Reform aren't a proper political party - why are we pretending they are?

[Slightyamusedandsilly]

Farage isn't a real political leader. He's a hype 'em up, sound bite merchant. When he was an MEP he rarely bothered to attend. He just wants the kudos without any desire or ability to do the actual work.

The councils run by them are chaos, having increased council tax massively despite promises to the contrary.

Reform is just the next iteration of the National Front, BNP, English Defence League. Farage is no better than Nick Griffin.

Cause people are sick of the immigrants innit and they want their country back! Until all the immigrants are gone and then they will realise their lives are no better, actually worse because our NHS will be gone. But it will be too late by then. We are fucked.

Yeah, you should probably read about what they are actually proposing before extrapolating from the equality act headline like you have.

It certainly doesn't seem fair or balanced that Reform get way more media airtime than the Lib Dems or Greens. They should be given at least as much exposure as Reform.

There was an excellent response to why Nigel is always on BBC Question Time that I read recently.

Apparently QT researchers will ask around the political parties to see who’s up for QT on which dates. NF responds immediately. He is extremely charming to every BBC employee so the bookers etc love him. The Greens have a habit of getting back to the BBC about 20 mins before the show is due to start, so are always overlooked out of necessity.

He should never have been given a platform, repeatedly approached for comment etc - his promotion has been the media's doing over a number of years. He was given a platform based on being a reliable source of click-bait controversial statements, rather than any merit.

It's been noticeably bizarre how the BBC increasingly started to include him again during the last 5 years or so, and in the same timeframe he's neatly distanced himself from the wreckage left by Brexit and managed to reframe it as being a symptom of excess immigration.

They don't have anything constructive or properly thought-out and costed to add, which has been so clearly demonstrated when they've achieved Council seats.

This is exactly the problem. Reform voters call it a "crystal ball", while everybody else calls it "learning from history".

It's not even like it's distant history. All of Reform's policies are essentially identical to Trump's, and they're failing in real-time. It's not guesswork.

Add to that all of the complete failures of every council that Reform has taken control of, with the constant revolving door of Reform councillors quitting/being fired, financial irregularities and incompetence, and massive policy reversals, and...how, exactly, is it "worth a try"?

The current Labour crop are pretty shit, I'll grant you, but at least we're not looking at the societal and economic collapse that is guaranteed with a Reform government (not to mention the dismantling of fundamental institutions that we wouldn't get back within our lifetimes).

The trouble with Trump- and Reform-style politics is that it needs a constant supply of victims to blame. We saw this with the Tories following Brexit - they had to increase the flow of immigrants, despite the fact that it was exactly what they campaigned against, because otherwise they'd have to start hitting the demographics that formed their support base. By definition, they can't solve any of the problems they're blaming all the other parties for, because then they'll have to look for other targets with an increasing blast radius of unintended consequences.

Just look at the US. Women's reproductive rights have already gone out of the window, and now they're sacrificing the voting rights of 50% of women (ie the ones without passports) with the Voter ID scheme. All because they need to maintain the blame on an ever-decreasing number of people for the ills in the country. These are things which can't easily be undone by the next administration; it's far easier to tear things down than it is to build them again.

But hey...worth a try, right? I'm sure they won't come after us...

Something needs to be done about the state of the NHS. Or maybe we should call it the International Health service since it seems to be a free-for-all for the rest of the world.
They can make a start by binning all the chest feeding, men's cervix, womens penis nonsense, suspending dedicated health professionals for calling men "sir". Non British tourists need to pay up front for treatment, other countries seem to fare quite well so why cant we?

The thing is, does he REALLY want to be in power? When he had a voice as an MEP he never turned up. Doesn't that really say it's just the position he's after? Although, I'm aware I've just described Boris.

The length of a UK Parliament is 5 years. I am concerned that you do not know this.

So everything that goes horribly wrong is easily reversible?

What, just like the Brexit shit show?

If the NHS is sold off it's gone for good.

Despite the damage they could cause, that may affect you directly in 4 years?

Neither is Polanski. I’m hoping people see through this at the ballot box.

They're enough of a political party for people to vote for them. Lots of people.

Exactly. How you define a "proper" party is neither here nor there.

Does that not mean that it could be tinkered with at will in the future? I don't like th idea of one government having complete control over something like that.

Until you can't get rid of the leader.

Nice evidence free rant there. Well done

I’d hope not. Do you see US presidents tinkering with their Constitution? They lock it away and forget about it. But you might be right. I do think it would take the wind out of Reforms sails though and I do trust Keir to do the right thing. I certainly don’t trust NF.

Keir Starmer is so so boring. A change would be good.

This, right here, is the problem.

Politics isn't supposed to be entertainment.

The belief that politicians should be entertaining is the exact reason we've had the last 10 years of stagnation.

My local council is now Reform, council tax has not gone up, pot holes are being fixed, the bypass that's sat part built for the last 20 odd years has started construction again, we now have plans for a much needed second GP surgery and most people seem quite happy

For a "not a political party" they sure are taking up a lot of your collective headspace 🤣🤣

The recent one certainly tried though didn't he. He doesn't want to leave.

It’s not really the problem. His manner isn’t behind the job figures their policies are.

Re op why so much focus on here, a GE is a while away.

I was talking about the poster's expectation that the PM should somehow entertaining. That's the reason we've had the shitshow for the last 10 years - people voting for "entertaining" politicians.

He does t claim that at all, for the simple reason it’s not true. The ECHR doesn’t stop action to remove people who shouldn’t be here. Look how many times it’s caused a problem so far. Look how many people have been removed from the country by Labour already. If that’s a metric that matters to you.

Edit: I removed ‘legal’ from the first sentence because it would immediately be used to say the ECHR doesn’t stop it. It doesn’t lots of laws and treaties do.