The razzle-dazzle politics of Britain’s rising Right

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Birmingham: A little showbiz never hurts a political conference – so Dame Andrea Jenkyns knew exactly how to liven up the supporters at a Reform UK gathering in Birmingham a few days ago. Jenkyns strode on stage in a sparkly blue jumpsuit to a thumping pop-rock tune and began singing with her arms flung wide.

Andrea Jenkyns in full song at the Reform UK national conference in Birmingham.

“I’m an insomniac,” she belted out. “I’m an insomniac, staring at the ceiling, waiting for my thoughts to switch off.” The deeper meaning of these lyrics was a mystery – they just happened to be something she wrote when she was in a rock band long ago. Journalists groaned and began thinking about the withering take-downs they would write. “Bizarre,” was the most common adjective. Jenkyns was mercilessly panned.

But the party faithful loved it. Jenkyns, a former Conservative MP who was appointed a dame by Boris Johnson before he lost the prime minister’s job, injected colour and energy into a conference that already seemed euphoric. While she converted to Reform only last November, she now has the base on her side. Smart move.

The conference was a huge success for the Reform leader, Nigel Farage, a lively character who knows how to make politics interesting. He jokes and exaggerates. He misleads, too, but he seems to absorb more energy every time his enemies try to Taser him. His party is ahead in the opinion polls and claims to have 243,000 members. That’s more than the Conservative Party. At this rate, Farage might overtake the Labour Party’s 309,000 members.

Politics is consumed with anger right now, and Farage is certainly harnessing some of the ill-will towards migrants and asylum seekers in the US. Even so, the Reform gathering was overwhelmingly positive. Given the shooting of Charlie Kirk in Utah, it’s a reminder that political movements can have sharp disagreements without fury or violence.

The political theatre of Andrea Jenkyns and Nigel Farage, pictured with Zia Yusuf during the Reform party’s annual conference, will not be enough to win them power.

No wonder he sounds confident. “We will open a department for preparing for government so that when we win, we can hit the ground running,” he told the conference. Not if. When.

I came to Birmingham to see if the euphoria could last – because I’ve seen this kind of enthusiasm before. I remember when Australia’s Labor Party under Bill Shorten thought it would win the 2019 election, and I watched the Liberals under Peter Dutton count their chickens before they lost the 2025 election.

The political theatre from Farage and Jenkyns will not be enough to win them power. Will they really be able to slash spending and fix the deficits, or turn back the boats, or restore traditional values? After shouting about all that’s wrong with Great Britain, they’ll have to have a compelling solution. As Dutton found out in May, complaints are not enough.

It was only a short walk from the convention halls to the bright sun outside – and the magic of the Reform theatre quickly evaporated in the fresh air. I was standing in a concrete forecourt with a brown pond in front of me and a shopping mall in the distance, alongside an empty arena and a Bear Grylls Adventure Centre – which, I later learned, had closed down last October. It all looked rather drab.

The truth was that the Reform convention wasn’t really in Birmingham. The heart of the city was miles away. We were in the countryside outside the city, near the airport, at the National Exhibition Centre. In other words, we were in a political bubble. This dull reality never makes it into news broadcasts about political conventions.

Walking out of the centre were young men in suits with slick hair, looking like they should have been at a Conservative Party lobbying session. There were older men and women, some of the ladies in bright frocks with light blue scarves to match the Reform colours. They made up a very white crowd, with none of the ethnic mix of modern Britain. Far away in real Birmingham, meanwhile, the population is 51 per cent black, Asian and minority ethnic. I wonder who they’ll vote for?

Like Jenkyns, many of the Reform members have shifted their loyalties from the Conservatives. This is boosting Reform, but it also carries risk. Does the party really want to fill its branches with defectors and end up confirming to British voters that Reform is just a new name for the same old crowd who ran the country for 14 years?

The loyalty test for Tories who join Reform will have to be as severe as a Maoist struggle session. The defectors will have to swear allegiance to Farage and repudiate the last four Conservative prime ministers. It will probably be acceptable to praise Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. For Reform, the rest of the Tories are rejects.

It will probably be acceptable for defectors to praise Winston Churchill, pictured, and Margaret Thatcher. For Reform, the rest of the Toris are rejects.

The Conservatives will hold their party conference in Manchester next month, and they will need a very large wind machine on stage to fan away the stench of decay. In the British electoral system, which does not allocate preferences like Australia, victory goes to the candidate with the greatest primary vote. The logical choice for voters who do not like Labour will be to fall behind the leader with the biggest vote share. Right now, that’s Farage.

Later, as I walked through the convention hallways to the closest train station, I saw a different gathering. A man dressed in a warrior costume was carrying a giant plastic axe, so I naturally followed. I discovered hundreds of young people in outlandish outfits for VeXpo, a convention of YouTube video creators celebrating their online avatars.

Whether a convention is about politics or streaming media, it pays to dress up. Some of the VeXpo attendees wore feline costumes, with petite cats’ ears. Others chose different fluffy animals.

They looked like they were having fun. Alas, I had a train to catch. So I left Birmingham with some regret. Perhaps I had chosen the wrong conference.

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