Nigel Farage: “We have a leadership class that believes in absolutely nothing”

Nigel Farage

There’s a saying I’ve always liked: the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. And right now, it feels like we’ve been walking that road barefoot for the past decade.

I didn’t plan to come back into politics. I’d done my bit. I’d stood on stages, in studios, and on the floor of the European Parliament telling unelected bureaucrats what I thought of their pet project. Brexit was done — or so we thought — and like many, I imagined a quieter life. But here we are. Why? Because this country is going to the dogs.

We have a leadership class that believes in absolutely nothing. Nothing. No conviction, no backbone, no principles beyond pleasing whatever lobby group shouts loudest on social media. And that, fundamentally, is what drove me back into the political arena.

It wasn’t ambition. It wasn’t ego. It was disgust.

We are watching the slow collapse of everything Britain has stood for — fairness, hard work, decency, responsibility. The march of the woke Left through our institutions is a cultural revolution in all but name. We’ve reached the point where a man can self-identify as a woman, commit a violent crime, and be sent to a female prison. Meanwhile, our children are being taught to hate their own country — that Britain was always evil, that the Empire was uniquely bad, and that our nation is irredeemably racist.

Rubbish. Britain is the most tolerant, open society on Earth. Always has been. We welcomed Jews fleeing Tsarist Russia, Ugandan Asians fleeing Idi Amin, Germans and Austrians escaping the Nazis. We’ve bent over backwards to give people a better life here. But what’s the point if we don’t even believe in our own values anymore?

Take crime. You can now steal £200 worth of goods and walk away without prosecution. Law and order is crumbling. Police are more focused on pronouns than patrols. Communities are fractured. In some parts of our major cities, neighbours don’t even speak the same language — and worse, they don’t know or care about one another.

It’s a collapse of culture, of cohesion. And yes, of courage.

Because courage is what we desperately lack in public life. Leadership that knows what it stands for, and has the guts to say it out loud. When I look at the leaders of the main parties, I see cowards. Not statesmen. Not even managers. Just hollow shells mouthing safe words they don’t understand.

We’re being run by people who have never worked in the real world. Just look at the Labour front bench — 24 out of 25 members have never worked in private business. The one who did went bust. “Rachel from accounts,” the would-be Chancellor, wasn’t an economist. She wasn’t even from accounts. She worked in complaints. You couldn’t make it up.

And meanwhile, small businesses are being bled dry. National Insurance up. Minimum wage up. Business rates through the roof. Regulations meant for multinational giants being forced onto sole traders and corner shops. No wonder the high street is dying.

I set up my first business in 1993. Not because I was clever, but because I was completely unemployable. I know what it’s like to pay your staff more than you pay yourself. I know what it’s like to stay up worrying about payroll. That’s the real economy. That’s where growth comes from — not Whitehall.

Government doesn’t create wealth. Never has, never will. Its job is to clear the way for people to succeed. That’s what built places like Hong Kong. Let people get on with it. Reward success. Encourage effort. Stop punishing those who want to do well. The more you try to engineer equality of outcome, the more you destroy equality of opportunity.

We’ve forgotten how to work. We’ve bought into this nonsense of hybrid working, four-day weeks, and remote learning. It’s cobblers. Young people learn nothing sitting in their bedrooms on Zoom. Productivity is in the toilet. And no one even checks whether public sector workers are logging in. The taxpayers foot the bill while council offices gather dust and services collapse.

We have to change. Not because it’s trendy. But because it’s necessary for survival.

And let’s not pretend this is just about economics. It’s moral, too. When free speech is punished with prison sentences, when the justice system bends to political pressure, when we have two-tier policing that targets some while ignoring others — the very idea of British fairness dies.

I’ve always said we need to stand up for what makes this country special. Common law. Free speech. Individual responsibility. It’s not about pandering to one group or another. It’s about building a society in which everyone is equal before the law — regardless of race, religion, gender or sexuality. No one gets a pass. And no one gets scapegoated.

That’s why I’ve spoken up on issues others would rather avoid. When Jewish families in North London are afraid to let their children out, when we see cars parading antisemitic slogans through our streets and the police do nothing — that’s a failure not just of policing, but of principle.

It’s a sad irony. Eighty years after the landings in Normandy, we’re now in a Europe where Jewish families can’t live safely in Paris, Brussels, or Strasbourg unless they’re under armed guard. I saw it as an MEP. I saw the silence and cowardice of those who prefer not to notice. We must never go down that road here.

Can we turn things around? Of course we can. We’ve done it before. Anyone who lived through the three-day week, the power cuts, the 30% inflation of the 1970s knows how bad things can get — and how quickly they can be turned around with the right leadership.

But it takes honesty. And bravery. And the will to say: enough.

We need to tell young people the truth — that hard work leads to success. That being proud of your country is not a sin. That being ambitious is not shameful. That family, stability and tradition are not relics of the past, but essential ingredients for a healthy future.

I’m not in this to please everyone. I never have been. If I wanted an easier life, I’d be on the after-dinner circuit talking about Brussels bureaucracy over fillet of beef. But I came back because I believe Britain can be better — and that someone has to say so.

You can believe in me, or not. That’s your call. But know this: I’m not going away. Because the stakes are too high. Because the values that made this country great are worth fighting for. And because if we don’t stand up for them — no one else will.