Worryingly, it’s often the mad-as-a-hatter crowd who go the distance in politics, just look at Donald Trump.
No, this isn’t a headline from Texas or Alabama, it’s straight out of the Telegraph. In what feels like a direct knockoff from Trump’s culture war playbook, Reform has announced that councils under its control will now be banned from flying anything other than the Union Jack or St George’s Cross.
Party chairman Zia Yusuf declared that ‘no other flags’ would be permitted on flagpoles, balconies, reception desks, or council chamber walls. That includes flags traditionally flown on commemorative days, like the Pride flag, the Pan-African flag, or even the Armed Forces flag.
Fresh from their success in last week’s local elections, Reform now controls ten councils across England, including in Kent, Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, and Lancashire. And with that foothold, the party is wasting no time laying down culture war diktats.
The flag ban is just the latest salvo. Echoing Elon Musk’s bizarre “Department of Government Efficiency,” Nigel Farage has pledged to create “mini-Doge” units within councils to slash “woke waste.”
As for diversity, equity, and inclusion officers, Farage has suggested they start updating their CVs. This call has been echoed by Dame Andrea Jenkyns, the new Reform mayor in Greater Lincolnshire, the only problem being that the county council has revealed it doesn’t employ any.
The flag stunt is proof of Reform doubling down on patriotism-as-performance, a space Labour has somewhat awkwardly tried to occupy. Starmer has repeatedly insisted Labour is the true party of British pride, even hosting a St George’s Day reception at No. 10.
But Reform’s latest move shows that Labour can’t out-Reform Reform on the culture war front.
What’s more, Labour’s own embrace of the Union Jack has ruffled feathers within the party. Some MPs warned last year that plastering campaign leaflets with the flag risked alienating voters from ethnic minority communities. There is a real danger is that it risks playing into the right’s narrative that immigrant communities are somehow anti-British. We seem back to the days of the Lord Tebbitt cricket test: which side do anglo-Indians support, India or England? In reality patriotism is, like identity itself, a many sided thing, sometimes splendid, sometimes tawdry.
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats dismissed Reform’s flag policy as “meaningless virtue-signalling.” A party spokesperson said: “I’m really proud of the way communities across the country have come together to show our support for Ukraine or Armed Forces Day.
“It would be a real shame if Reform councillors block their communities from flying the flag for our brave British troops and our allies against Putin, all for the sake of some meaningless virtue-signalling.”
As Reform bans ‘woke’ flags, critics raised the question of freedom of speech.
One X user asked: “What happened to the free speech they claim to want?”
Another remarked: “Ban woke flags? Gosh, that will get the potholes filled in. That will get council tax bills down. What are Reform afraid of? Their fight is not to get better services, but to end equality for the people.”
“Mad as the hatter this lot,” added another user.
Worryingly, it’s often the mad-as-a-hatter crowd who go the distance in politics, just look at Donald Trump.
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