Two-time European election winner and seven-time parliamentary loser Nigel Farage is adding a new stat to this Eurosceptic “Numberwang”. Mr Farage is currently developing “The Reform Party”, otherwise known as the third in his long-running anthology series on the swift deaths of single-issue political parties.
To recap, Series 1 saw Farage take on the European establishment as he singlehandedly swayed public opinion in favour of Brexit in 2016. This was done without any intervention from Conservative Eurosceptics, as Mr Farage was buoyed by his boyish charm, family-friendly image and silver-tongued interview style.
In Series 2 Mr Farage swept to election victory in the 2019 European Election, which was famously the only election to be held in that year. He was on top of the world, and he’d never been so relevant. His team could sense that Farage-mania was only just beginning to heat up.
Now, Series 3 will see Farage go to a place that he’s only been twice before: hoping that a single issue will interest people after it’s over. With a new party campaigning in favour of herd immunity, long-time fans of the series have expressed concern that the policy of opposing lockdown restrictions may be unappealing to Farage’s mostly elderly base.
Doris, a previous Farage supporter who hasn’t left her house since 1972 other than to attend lockdown protests, has pondered “Is there some way that grandparents could see their grandchildren, but grandchildren not see their grandparents?”
A spokesperson for Farage, when asked by The Squid to comment on the longevity of the Covid-19 issue, remarked “the way we’d let it spread, you bloody bet it’ll have longevity.”
There has been further speculation that Mr Farage is looking to extend the series long past this chapter, with Series 4 centring in on paving the green belt in the colours of the Union Flag and Series 5 focussing on charging nurses for parking in shillings.
