You’ve seldom seen Nigel Farage look quite so happy. Beatific bordering on ecstasy. And all because he had been cancelled. Something he has longed for all his career. Failing to be elected as an MP on seven separate occasions was just proof of the limitations of democracy. Winning the Brexit referendum was almost a disappointment. What was there left for him to do? Other than to sniff around the far right in the US. Hoping for scraps. A sense of identity. But on Tuesday all his dreams came true.
Last year’s National Conservatism conference in London had been largely forgettable apart from a few attention-seeking appearances from people most go out of their way to avoid. And even these were no more than period pieces, designed merely to preach to the couple of hundred of the already converted. An exercise in futility. No more, no less.
A year later, this rather sad bandwagon had moved on to Brussels. Many of the same speakers due to reprise their less than stellar turns. Apart from Douglas Murray, who had found better things to do. Presumably this gig is now way too small for Dougie’s ego these days. It’s warmup act for Jordan Peterson or nothing. But in his place, the organisers had managed to recruit Viktor Orbán and Éric Zemmour. Who could resist such a delightful pair?
This had been the chronicle of a slow death foretold. Even before the conference had begun, it was already on to its third venue. The first two had decided the damage to their reputation was too big a risk to take. Much like Rwanda Air declining to transport the UK’s unwanted asylum seekers.
But at the 11th hour, another location had been found and the conference got under way. Largely slipping under everyone’s radar. No UK news channel was broadcasting a live feed. Nor was there even a YouTube feed. I guess the only people who were interested were the couple of hundred people who had paid through the nose for an opportunity to get within touching distance of this niche lineup.
It was late morning when Nige stepped up to give his keynote speech. What had happened in the previous couple of hours was anyone’s guess. Almost certainly a few members of the elite moaning about how the elite were taking over the world and squeezing them out. Have they no idea of how stupid they sound? Or does irony escape them? The only people squeezing them out are themselves. Their voices do regularly get heard. Just no one is very interested.
Nige sounded almost comatose at first. Then who could blame him, for this was a speech he had given literally hundreds of time before? No notes, obviously. That might suggest some work had gone into it. Money for old rope. Kerching. The bank transfer had just gone through. There’s clearly a market for this kind of thing. Radio Absolute Politics Gold. Never knowingly playing you something you’ve never heard before.
On and on he went. Brussels was the centre of the globalist alliance. Yawn. Spitfires over the Channel. Theme music for The Great Escape. The EU was no longer a project of peace. It was a project of power. Full of humourless German socialists. Yet more yawns.
The only vaguely new line was Nige declaring that the EU was responsible for the drone attacks that had been launched against Israel the previous weekend. That will be news to Iran. No one thought to applaud. His audience was just as soporific as he was.
Then it all changed. Word got through that three police officers were standing outside the entrance to the venue, refusing to admit anyone. Local mayor Emir Kir had decided he could do without a bunch of superannuated rightwingers taking root in his city for a couple of days. Nige couldn’t have been happier.
“They’re shutting us down,” he declared, excitedly. “This is cancel culture.” Free the Nige One. Free the NatCons 186. For the first time in ages, Nige felt relevant again. He was important. People were listening to him. He had a purpose that extended further than trying to make the Conservative party even more unelectable than it already was.
The conference was finally on the map. It had become news. People were suddenly listening after all. Obviously not to any of the speakers. No one cared what Suella Braverman or Miriam Cates were planning to say. Because they were only ever going to say what they always say. Yawn.
But they would listen to Nige, who had moved himself out to the foyer to stick his face in front of every available news camera. This was D-day and Dunkirk all rolled into one. For about 20 minutes or so. Then Nige sloped off in his car and the conference could glide back to obscurity.
Not that there wasn’t enough rightwing chaos going on back home in the UK. Most of it supplied by Liz Truss. Two years ago, Liz was obviously mad but displayed fewer outside signs. Now she laughs hysterically and inappropriately and also seems to have no idea of what has actually happened to her. Bizarrely, her humiliation has only increased her self-confidence. Her denial and detachment from reality is almost complete. It’s as though she has no idea she is the star of her own version of The Truman Show. Only this one is a comedy gameshow. Though with the joke on us.
Liz started the day by giving yet another exclusive TV interview. Like Nige, she only knows she’s alive when she’s in front of a camera. Though that’s also the only time we can be sure she’s brain dead. This time she was speaking to TalkTV’s 18 viewers.
And out came all the old nonsense. She was just a genius way ahead of her time. People should have been happy to pay more for their mortgages for the privilege of having her. The problem with the UK was unelected elites. Said the unelected elite. Oxford must be thrilled to have had her as a student. The dimmest of the dim. Which perversely makes her an anti-elite elite, I suppose.
But Liz was not yet done as she made a rare Commons appearance for the smoking debate. The health secretary, Victoria Atkins, opened proceedings but rather left it to Labour’s Wes Streeting to make the case that preventing people from dying unnecessarily was a good idea. Partly because she all but admitted that the Tories were going to lose the election anyway so it was up to Labour to see this through. But also because her delivery is so annoying and lacklustre that even her supporters end up disagreeing with her.
Then up stepped the Trusster. She felt it was profoundly unconservative to try to stop people killing themselves. Given the choice, she would legalise fentanyl. No more nanny state. Live and let die. Too many unelected doctors allowing their expertise to go to their head. Next time Liz needs an angioplasty, perhaps she could get a five-year-old to have a go. Please. Please. Someone make this stop.
