intolerance in the process of demonstrating our own tolerance. In Popper’s own words: “unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance”.

Third, Labour in government must show urgency in stifling the growth of Reform by better addressing people’s concerns. We saw this in the US, we saw this in India, and we have seen this in plenty of much smaller countries already. Fascism grows in the face of weak opposition. In the US the Democrats did nothing of meaning, coasting smugly driven by an assumption of victory; in India the largest opposition parties were ill-equipped to stand effectively in opposition against the nationalistic BJP’s ability to overwhelmingly mobilise the public in their favour twice before as they swept up most votes cast in local and national elections. In both cases it was not so much an inability to stand in opposition as it was a combination of overconfidence and tone-deafness—a form of complacency. For now, in the UK, Labour have enough time to learn their lessons, enough opportunities to demonstrate that they have not become complacent. But such times do not last forever.

Fourth, the fall of both the Tories and Labour while Lib Dems and Reform surged paints an instructive picture. The fault lines are opening up noticeably more than they did in the last election (where they had already begun to show). Some people are moving further left in fear of either Labour not doing enough or Tories picking up the scraps and somehow returning to power. Others, meanwhile, are moving further right in response to fear-mongering and nationalism and concepts of plans being paraded around by Mr Farage and his jolly group. A fracturing society should be recognised and responded to; this is the single most important responsibility of political parties. Without this, the chasms will widen. This does not mean all concerns are well-founded, especially not when they arise from conspiracies and skewed pictures and even outright lies such as those painted by Reform. But to pretend like a large group of Reform-inclined voters do not exist will prove to be a costly mistake for all parties. The fact that Reform gained more than Lib Dem shows even these fault lines have an inclination.

Fifth, voter turnouts are alarmingly low. According to the Local Government Association—which provides data for the public, councils and government departments—the mean turnout during local elections in southeast England was about 33%; in the east of England it was a paltry 30%; and in the West Midlands the numbers are identical. Nowhere has the voter turnout been over 50%. When the majority are not turning up the vote, a few things are worth noting: the voters are to blame, the votes for Reform (or any other party) is no longer representative of the general public perspective, and, most important, one must wonder if the people voting for Reform simply show up more reliably to vote at all. If we are going to stop Reform, voting for another party whose ideals align with ours is certainly important. More important is to actually turn up and vote.

Sixth, the people voting for Mr Farage in the guise of voting for ‘the people’, whatever that may be, will do well to remember that the Reform leader is an elitist himself. He is, as Phil Wilson once put it in The Independent, “a wealthy, privately educated, former stockbroker… Behind the brand of a man with a pint lies a member of the very elite he says is betraying the people. He is playing a very dangerous game. He is being dishonest with people.”

Seventh, and finally, it is worth noting that Reform is not a joke, no matter how much Mr Farage is treated as such particularly amidst left-leaning online platforms. Nor is their political movement, divisive and as full of lies as it may be, transient. Research from Oliver Heath et. al. in the political quarterly shows a stable continuity in people who voted for Ukip, Brexit and now Reform. In other words, people who vote for Reform are not becoming disillusioned and casting their votes for other parties in subsequent elections. Where Reform wins, it is continuing to win. It is high time other parties treat this with the gravity it deserves and debate Reform, especially on the small print associated with its myriad claims and promises.

The UK still has time to recognise and act. As of now, Prof. Jane Green of Oxford’s Nuffield Politics Research Centre believes Reform’s victory in the local elections in Runcorn will be “much harder” to translate into a subsequent general election victory. For the Conservatives The Economist called these results an “existential threat”.

At least Labour has time to act, even if only as a matter of theatre, since similar polarising effects might have reached councils farther than the current elections—held in Conservative-majority areas—seem to suggest. They do not say enough about what is going on, and will happen should an election be held today, in Labour-majority areas. Thankfully for Labour and for everyone with a progressive, inclusive, tolerant and humanistic worldview, there is still time for the next round of elections. But there is also time for Reform to further strengthen their stance, perched atop their recently-acquired Mayoral thrones. The UK finds itself in the unique position of being able to learn from the mistakes of several other countries the world over, but as the adage goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.