One potential side-benefit of the Reform surge may be the end of the BBC's and ITV's ability to rig the TV leaders' debates

Right at this moment, Reform UK are the outright favourites on the leading betting exchange to win most seats in the next general election.  They are priced at 2.5, with Labour just behind at 2.64, and with the Tories third favourites at 5.3.  So even with four years potentially still to go until the election, people are giving up on the idea that the Reform surge is just a passing fad.

I always try to look on the bright side wherever possible, and as you know I do think the looming prospect of a Farage government and Britain's withdrawal from the European Convention on Human Rights could lead to a surge in support for independence and the type of Yes supermajority that John Swinney seems to be needlessly insisting on before taking any action.  However, that is only a potential and highly speculative indirect benefit.  

It's much harder to think of any direct benefits of a Reform government.  Pretty much the only one I was previously able to come up with is that Reform are, theoretically at least, committed to replacing first-past-the-post with proportional representation.  But even that has to be regarded as highly dubious, because their support for PR is tactical rather than principled, and if they win under first-past-the-post they're likely to suddenly decide there's no tactical advantage after all.  I wouldn't totally give up hope on the idea, though, because it depends on the circumstances in which a Reform government is elected - if they're well short of a majority they may yet conclude that PR would work in their favour.

I have, however, now come up with a potential second direct benefit of the Reform surge, because I think it's highly likely to put an end to the "Prime Ministerial Debate" con that the BBC and ITV have been attempting in recent elections, which involves them pretending that we have a presidential system in which there are only two "candidates for Prime Minister", thus justifying the exclusion of all but two parties from TV election debates.

How would that work this time?  You can't have Labour v Tory debates when it's obvious from the polls that Reform are one of the two main contenders for power.  In any case, we hear that Morgan McSweeney wants to frame the next election as a straight choice between Starmer and Farage, which means Labour would be unlikely to agree to a Labour v Tory head-to-head.

But neither can you really have a Labour v Reform head-to-head when the Tories remain the second largest party in parliament.  Indeed, once you concede the participation of Reform, you're also making the case for Lib Dem involvement almost unanswerable, because the Lib Dems have a far bigger parliamentary group than Reform.  The case for the Greens to be involved would also be strong, given that they have almost as many MPs as Reform.  And if you've already got five parties in the mix, and two of them are Reform and the Greens, how can you exclude the SNP, who have as many MPs as Reform and the Greens combined, and who may well be poised to quadruple their own numbers?

The broadcasters will hate this, but I think the logic points inexorably towards immaculately fair 2015-style seven-way debates between Labour, Conservative, Reform UK, Liberal Democrat, SNP, Green and Plaid Cymru.