Thomas Kerr: I've been branded ‘fascist’ for defecting to Reform

Thomas Kerr has said he has been labelled “a fascist” and “a racist” since his defection to Reform UK. 

The councillor, who had led the Conservative group at Glasgow City Council since 2019, defected to Nigel Farage’s party last month after becoming “annoyed and angry” over the period of several months, accusing the party of failing working-class people.  

In an interview with Holyrood, Kerr revealed that the move had cost him some friendships and that he had been “hurt” by briefings against him by people in his former party.

And he admitted he had been “branded everything under the sun, from a fascist to a racist” since the announcement.

In the hours following the defection, a Tory party source made claims to the media that Kerr made the move because of career aspirations, stating there were “74,506 reasons” why he had left – a reference to the salary earned by an MSP. 

The source added: “He’s been promised top of the Glasgow list by Reform, which he wouldn’t have got near in our party.” 

Kerr has denied this and said he was yet to decide whether he will run for the Scottish Parliament elections in 2026. Despite having “ambitions” to be an MSP in the future, he cited his young family for his reservations.  

He said: “The [Scottish Conservative] briefing was hurtful. If I were to sit here and say to a journalist that I didn’t want to be an MSP, I’d be lying. I joined the party young; I have ambitions to go to Holyrood for this area. It’s no secret I have ambitions, but the idea that I did this because I was promised something is not true.” 

Reform UK claim its membership Scottish membership has risen to over 9,000, which would make it the third largest party by membership behind Labour and the SNP.  

Kerr said the party had become “a mechanism for people to let out their anger about where the world is at the moment”.

He added: “The day I defected I went to the branch meeting in Pollokshields, and there were 60 people there; the Tory branch meetings were six people and a dog. There were young men and women, all different ethnicities, and when you speak to them, they are not all Tory and Labour defectors. A lot of them are people who have never been involved politically.”