By Frank Wright
With Nigel Farage and Reform U.K. from the right, and George Galloway and his Workers’ Party from the left, the populist element threatens to make the cheerless pantomime of British politics entertaining – and interesting – again.
The United Kingdom’s general election is days away. Thursday, July 4, a memorable date for American home rule, may see a degree of self-rule return to Britain as the liberal establishment is shaken in its heartland by populists from the right and left of the center of permanent government.
Last week current Conservative Foreign Secretary David Cameron said on video that British policy on Ukraine was “fixed” and that nothing would change if Labour won the election – as many expect they will.
Yet a rising tide of populism led by two charismatic figures has complicated the situation.
Despite attempts routinely seen in European nations to “lock out” populists from mainstream media, Nigel Farage’s Reform continues to surge. Mass rallies across the country combine with several polls showing his party now pushing the Conservatives into third place nationally in three polls.
When the first poll showed Reform a point ahead of the Tories, Farage claimed his party was now “the real opposition to Labour.”
Farage has complained that his party is not being given fair media coverage. Reform have cautioned against believing mainstream media polls, as their own claim to show far stronger support – such as this from July 1.
As many former Conservative voters openly call for their party to get “zero seats,” Nigel Farage and George Galloway are rising in the polls to challenge both parties of government – widely seen by their traditional voter base as having betrayed them.
Almost all polls exclude Galloway’s Workers’ Party from their calculations, locking his voice out on screen. But it is his voice which has resonated with many who share his support of Gaza against Israel’s ongoing genocide.
Galloway claims that the established parties have “abandoned the working class.” He claims to stand against “the uniparty” of British politics, having denounced the “one-party state” of Britain in colorful terms in the past.
His recent sentiments on the merits of both the Labour and Conservative leaders will be shared by many.
With Galloway from the left, and Farage from the right, the populist element threatens to make the cheerless pantomime of British politics entertaining – and interesting – again.
Farage came to prominence as a leading figure in the “Brexit” movement, which following then Prime Minister David Cameron’s decision to hold a referendum, saw the U.K. vote in it to leave the European Union.
Many British voters – known as “remainers” – sought to remain in and seek to rejoin the E.U., and hope that a vote for the Labour Party will realize this ambition.
British Christian commentator Peter Hitchens criticized the referendum at the time, saying that it introduced a conflict over sovereignty that replaced another. He said that the referendum made the popular vote sovereign at the expense of Parliament, and that the membership of the E.U. had also done the same. This, he said in 2023, had diluted the power of Parliament overall.
Hitchens concluded that the referendum really contested the supremacy of Parliament in determining the fate of the nation.
Election as referendum on Parliament?
This election can be seen as a sort of second referendum – on the legacy of that Parliament and how its determination to act against the nation should be judged by its population.
The Conservative Party has ruled Britain for the last 14 years. It has attacked Libya (in 2011), unleashing waves of mass migration, which saw the party then call for integration and diversity as scandals over child sexual abuse (2010-2014) and the public execution of a British soldier (2013) by immigrant populations hit the press.
The Conservatives, as with many other parties of the liberal consensus in the West, strongly supported lockdowns and burdened the nation with record borrowing to fund the destruction of the high street businesses, community groups and the education and development of children and young people. They aggressively promoted the so-called “vaccines,” with conservative commentator Andrew Neil saying it was “time to punish the unvaccinated.”
With its “winner takes all” system of “first past the post,” the party with the most votes in each constituency wins. This means Reform may take millions of votes, but still end up with very few seats.
Elections are not only a matter of who counts the votes. They are also determined by who draws the boundaries – in reality and in the media.
Mass migration breaks the game
Yet it is mass migration – and its profound effects on the politics, policing, and practices established in Britain which is mainly driving support to Farage’s Reform. Why is that the case?
It is a reality which can no longer be ruled out of bounds by the politics and media of the establishment.
Mass migration has increased significantly under the Tories, as the Conservatives are known. So have laws against free speech, including a National Security Act which threatens to criminalize investigative journalism. Nigel Farage was himself “debanked” under measures permitted by Conservative rule. The party of law and order has marked the nation by the absence of both.
READ: Press freedom under threat as UK National Security Act could put journalists in jail
Christians have been prosecuted and cautioned by police for praying, preaching the Gospel, and singing hymns. In May 2024, the Daily Telegraph reported that “Christians are the most despised minority in Britain” as a result.
The U.K. now has the highest tax burden in 70 years, and it is set to rise higher still. Taxes have risen in the U.K. more sharply than in the U.S. or the E.U. in the last five years.
For these reasons the most vociferous opponents of the Conservative Party are now its own former core voters.
This election will be lost by the Conservatives. It may finish them. But a massive Labour victory is not guaranteed, and the chaos created by Labour and the Tories in Britain is driving people towards populism to secure a meaningful change – from the politics of national suicide.
A guide for Christian voters
The U.K.’s Christian Institute has produced a guide to all the parties’ policies, showing where each faction stands on issues of concern to the near 60 percent of the population which identifies as Christian, per the most recent census in 2021.
Nigel Farage’s Reform is the only party to oppose the LGBTQI agenda in schools. Reform also supports marriage with a proposed raise in the marred couples’ tax allowance. It wishes to abolish “hate crimes,” including repressive measures on speech, and has pledged to leave the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits most meaningful action against mass migration.
The elephant in the room
The migration issue remains one which dominates ordinary life in Britain, but whose mention has been routinely and deliberately excluded from mainstream debate and media coverage for the decades during which it has taken place.
Nigel Farage has won one referendum – on Britain leaving the E.U. in 2016. Most polls said he would lose that one. One said “Leave” would lose by 10 points.
With the elephant of migration now dominating what little room is left in Britain, Farage may be on course to deliver another profound shock to a system designed to conduct business as usual – regardless of the interests and opinions of its people.
