A UK-France populist alliance is no longer mere fantasy

PICTURE the 2026 scene: French Prime Minister Jordan Bardella and British PM Nigel Farage, fresh from winning snap elections on anti-handout, anti-immigration and anti-Europe platforms, advocate a new entente cordiale between their two countries with the support of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. Unlikely? Perhaps. But increasingly possible.

If the recent meeting between the two far-right leaders proved anything, it is that France’s National Rally and the UK Reform party have never been so close to power and so vocal about forging a continental “patriotic” alliance – maybe one day encompassing Germany’s AfD (Alternative for Germany).

While still divisive enough to be pelted with eggs or milkshakes when out in public, Bardella and Farage are polling top in their respective countries with a 25 to 35 per cent vote share.

The two leaders make for an odd couple: 30-year-old college-dropout Bardella’s inner-city background contrasts with 61-year-old ex-City of London trader Farage’s. 

Yet they have both used the European Parliament’s pulpit to lob attacks against Brussels, clear a path into domestic politics and capture the younger generation on social media. They are also closer on economics than National Rally figurehead Marine Le Pen’s welfarist, anti-market ideas would suggest. 

Bardella has openly wooed the likes of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton’s Bernard Arnault with talk of lower taxes, less waste and less red tape. Bosses might blanche at the immigrant bashing, but Bardella is no longer quite so radioactive for the elite ahead of Emmanuel Macron’s exit in 2027 – much like Farage’s appeal among Reform-curious financiers.

Given the similar positioning seen on the Italian right under Giorgia Meloni, you might call this the post-Meloni strain of European populism. The reality of stretched public finances in Britain and France means even constitutional radicals have to appear fiscally conservative.

On Russia, both Farage and Bardella have shifted away from overt Putin admiration. And their route to election victory is seen as uniting the right, rather than competing with the left.

A more relaxed attitude towards money is also de rigueur, Le Pen’s embezzlement conviction aside. Farage’s Reform clinched a record £9 million (S$15.6 million) donation from a cryptocurrency investor; Bardella’s publishing partnership with the Vivendi empire of Vincent Bollore is a money-spinner.

The quiet refrain in certain cocktail parties from London to Paris, perhaps reflecting Milan’s recent experience, is that these are populists you can do business with.

The consequences for Europe if the pair wins power would be severe.

“It could be existential for Europe as a political entity as we’ve known it,” says Catherine Fieschi, author of the 2019 book Populocracy.

Stress tests

Nato commitments would be tested and ambitions for euro-area integration would collide with statism and France-first protectionism. Markets already unsettled by the current fiscal health of the UK and France would not easily give the benefit of the doubt to political disrupters. Europe would face “a series of structural stress tests”, as Gregoire Roos, director of the Europe and Russia and Eurasia Programmes at Chatham House, puts it.

None of this is to say a Make America Great Again-style rainbow coalition is a foregone conclusion for Europe. Centrist parties have shown they can learn from and beat their populist rivals, as seen in the Netherlands. And Farage and Bardella have other possibly fatal political weaknesses. If the UK manages to avoid an election for the next few years, Farage’s appeal may dim as the costs of Brexit – with which he is indelibly associated – become clearer.

As for Bardella, if the French government holds until 2027, his next big test might be the presidential election should Le Pen’s legal case make her ineligible.

Despite his current poll lead, the two-round vote would put him up against a pensioner-heavy French electorate who may hesitate to before handing the nuclear codes to someone who not too long ago was streaming Call of Duty.

Still, populists are adding new pages to their playbooks, which are proving ever more tempting in an unstable time that favours action of any kind – however shocking, vile or unlawful – over technocratic deliberation.

Both Farage and Bardella are pitching themselves as providential leaders who could work miracles if given half a chance. The smooth-talking French and British insurgents will be the political figures to watch next year. BLOOMBERG