In Doncaster, at the insurgent rightwing party’s ‘biggest ever’ gathering, one absence is on everybody’ lips

On a sunny day at Doncaster racecourse, those gathered for Reform UK’s “biggest ever party conference” were presented with a dizzying array of pledges to cut tax and ­freeze “non-essential” immigration as its leading lights published a ­programme to “save Britain”. Yet even as the sun beamed down, the shadow of one absent figure seemed to hang over proceedings.

There was a jubilant mood at the South Yorkshire gathering as they cheered leader Richard Tice’s demands for an inquiry into vaccine harms, to break with the World Health Organization and to fire headteachers who refused to drop “critical race theory”.