# Labour steps up attacks on Farage and Reform over pro-Russia stance

## Labour steps up attacks on Farage and Reform over pro-Russia stance

Government targets party’s ‘softness on standing up to Putin’ to show Reform is out of step with UK public

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Sat 1 Mar 2025 01.00 EST



All the main parties have been grappling since the election with how to , with Reform often tying or  in opinion polls.

However, Labour and the SNP have been increasing their criticism of Farage, in particular over Russia, in the last week, firstly for , and also for his statement in 2014 that the Russian president was the world leader he most admired.

 in an unusually direct jibe this week, while the SNP’s Westminster leader, Stephen Flynn, accused Reform MPs of being “Putin’s poodles” after most of them did not turn up to big parliamentary debates on defence and security. In response, Farage said the prime minister appeared to be “terribly upset” and “scared” of him.

Meanwhile, John Swinney, the SNP leader, called the Reform leader an “accomplice to the Russian agenda and an apologist for the Russian agenda”.

With defence and security at the top of the national agenda, polling shows the UK public are still firm in their support for Ukraine and opposition to Russia – despite Donald Trump’s moves to strike a deal with Putin to end the war and .

Luke Tryl, the executive director of the thinktank More in Common, said: “One of the things that we know is that Reform is out of step with the public on Ukraine and Russia. Seven out of 10 Brits say it is important to the UK that Ukraine wins the war. Similarly, Reform’s rise looked unstoppable in the election until Farage made his comments about Putin and Ukraine.”

But with Reform having dipped slightly in recent polls, Tryl said the public may be responding to the uncertainty of global events rather than any specific concerns about Reform and its position on Russia.

However, even some Reform insiders acknowledge that Russia is a weak point for the party when it comes to alignment with the public, with one describing it as a “chink in the armour”.

The Reform source said some in the party believed it would have done even better at the last election had Farage not said during the campaign that the “ever-eastward expansion of Nato and the European Union” had given Putin a reason to go to war.

“He doesn’t fit the mould which we expect which means he can go off on tangents and so when he was asked about Ukraine he was honest,” the party insider said.

Farage’s stance on Russia appears to have shifted to become more critical in recent years but he is still less hostile than many of his political opponents.

 and while an MEP for Ukip and the Brexit party, his parties several times aligned with hard-right parties in the European parliament to vote against EU motions that were critical of Russia.

Over the past year, Farage has said that “of course” Putin was responsible for the war in Ukraine and , though he said the country should move towards democratic elections and has long been saying there should be a negotiated end to the war.





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