Is Farage’s win a new dawn? We could ask Labour, but they’re still fast asleep | Marina Hyde
The local elections results tell us one clear thing: the ‘two main parties’ offer a change that actually changes nothing – and voters know itIt’s been a funny old decade. Just over 10 years ago, the comedian Russell Brand was lionised in some quarters for appearing on a Question Time panel with Nigel Farage, and producing what was widely, if bafflingly, interpreted as a brilliant zinger about the then Ukip leader. “He is a pound-shop Enoch Powell,” honked Brand, “and we gotta watch him.” Well now. Perhaps it takes someone who needs to be watched to know someone who needs to be watched. Mr Brand returned to the UK this week from the Florida base of his conspiracist Christian media outlet, appearing in court today on rape and sexual assault charges. He denies them.Anyway: the local elections, where the big thing that people said could never happen seems to be happening. Farage now leads Reform UK, which even last year used to be bundled in the “other” category by political pollsters – now its standalone poll results frequently top the charts, with the eponymous two parties of The Two-Party System doing not a whole lot better than simply wailing that it isn’t supposed to be this way. In terms of last night’s byelection, Reform has taken Runcorn and Helsby, one of Labour’s safest seats in the general election you might dimly recall it won by a massive landslide 10 months ago.Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
The local elections results tell us one clear thing: the ‘two main parties’ offer a change that actually changes nothing – and voters know it
It’s been a funny old decade. Just over 10 years ago, the comedian Russell Brand was lionised in some quarters for appearing on a Question Time panel with Nigel Farage, and producing what was widely, if bafflingly, interpreted as a brilliant zinger about the then Ukip leader. “He is a pound-shop Enoch Powell,” honked Brand, “and we gotta watch him.” Well now. Perhaps it takes someone who needs to be watched to know someone who needs to be watched. Mr Brand returned to the UK this week from the Florida base of his conspiracist Christian media outlet, appearing in court today on rape and sexual assault charges. He denies them.
Anyway: the local elections, where the big thing that people said could never happen seems to be happening. Farage now leads Reform UK, which even last year used to be bundled in the “other” category by political pollsters – now its standalone poll results frequently top the charts, with the eponymous two parties of The Two-Party System doing not a whole lot better than simply wailing that it isn’t supposed to be this way. In terms of last night’s byelection, Reform has taken Runcorn and Helsby, one of Labour’s safest seats in the general election you might dimly recall it won by a massive landslide 10 months ago.
Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
