One imagining he would be still bathing a female colleague if she was his daughter, another talking about decapitating King Charles…
And, of course, monstrous racism – concentration camps, parasites, bury pork chops to stop a mosque being built – prompts increasingly serious questions about why Reform attracts so many disturbed nasty nutters and now whether Nigel Farage’s company will survive.
Perhaps it’s no surprise this Hard Right, increasingly Far Right, unhinged group appeals to vastly disproportionate numbers of the “fruitcakes and loonies and closet racists” as David Cameron correctly identified forerunner Ukip when Tory defector Robert Jenrick glibly toyed with shooting unarmed civilians.
The racists are out of the closet after ITV’s explosive public interest undercover expose and watching and listening to the vile brigade it’s impossible not to wonder whether Reform’s unsavoury army of weirdos look down and scapegoat other people to feel better about themselves.
I too have heard Westminster talk of looming fresh scandals that may befall Reform including predatory sexual behaviour (plus drugs) in the Mayfair club heartland of a leadership enjoying a jet-set life as far as it’s possible to get from the pubs of Sunderland, Hull, West Midlands and Welsh valleys.
Moneybags Farage, tainted by an inquiry into a £5million secret personal bung from a Reform donor, is devoured by the savage beast he birthed with the poisonous party slipping in the polls – behind both Kemi Badenoch’s Conservatives as well as Andy Burnham’s leading Labour in the latest – as his Downing Street dream rapidly fades.
Echoing demented Rupert Lowe’s deportation-happy Restore as a 1970s National Front tribute band repels curious voters once prepared to give Reform the benefit of the doubt.
That’s not to be complacent. Politics is hugely unpredictable. Evil triumphs when good men and women do nothing. But the more people see of Reform, the less they are liking Reform.
Farage’s “bad apple” defence doesn’t wash, Labour free school meals girl Bridget Phillipson reminding us bad apples don’t fall far from the tree. Maybe the serial quitter will pack in politics again, resigning to spend more time with other people’s money. Farage could conceivably find a backdoor to No10 via a Tory pact but Reform is wilting under public scrutiny. The party isn’t quite over but many folk are collecting their coats and leaving early.
