I was thinking lately of Robert Kilroy-Silk. For younger readers, and people who were never students or unemployed, a quick refresher course may be needed.
From 1986 to 2004 Kilroy-Silk was the presenter of a BBC daytime television programme called Kilroy. It had something of a cult following because of its unintentional hilarity. The live audience was carefully ring-mastered by Kilroy-Silk, who wandered around the studio with a microphone asking people what they thought about various ‘ishoos’ of the day. For some of us the main entertainment came from the fact that there was never quite enough room on the audience banquettes and so we watched for those moments when Kilroy-Silk would ask the opinion of an audience member and then inadvertently sit on them.
Kilroy-Silk’s career on the BBC came to an end at the beginning of 2004 when he used a Sunday newspaper column to express views on Arabs, whom he described as including ‘limb amputators’ and ‘women repressors’. The media and political class agreed as one that there was absolutely no excuse or justification for such comments. The BBC took Kilroy off the air and the man himself needed a new berth.
So he joined Ukip and was swiftly elected to the European parliament. His time in Ukip turned out to be short-lived, because he soon told an interviewer that he would like to lead the party – which was where he made his bloomer. Political parties – especially newish ones – tend not to appreciate people saying they would like to lead them. After less than a year Kilroy-Silk announced that he was leaving Ukip and set up a political party of his own called Veritas. Neither he nor his party ever quite succeeded in breaking through.
So why do memories from that halcyon age of daytime entertainment float back into my mind? Largely because of the discomforts afflicting another new party: Reform.
Given our electoral system, it was an astonishing achievement that Reform got five MPs elected at the last election. Since that time the party, led by Nigel Farage, has made more than its fair share of political weather. With the Conservatives under new leadership, Reform has had a fine opportunity to outflank the traditional party of the right.
For it is hard to imagine how a party of Reform’s size can exist with two-fifths of its parliamentary members believing they should lead the party – although that is almost certainly lower than the percentage of the parliamentary Conservative party who believe they should lead their party.
It is safe to say that Lowe is not among those who regard diversity as being our greatest strength
In any case, as many readers will know, Lowe and Farage are no longer friends. Indeed Reform has referred Lowe to the police on allegations of ‘threats of physical violence’ which Lowe vehemently denies. Some will put all this down to the usual teething problems of any new party; others to what some on the right believe is Farage’s inability to deal with rivals. Or as Dolly Parton once said when asked about her small shoe size: ‘Nothing grows in the shade.’
Early on there was talk of Elon Musk donating a large sum of money to it. Then Farage suggested in an interview that he was not in favour of mass deportations of illegal migrants. Musk said on X that Farage did not have what it takes to be leader of Reform and that Rupert Lowe should be the party’s leader. And that is where one felt a Kilroy-Silkian sense of foreboding.
These fallouts to the right of the Conservative party tend to be too labyrinthine to follow, though even a casual observer might note that there is a fair amount of road-kill within Reform, as there was in Ukip. But for once there does seem to be a dispute that is bigger than personalities. That question surrounds the issue of deportations.
In recent weeks Lowe has stepped up his rhetoric online and in parliament against what he sees as the failings of multiculturalism. It is safe to say that Lowe is not among those who regard diversity as being our greatest strength. But while he was ramping up his musings on this matter, Farage appears to have gone in the opposite direction. In a number of recent interviews – including with Steven Edginton on GB News – Farage has been asked what he would do about the million or so illegal immigrants who currently reside in the UK.
That number has remained strangely static for years and is almost certainly an underestimate. After all, boatloads of illegal migrants arrive on these shores every day and are almost never deported. Which is one reason why the government has to splurge hundreds of millions of pounds on accommodating and otherwise looking after people who should not be here.
And that is where the real rift on the right is taking place. Because in what is presumably a leap for the centre-ground, Farage has kept insisting that there is no way to deport the people who are here illegally. At the same time, Lowe and others insist that if people should not be here then they should be removed, however large their number.
Farage may be right that the British state currently has no ability to deport hundreds of thousands of people. But there does not seem to be much point in a party to the right of the Conservatives which simply observes Tory failures while proposing no radical means to redress them.
Donald Trump’s electoral success in America came substantially from his promise to deport illegals. He has installed a team of border enforcement agents who are performing this task – beginning with removing violent criminals.
The world is shifting fast, and if you do believe illegal migration is one of the principal threats to your country, then squishing onto the sofa and just watching seems a very 1990s option.
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