MSP says she was forced to quit Reform due to its 'toxic culture' for women

Nigel Farage ’s Reform UK has been plunged into a misogyny row at Holyrood amid claims of a toxic culture for women that feels like ‘a coercively controlled relationship’. Amanda Bland, who quit the party last week to sit as an independent, has claimed she experienced abusive and misogynistic behaviour from senior Reform figures in Scotland. Her claims were backed up by a former election candidate for the party, who told the Mail that women ‘don’t get a look in’ and there is a ‘neurotic culture’ within the small group of men running Reform north of the Border. But Reform MSP Senga Beresford called the allegations ‘absolute nonsense’ and said she had never heard anyone else raise similar concerns. Ms Bland, the MSP for Central Scotland and Lothians West, told the Sunday Post that her clashes with the party’s Scottish leader Lord Malcolm Offord and his chief of staff Martyn Greene had triggered memories of growing up in a home where there was domestic abuse. She said: ‘The behaviour of the Scottish leadership, the persistent shouting at me, was triggering. It took me right back to being a child. Amanda Bland claimed women 'don't get a look in' in Reform UK north of the Border Lord Malcolm Offord is Reform UK's leader at Holyrood ‘I grew up in a home ruled by my father’s domestic abuse where my mother, my sister and I were expected not to speak, not to tell and only do what we were told. I will not put up with that same kind of abusive, misogynistic behaviour that I have been subjected to from the leadership clique here in Scotland. ‘That is the reason I chose to walk away from Reform. Looking back now, it feels like I have escaped a coercively controlled relationship and it is a huge relief. ‘No politician should be subjected to that kind of behaviour, and no political party should behave like that.’ Ms Bland said that since her election there were persistent attempts to control and undermine her and she found herself excluded from key discussions. She also described one occasion when Lord Offord was ‘visibly angry, shouting at me’. One former Reform election candidate told the Mail that Ms Bland’s experience of Reform, Mr Greene and Lord Offord ‘certainly chimes with mine as a candidate and I’m sure it will not be unfamiliar to Reform’s female MSPs at Holyrood’. Ms Bland also criticised Mr Greene’s and Lord Offord’s dominance in a group of four alongside chief whip Max Bannerman and deputy leader Thomas Kerr. She said: ‘The party at Holyrood is run by an exclusive group of four men; women MSPs don’t get a look in.’ The ex-candidate claimed there is ‘no internal democracy in the wider party’ and this ‘speaks to a neurotic, controlling and closed-minded culture in the party’. Responding to the comments, Ms Beresford, Reform MSP for South Scotland, said: ‘That is absolute nonsense. I could not imagine Malcolm even raising his voice, I’ve never once heard him shout... I’ve never heard Martyn shouting at anybody. I’ve never heard him being offensive to somebody.’ On the wider claims of misogyny in the party, she said: ‘I’ve never felt controlled. ‘It sounds like someone who is pretty bitter.’