Rome wasn't built in a day. Reform is growing, and they will have to learn on the job if they are elected.
I can't imagine a more useless set of politicians than currently occupy government, so the bar is low.
You'd be surprised.
I detest a great deal that comes out of Reform (surprised?). Tice's letters to the energy companies makes me want to stab him. In the bladder. Longest most painful death apparently.
Effective migration control (a policy you may have mentioned is close to your heart) may be one consolation; but you wonder so many successive governments pay lip service to aggressive policies.
The last lot had their tinpot scheme of Rwanda, the current lot keep it constantly in the news and boast about "improvements" over the last year etc. But it's largely face.
I know
why. The old all vote and their top 2 issues are migration and health. Feed the NHS and stop the boats and you stay in power.
But why lip service? Why not just do it?
I hear a lot about difficult international logistics. But that is about the
illegal migrants. You get no issue with me on that. There has to be control. But they are a pin prick compared to the
legal migration over which we do have control.
Could it be resources? Why not? All public services are resource-starved. We have our own pet, former Border Control Officer on here who can confirm the coal face issues facing his profession.
But given its political importance, resources would be found if they genuinely wanted to do it. But they don't.
Could it be demographics? And I refer not to the illegals (migration policy window dressing) but the legal migrants from largely India, Poland, Pakistan, Romania, and Ireland of which India and Romania (??) present the largest groups. And for the purposes of this post I am also excluding those who come for "family" reasons (I suspect the majority from Pakistan).
Our birth rate is in the toilet, people are retiring and living forever, often with need for care and treatment for complex medical issues. Our working population is increasingly unreliable with poor motivation and productivity and falling in number. Lord help us if there really was a war. Have there been quiet words in the corridors of power that this nation would collapse if we actually cut the flow of young, hungry, healthy, enterprising migrants?
I know there is a post on immigration but that appeared a little gammon for my taste. So I will say one more thing on this. Migration - Emigration = number student visas. They are also keeping our world famed tertiary education industry alive.
Small wonder the lip service? Meanwhile, and finally back on topic, will Reform be the party that decides to cut through the economics to keep Britain for the British or whatever? It may work. It could be an economic miracle. But populist policies that cut through fiscal sense rarely do. Instead, what will be the cost such as those who, ironically, lose their job as their employer closes due to an enforced skills gap?
I have mentioned this before and I think it was Stirling who (like you?) assert that our economic prosperity is trumped by preserving our cultural identity. I am sure that many who are on a good pension will say the same. Less so, perhaps, those who are hungry and looking for work as the economy nose-dives and public services collapse from a diminishing tax revenue.
However, I suspect this will largely be academic. You refer to a party learning as it goes. If a party that has held office many times cannot cope after 14 years in opposition, what chance a new party learning on the job?
Also, the greatest threat to Reform is and always has been Reform. A party with a single charismatic leader backed by a disparate group of limited competence, constantly hacking chunks out of each other... We have seen how it behaves while a small protest party. It seems almost certain to violently and unpleasantly implode once any handed real power.
England
Ireland
