Nigel Farage warns Labour to stop being so ‘miserable’ and ‘declinist’ to get Britain’s birth rate rising again_Nhy
Labour must stop being so ‘miserable’ and ‘declinist’ to get the UK birth rate booming again, Nigel Farage urged yesterday.
The Reform leader blasted Chancellor Rachel Reeves for making the public ‘reach for the tissues’ with her downbeat rhetoric and warnings of difficult decisions in the early months of the Labour Government.
He suggested both Labour and the previous Tory government are at fault for ensuring the fertility rate in England and Wales dropped to its lowest level on record last year – and that a ‘180-degree shift’ was needed.
Affirming that the traditional family unit ‘matters enormously’, Mr Farage told the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) conference in London: ‘What underpins everything is our Judeo-Christian culture, and that’s where we need to start.
‘We need higher birthrates, but we’re not going to get higher birthrates in this country until we can get some sense of optimism, and we need a complete 180-degree shift in attitudes.
‘We disincentivise young people – to think, another million young people are on benefits since the pandemic.
‘We need some very big cultural changes. We’ve got to get that spirit, that sense of optimism, back in the country. We had it in the late 1980s.
‘We actually had it through much of the 1990s. That’s what we have to recapture.
Labour must stop being so ‘miserable’ and ‘declinist’ to get the UK birth rate booming again, Nigel Farage (pictured) urged yesterday
Mr Farage has the highest favourability rating of all party leaders with 60 per cent of people disliking him compared with 30 per cent who like him, far better than Keir Starmer’s (pictured) minus 40 score
‘Frankly, being led as we are – doesn’t Rachel Reeves just make you want to reach for the cry tissues? It’s all so miserable. It’s all so declinist.
‘Frankly, the Conservatives have been no better. We deem a change of attitude in Britain, we get that right, people will have more kids.’
Women in England and Wales had an average of 1.44 children between 2022 and 2023, according to data released in October last year by the Office for National Statistics.
Just 591,072 babies were born in 2023, fewer than in any year since 1977 and a fall of more than 14,000 on the previous year.
Having been divorced twice, Mr Farage admitted he may not be the ‘best advocate for monogamous heterosexuality or stable marriage’, but said his motivation for re-entering politics was ‘family, community and country’.
The issue of declining birth rates in Western nations has previously been raised by Tory leader Kemi Badenoch, who said in September that young people are now ‘scared to have families’.
Her concerns have been echoed by Elon Musk and JD Vance, two senior members of the Donald Trump administration.
Mr Farage was speaking at the ARC conference – a gathering of Right-wing figures from across the world – as Reform UK extended its lead over Labour and the Conservatives in the latest opinion poll.
The Reform UK leader blasted Chancellor Rachel Reeves (pictured) for making the public ‘reach for the tissues’ with her downbeat rhetoric and warnings of difficult decisions
He suggested both Labour and the previous Tory government are at fault for ensuring the fertility rate in England and Wales dropped to its lowest level on record last year
The insurgent party – which has just five MPs – sits on 27 per cent, with Labour on 25 per cent and the Tories on 21 per cent.
Mr Farage has the highest favourability rating of all political party leaders with 60 per cent of people disliking him compared with 30 per cent who like him.
This is far better than Sir Keir Starmer’s minus 40 score and Ms Badenoch’s rating of minus 34.
Reform UK chairman Zia Yusuf said last night: ‘The polling is clear and consistent, Reform has all the momentum in British politics and is the only party that can beat Labour. A vote for the Tories is now a wasted vote.’
