'Voters feel ignored & betrayed by Scotland's political establishment'

The Herald Scotland

2 days ago

This seems barely believable. I'd always imagined Reform to be a peculiarly English political force feeding mainly on the racial tensions that swirl south of the Border and which have never really been a feature of Scottish society.
What gives in this region which had only lately been annexed in the devolved era by the SNP following generations of largely Labour control? Why are decent, cautious, working-class Scots, traditionally suspicious about end-of-the-pier chancers like Nigel Farage, now shuffling towards the party he leads?
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We've been joined by Thomas Kerr, the most high-profile of recent Scottish Tory defections to Reform. Kerr, formerly head of the Conservative group on Glasgow City Council, is fresh from a lively appearance on BBC Scotland's Debate Night. There, he'd been harangued by representatives of the main parties who've all been quite palpably spooked by these upstarts.
'We're sensing an urgency among voters that something needs to be done to address their real problems and challenges, none of which are currently being addressed by Labour and the SNP,' says Lambie. 'There's growing resentment at the amount of money and time being spent on meeting Net Zero targets which are of only peripheral concern to families here, while NHS waiting lists get longer. They feel ignored by Scotland's political establishment.'
Within minutes we're approached by an elderly lady. An exchange ensues which couldn't have been more telling than if it had been scripted. She's been a lifelong Labour voter but now feels 'betrayed by their attack on the winter fuel payment'. When she learns that Reform have pledged to restore this and to scrap the two-child benefit cap, she says the magic words: 'I'd consider voting for you.'
A second woman stops for a chat. She didn't know much about Reform and had voted SNP at the last election, but she's keen to talk. 'I grew up in the Blackwood estate,' he tells her. 'Oh, my mum grew up there too,' she says. The candidate is keen not to be too vociferous in criticising his political opponents, sensing that such an approach is often counter-productive. 'They've had 18 years,' he says, 'and they haven't improved anything in this community.' She isn't disagreeing and I'm putting her down as a 'maybe'.
In the course of the next two hours not a single person has declared for Labour or the SNP, but several are inclining towards Reform.
'What Labour voters are telling us follows a pattern,' he says. 'There's an overall feeling of betrayal. They're absolutely raging about what they see as an attack on pensioners over the heating allowance.
Kevin McKenna joins Reform UK candidate Ross Lambie canvassing in Larkhall (Image: GordonTerris) 'The way the WASPI women have also been treated is also raised and they've clearly turned against Keir Starmer as a person. They also feel they've been taken for granted and when they find that we've pledged to lift the two-child benefit cap they're taking an interest in us.'
As the afternoon progresses and a few more people stop to chat, I realise I am witnessing in real-time the worst nightmare of the Scottish Tories and the Scottish mainstream Left.
Once, when Labour voters wanted to send a sharp message to their party they might have parked their votes temporarily with the Lib-Dems and maybe the Greens. In places like this, though, many now view these parties along with the SNP and elements in Labour as middle-class elites who can't hide their loathing for communities like these.
For Labour, it's an even worse nightmare. These are their people, generations of whom backed them in the expectation Labour would always fight for their jobs and better services while providing a safety net for them in sickness, unemployment and old age. Labour, in turn, were comfortable in the knowledge that many in places like these could never vote for the Tories.
But what if another party would came along with candidates raised in this community who weren't posh? A party like Reform would be the ethical alternative to voting Tory. Working-class people needn't apologise for choosing them.
I also sense a dawning realisation amongst some of these voters that Scotland's governing party has been hijacked by a cohort who loathe the people who live in places like Larkhall and North Ayrshire and some of Glasgow's edgier neighbourhoods where family, faith and tradition have always maintained social cohesion and community.
Reform candidate Ross Lambie canvassing (Image: Gordon Terris) Lambie rejects my suggestion that Reform's suite of newly-minted policies around social welfare are a bit opportunistic. 'Look, we want to have high birth rates in this country and to support families. It's all about choices. There's a sense that the ruling elite at Holyrood would prefer to prioritise a Net Zero obsession which contributes nothing to the lives of these people.
'What's also pleasing is that our support is not breaking along tribal or sectarian lines. We're receiving indications of approval, if not outright support, from people of all party political traditions who, for different reasons, all feel let down by the parties they've always voted for. They're willing to consider Reform because they sense we're actually listening to them instead of merely pretending.'
When he talks about Net Zero he's on solid ground. Lambie says he's a successful architect who says he doesn't need to do politics. 'Once you strip out all the Net Zero requirements in building regulations it reduces the average price of a house by £30,000,' he says.
'The drive for reaching Net Zero punishes people who are striving to make a good life for themselves amidst rising living costs and wages which haven't caught up with them. Are our birth rates are so low because people don't have the confidence to start families? Is it because they don't feel good about our education system or flexible working patterns that would support making families?'
There's a curious anomaly at work here, though. The falling birth rates present major social problems as baby-boomers approach old age. It's a gap that can be plugged by immigrant labour, but not when Nigel Farage is talking about Anas Sarwar's ethnicity after the Scottish Labour leader's calls for more Pakistani Scots to become involved in politics.
This, after all, was the messaging of white, Catholic Irish immigrants in the post-war era: 'Get educated, get promoted, become influential.' Just what is it about Sarwar's messaging that seemed to have upset Nigel Farage so much?
I sense that both Ross Lambie and Thomas Kerr are exasperated by Farage's comments. After all, Reform are doing a decent job of picking up disaffected Labour votes without making race an issue. I press Lambie on this. Farage's comments seem to covey something ugly.
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'I meet people like you and Thomas,' I tell him, 'and you both seem to be sound. But you must have winced when he starts talking about people's ethnic heritage. A lot of the people you want to level up are minorities who've previously been kept down: Black, Asian, Chinese, Afro-Caribbean, Gypsy, Irish...' Mr Lambie chooses his words carefully, managing to distance himself from his leader's comments without overtly criticising him.
'I absolutely agree with you,' he says. 'Reform's position on this has always been that we believe in merit. People should get promotion and work on merit. It should not matter what age they are, whether a man or a woman, or what ethnicity they are.
'Whereas SNP and Labour, they have gone down this rabbit hole of DEI [Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion] and want to try and socially engineer the make up of companies and governments and councils. We just do not believe in that.
'You judge Reform based on the people in it like me, from a working-class background. My parents are from the council estate just down the road.'
At this point, Thomas Kerr is trying to source a couple of copies of the Daily Record. On today's front page it carries a picture of John Swinney and his personal message to voters: 'Labour can't win this by-election so if you want to beat Reform the only way to stop them is vote SNP.'
It's a clumsy and desperate stunt transmitting fear. Today, in these streets, there's a growing sense of voting Reform to stop the SNP.
Kevin McKenna is a Herald writer and columnist and is Scottish Feature Writer of the Year. This year is his 40th in newspapers. Among his paltry list of professional achievements is that he's never been approached by any political party or lobbying firm to be on their payroll.