QUENTIN LETTS: Ann Widdecombe had the crowd jiggling like nudists in a sandstorm
Nigel Farage called it the biggest rally in British politics. There were certainly plenty present.
Mind you, that could also be said of Jonestown in Guyana in 1978 when the Rev Jim Jones persuaded devotees to down a soft drink laced with cyanide.
Forward, brothers and sisters, to self-ruination. Let us grasp glorious extirpation.
The noonday hall at the National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, held some 5,000 believers.
This event was bigger than any of the main party conferences, even last year's Labour one which was so stuffed with lobbyists.
Anne Widdecombe's hair has gone Julian Assange blonde and her left bosom bore a Reform rosette so big, it may once have been a badminton racquet
Reform supporters, paying £5 a head, cut a different dash. Apart from your sketchwriter's, there was not a tie to be seen; a few baseball caps, inkings on bare shins.
Some brought their children, others looked to be on a date.
The only angry people I saw were a few anti-racism protesters at the entrance. Even they were a bit Sunday morning-ish.
One greeted me like a curate saying hello at the church door.
Ann Widdecombe, in a warm-up speech, had the crowd jiggling and screaming like nudists in a sandstorm.
She wore a gent's-style houndstooth suit that may have been one of Sir Les Patterson's cast-offs.
Her hair has gone Julian Assange blonde and her left bosom bore a Reform rosette so big, it may once have been a badminton racquet.
She tottered front of stage and bellowed in that voice that combines the lower notes of Margaret Rutherford and the upper register of a pinking Vespa engine.
'We will bring Common Sense back to Britain,' squeaky-boomed Ann, absorbing a chorus of wolf-whistles as if she heard such noises every time she passed a building site.
'The first thing I would do is get rid of WOKE.' Some 10,000 feet drummed on the floor making the sound you hear at the Edinburgh Tattoo.
Hundreds of sky-blue 'Vote Reform' placards were held aloft and the punters could not quite decide if they were happy or indignant.
They booed mentions of Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer, hated Channel 4 and absolutely detested the BBC.
Nigel Farage called it the biggest rally in British politics. There were certainly plenty present. Mind you, that could also be said of Jonestown in Guyana in 1978 when the Rev Jim Jones persuaded devotees to down a soft drink laced with cyanide
The noonday hall at the National Exhibition Centre, Birmingham, held some 5,000 believers
Hundreds of sky-blue 'Vote Reform' placards were held aloft and the punters could not quite decide if they were happy or indignant. They booed mentions of Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer, hated Channel 4 and absolutely detested the BBC
Biggest cheer of the day came when Mr Farage called for the Beeb to be scrapped. But all this loathing made them rather perky. There's nothing like some fury to put a smile on your face.
'Make Britain great again,' was the Trumpish slogan proposed by Reform's chief executive Paul Oakden.
Sweaty, ill-shaven customer, Oakden. Shouldn't have worn that hot little waistcoat. The eyes shifted, he sniffed a lot and his fingers fidgeted as he spoke.
In a dig at newspapers he said: 'We no longer care about what you write.'
This was possibly not entirely true, given that Reform last week hired notorious libel lawyers Messrs Carter-Ruck.
Another speaker, a smarmy tech entrepreneur called Zia Yusuf, wanted to 'put British people first'.
Mr Yusuf had just given Reform a big donation. He said 'Britain' a lot and boasted that he had paid 'millions in tax'. We all know the feeling, mate.
In a line worthy of the Psalms, he added: 'We will break down those that seek to destroy us.'
And then, after a dose of oratorical anaesthetic from party chairman Richard Tice, the Prophet Nigel was in our midst.
After disclosing that he became a grandfather (on, of all days, June 23, Brexit Day) he set about his rivals and enemies. We heard of 'slippery Sunak'.
Sir Keir Starmer was denounced, like Herman Van Rompuy before him, as having 'the charisma of a damp rag'.
Mr Farage proclaimed himself the election's one optimist – and then went into a litany of moans about how modern Britain was a dump.
There is something slightly schizoid about this party.
If party it be. Detailed policies were almost absent. This was broad-brush, personality-cult stuff, marbled by self-pity about the rotten media.
The cartwheels will continue another four days. Then we may be in to five years of parliamentary domination by the very socialist drudges the Reformers dislike.
All, I fear, for one man's self-glorification.
