In the battle for Britain, Nigel Farage's Reform party is set to become a major political force in Scotland and Wales

Polls suggest that in local elections on Thursday, Reform will collect 20% of the vote in Scotland – up from 0.2% in the last election in 2021. In Wales, the party will collect 30%, up from around 1%, Reuters writes.

The Reform Party is poised to become a major opposition force in Scotland and Wales with parliamentary elections taking place in those two countries on Thursday, alongside local council elections in England.

Reform is riding high in national polls with a strong lead over the ruling Labor Party and the opposition Conservatives ahead of a general election due in 2029.

The party, whose post-Brexit rise was largely driven by support in England, is now gaining ground in Scotland and Wales, reflecting a rejection of the UK's traditional two-party system, Reuters writes.

Following Thursday's vote, Reform is likely to become the official opposition in Scotland and Wales to local parties, the Scottish National Party (SNP) and Plaid Cymru, polls show.

Analysis suggests Reform will garner 20% of the vote in Scotland – up from 0.2% at the last election in 2021. In Wales, the party will garner 30%, up from around 1%.

During this time, the Labor Party will lose votes and the Conservatives will be left with only a few seats.

The attractive message of Reform

Scotland and Wales, historically oriented to the political left, have become fertile ground for the Reform party's message, which urges voters to replace the current political system, sweep out elites and crack down on migration.

Labour's spokespeople for Scotland and Wales said Reform would divide communities and drag politics “into the mud”, adding that Labor was focused on delivering fair change.

Critics of the Reform party say the fledgling party, founded as the Brexit Party in 2018 before changing its name in 2021, is completely unprepared to govern regionally, let alone nationally.

Questions about training are also pervasive within the party. Six Reform sources, Reuters writes, said that instead of leading the Scottish and Welsh parliaments, the party would be better off taking a secondary seat, to get used to the functioning of the administrations and assemblies, before the national elections.

Nazi salutes, racist comments

Among Reform's thorniest and most scandalous issues is candidate vetting.

Following setbacks in the last general election in 2024, when more than 100 candidates were kicked out, some over racist comments, the party has tightened its procedures, adding checks by credit data agency Experian to those carried out by its central office, Reform officials said.

Llyr Powell, the Reform candidate for the so-called Blaenau Gwent Caerffili Rhymni super-constituency in south Wales, told Reuters his vetting process included a quiz conducted by British tabloid talk show host Jeremy Kyle in mock media interviews.

However, the problem remains a major one.

Since March, when the party announced its list of more than 160 candidates in Scotland and Wales, 15 have withdrawn following the re-emergence of racist or offensive material online, disputes with the party or administrative errors.

In one case in Wales, a candidate resigned after footage emerged of him giving the Nazi salute. In Scotland, another resigned after publicly describing the country's first Muslim leader as “un-British” and an “Islamist idiot”.

The anti-Reform vote

Powell admitted there had been “bumps along the way” but said Reform included people with “real life experience” rather than career politicians with a polished image.

On the other hand, the local nationalist parties, the SNP and Plaid, hope that Reform will help their cause.

Delyth Jewell, Plaid vice-chairman, said she had lost the number of voters in her constituency, Blaenau Gwent Caerffili Rhymni, who said they would vote for her party to keep Reform at bay.

“They have been outraged by the virulence and nasty rhetoric that the Reform party has brought to our streets and they want to do everything they can to oppose it,” she told Reuters.

Disillusionment

Chris Hopkins, director of political research at polling firm Savanta, said British politics was witnessing a breakdown of traditional left-right polarized voting patterns following the 2016 Brexit vote.

“For UK voters at the moment the problem is that the system doesn't work. Can someone change it? And they're much more willing to take their chances with an unknown,” he explained to Reuters.

Reform officials said the party was attracting former Labor and Conservative voters in Scotland and Wales, as well as people who hadn't voted in years, with policies such as income tax cuts and promises to tackle local issues such as road building.