Malcolm Offord: another SNP-Green coalition would be terrifying (pic: DB Media Services)
The Reform UK Scotland leader says attitudes towards wealth need to change, writes TERRY MURDEN
He may once have worn the ermine appropriate for the second chamber but today Baron Offord of Garvel, as he is still officially titled, is attired in more casualwear. Skinny jeans, black slip-on shoes and a gilet tucked inside a blue jacket. He’s in the final laps of an exhausting election campaign and comfort is king. In any case, all that lord of the realm stuff is part of a past life.
“Yes, I am a baron. It’s something that I cannot give back,” says the leader of Reform UK Scotland, “but plain Malcolm Offord will do.” He’s also no longer a peer, having resigned his seat in the House of Lords to stand for election. Now he’s playing the role of businessman-turned-politician, and is trying to change the negative attitude that persists towards those who have been successful and made money.
Needless to say, his status and his background seem to be recurring themes in the media and among those who see him as a legitimate target as not really a man of the people. They niggle him, but he shrugs his shoulders and smiles. “It largely comes from the left, they just don’t get people who get on and create something,” he says.
On that, he says his own target is “to stop Scotland becoming a communist country”. It’s no surprise that he has in mind the potential for an SNP-Green coalition over the next five years.
“If you thought the current government was anti-business you ain’t seen nothing yet,” he says, with the solemnity of a priest delivering the last rites.
He lists the freebie promises, particularly from the Greens, but also the SNP who he accuses of only just coming round to talking up the importance of the economy. It is one of a number of themes on which he says Reform has led the debate.
“We have changed the narrative by talking about the things that matter. We have done all the creative thinking,” he declares.
It is also fair to say that Offord has led the headlines on a number of occasions, and not always to his benefit. The now infamous declaration about having six homes, five cars and six boats again made him a target of the left, but also those who thought that, despite his claims not to be boasting, it came across as just that.
To his credit, he said he had paid £45 million in tax, but also that he’d created “hundreds of thousands” of jobs, which he now says was a slip of the tongue. He shows me a copy of his original notes which refers only to “thousands” of jobs. His spreadsheet shows 23,471 jobs in his portfolio growing to 47,458 over ten years. He will not divulge the names of the companies.
His intention was to make the point that others could see his rags-to-riches story as an example to follow and that wealth and success can be achieved by anyone who works hard, rather than relying on the state. Beyond that, he wants the country to embrace wealth, rather than sneer at it.
The latest attack came after he promised to donate his MSP salary to charity. Even this was not enough to satisfy his critics who pointed out that the money would go to his own charitable foundation.
“Can you believe I am being criticised for donating to charity? We have to stop this nonsense. This has been running for 20 years, mainly helping young Scots,” he says. He goes further and says he will donate his salary “gross”, and for the full five-year term.
Asked how much he’s worth, he laughs. “I’ve told you how much tax I have paid. I’m not saying any more.”
His focus on wealth is not meant to divide him from those who are struggling, but to impress on his opponents that without someone creating it, everything else just won’t happen.
He wouldn’t scrap all the freebies, but he would insist they are manageable. Free university tuition would remain, but he would divert young people into other forms of training. “If we had fewer undergraduates it would not be such a cost to the state, and many youngsters are better off learning a trade than spending time doing degrees that don’t provide a job.”
He says he’s been the only candidate highlighting the economy while others focus on giveaway gimmicks and promises that he doubts they can keep. He points to the struggles among small businesses which say are not getting the help they need.
“How can you have a prosperous Scotland if SMEs are closing down?” he says. “Getting the Greens involved in running the country? I am terrified.
“The business community is pleading for someone to stand up and say ‘enough is enough’ and that is what Reform is doing. Every SME I have spoken to says they will be voting Reform.”
His desire to cut income taxes, reduce the number of bands and pay for it by slashing the number of quangos has been questioned by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, which described his numbers as “not credible”.
He replies: “The IFS is not independent. They are left wing economists.” Far from revising his numbers, he says he has “doubled down” on the policy. “We have an emergency. We need to do this ASAP,” he says.
He declares that Scotland has all the ingredients to be a wealthy and successful country, with world-leading skills across a number of sectors, including financial services, defence, life sciences, the creative industries and agri-tech.
“Those are all high value, high margin sectors employing talented, highly-salaried people, but we are squeezing them with high taxes and potentially driving them away.”
While Scotland relies on state intervention to support the economy, through organisations like the development agencies, he says America is “full of wealthy people who support the start-ups.
“If we create an ecosystem of wealthy people they would invest in companies. This socialist idea that the state pays for everything, I just don’t get it. Look around Glasgow and Edinburgh and the grand buildings… it was the merchants that built the cities and they paid back a hundred times.”
Understandably, he won’t concede that the outcome of the election will mean another SNP government, but he seems to accept that becoming Leader of the Opposition could be a victory of sorts, given the party’s rise from nowhere in just a couple of years. He would offer a robust opponent to John Swinney, accusing him of not really believing in independence.
“John Swinney knows it is a performative lie. He doesn’t actually want independence. If he did he would have got Scotland in a better position. The deficit would not be acceptable to the EU. He’s just trying to keep the hardcore independence supporters on board, but many of them won’t vote SNP because they know they won’t deliver.”
Offord dispels any suggestion that he would support splitting the UK, stating that in 2021 he wrote seven essays on why Scotland should remain. During the campaign he called for the unionist parties to unite to stop an independence majority.
“I have said many times that there is no need for a referendum,” though he leaves the door open by adding: “… any time soon”.
His immediate demands include stripping down the 132 quangos, saying they are inefficient and duplicate work being done by civil servants. He brushes off the nine resignations among his candidates as being a result of putting a list together “very quickly”. He notes that the SNP and Labour have also had a few casualties.
Reform is still cast as a divisive party, and that its latest plan for detention centres for illegal immigrants has kept the issue a live one. He insists that rather than being divisive, Reform stands for unity and cohesive communities, meaning that the indigenous population has concerns that need to be addressed.
Now 61, he will become a late-starter in the parliament, but a significant one. Apart from leader he will take on the role of finance and economy spokesman. “I will be leading on finance because it is an important message that the leader of this party is fundamentally saying the most important thing is to fix the economy.”
Should his party do particularly well, would there be any circumstances in which he would play a part in government?
“I am not interested in being deputy First Minister. It is a pretendy job,” he says, adding that working with the SNP in government has no appeal. “I would rather stick pins in my eyes.”
Related
#Malcolm #Offord #Reform #Daily #Business #Magazine