Why on earth are Farage and Reform so popular ?

[Nonamenoblame]

Their ideology is essentially heated up Thatcherism, more deregulation (if that’s possible) and laissez faire light touch for businesses, more cuts to public services because they love an even smaller state, cuts to benefits apart from those for pensioners, no real solution to the immigration issue apart from sinking the small boats.
So why isn’t Farage being challenged ? Everywhere you read that Farage is the next PM in waiting but his policies are a rerun of the last 14 years but worse, they haven’t worked so far, why would they work with a Reform government ? What’s an even worse thought is a Tory/Reform coalition, are we as country daft enough to fall for it ?
And how long would we give a Reform government to turn things around ? 6 months, a year ?

Do you know what you’re talking about? Truss wanted the opposite. Tax less for growth. She was actually right. It was a bit of a fix to get her out as the really rich can’t have people figuring that out. The only way to keep people in their place and stop them moving up is to tax, tax, tax so growth dies. I bring you Labour. Tax is used to keep everyone down.. it’s impossible really to do well now through earnings. The tax system is designed to keep all the peasants below 100k. Labour enabled those, Truss tried to stop it. Now people are seeing that Tories and Labour are cheeks of the same arse…

Makes you wonder who's really funding them and what the game is, eh...

. I mean at least Labour are trying to do something.

By pledging to 'smash the gangs'? Their failure will lead to Reform votes

Many voted to leave the EU because of the high levels of legal immigration and - thanks to Merkel - illegal immigration entering the EU with borders thrown open all the way to France. Brexit was the closest to a referendum on immigration that the people were offered. The people cannot be blamed for their wishes being ignored. That is why they are now looking to Reform.

Aren’t they deporting foreign criminals. More than the previous lot did.
I think we all know that the whole issue is more complicated than just stopping immigration. And I think you’re forgetting that Reform needs decent workable policies. Not just sound bites. If Farage is challenged appropriately by journos and actual experts, people will realise he was just the emperor with no clothes.
What’s ironic is that Farage has consistently painted himself as anti the elites, surely said elites will block him. Let’s see !

@Nonamenoblame those headlines are costing a fortune and will only work on those who vote Labour anyway, which I'm guessing you do

It won't work for people who are fed up and going for Reform. Each time numbers go up so does support for the latter

I think it will be interesting to see the outcome of Germany's election next week.

The point is we can raise taxes or we can cut them, it doesn't really make any difference to a broken economy.

Truss might have had the right idea but you can't just issue tax cuts without funding it from somewhere else. It was uncosted.

From what I've read the Germans may well vote for the Afd party.

It would serve the EU right. They've caused this mess with their open borders.

Yes I think so

A fish rots from the head as does UK politics and public services. The snouts have been in the trough for decades now. Mediocre people making large sums of money from Westminster to our local councils. The European gravy train probably dried up somewhat after Brexit.

We don't have a body/agency remote enough to investigate and root out the worst of them those that run us are happy with the status quo n.

It seems pointless to vote these days.

Brexit is and never was a workable policy. It did not stop people voting for it.

I agree Labour are trying to do something, more than the Tories ever did. However, if they are ineffective or even thought to not do enough, people may vote Reform in protest.

Also, compared with most politicians, Nigel Farage comes across in a way many seem sympathetic to, regardless of how objectionable his views are to me and many other people. This government got a majority with only 33% of those who voted, and many Tories seemed to have not voted.

The eu was sold as a trading block.

No one voted for deeper social and political alignment.

The only thing that would have worked on 'doing something' was a deterrent

Starmer scrapped that on the first day so if he sees Reform go up when he's in power it's his own doing

All the headlines that they try to get won't work against the reality of rising numbers

Except the pressure on the infrastructure doesn’t come from young healthy immigrants, it comes from millions of aging pensioners who are sucking up the resources of the NHS and living in big houses they bought cheaply in the 60’s and 70’s. While the young live with parents until their mid thirties and struggle with student loans and jobs which don’t pay enough because greedy corporations demand more profits and the wealthy demand more tax cuts or they’ll move abroad where, ironically, they are likely to be taxed more.

It’s both. However, it’s not the boats. In tech especially, we are attempting to solve our brain drain by allowing lots of immigration on graduate visas. The problem is two fold. One, these graduates aren’t up to the job so the posts go out for global hire. Two, these graduates bring their families over at net cost to the state. Both are the problem.

Also a lot of the immigrants get older and have health problems themselves not to mention them somehow managing to bring over their elderly parents who haven't paid anything into the system

We knew a lovely plumber Spanish had done all his tickets here. His i wife had become the manager of a beautiful four star hotel on the river. Both returned home following Brexit where I bet they were appreciated.

It might be a little bit both but it’s overwhelmingly the demographic issue rather than a couple of hundred thousand young, healthy immigrants a year. As for them aging, it is a factor but again not so much a factor as all those baby boomers in big houses with complex medical issues.

My mother is nearly 80 and still working(bless her),small flat but she still consumes her own body weight in pills everyday. My father in law, health visitor everyday, multiple care visits everyday, dementia. Five bedroom house, massive garden and an income that would allow him to live in luxury sheltered accommodation. Miserable and lonely and won’t consider it.

We need a different attitude to elder care. We need a different attitude to working in care for the elderly because if we are going to treat carers like crap then we are going to need immigrants who are poor and desperate to do that vital work.

If we have a brain drain then you need to ask yourself why? Could it be that elderly vote and therefore attract political attention and the young say, I’m getting no political consideration here so I’ll go where the moneys good and I don’t have to worry about the crap that’s happening here. he

The brain drain is happening because the young are disenfranchised. The generation that had it all - took the ladder up behind them. The young are leaving for nations that value their skills.

The care sector is actively being damaged right now by the NI rises so Labour are actively being making that situation a whole lot worse.

"Care" sends a negative signal to the ageing people who need help. Nobody wants to be the old cabbage (which is how the care sector treats the demented and needy). Old, institutionalised and treated like infants being weaned on soft foods. Thank you, but no; if I think I face that, I will take extreme measures to end my life fast.

Does it matter what anyone votes ? Labour or Con we want the best for the country.
Reform, not so much.
Like I say, Reform’s policies are poorly thought out, even the ones to tackle immigration. In fact I’ve not even seen them. Do you know what they are ?
I worry that what is needed, massive investment in the North and Midlands, more decent paying jobs, restoration of HS2, etc, that will not happen under Farage.

@Nonamenoblame I don't really engage with their policies as I didn't vote for them but I do think Labour have set themselves up to fail on this

I just heard R4 news leading with high numbers and it's winter, summer will be higher

It was Starmer's absolute belief that smash the gangs would work, and it's still his line. How can it work?

It might take him out, that's how badly judged it is

I would prefer border control that doesn't come with lots of other stuff but it looks like people buried their heads in the sand until Reform offered to listen

@Nonamenoblame I'm a tart voter, because I have no party loyalty. Over 50 years, since I was 18, I have voted for most parties depending on what I thought was most important at the time. My main comment on high level policy is that the most important vote was the one NOT held in 1992 when the EEC was transformed into the EU. The UK was not granted a referendum then; if it had been, I think there would have been a much better broader cross party Europe wide discussion about what everyone wanted Europe to become. Europe has paid dividends for Spain and Portugal, that now have splendid fast road networks. But the UK - because it was the second largest economy and the second largest contributor - paid in a lot and didn't get much big shiny stuff to show off in return. It is only now that little operators see how the wheels of trade are gummed up and slowed down that 50 years of smooth trade seem valuable.

Brexit hasn't been an issue for us, except it takes longer to ship kit we buy in Europe. In fact there has been a bit of a bounce, because all our clients want local suppliers. TBH, it's at best a few percentage points either way.