40% of crime suspects in Berlin are foreign nationals - no wonder German young are turning to the far-right - Kelvin MacKenzie

The country is scared for its future. And it’s not just the old who are taking fright. In Thuringia (in the old Germany) 38% of those aged between 18 and 34 voted for the AfD.

The party has thrown much of its marketing into Tik Tok and Instagram and Gen Z has bought into its fervently anti-migrant message. The leaders of Alternative fur Deutschland proclaim they are the Party for Youth. It is the most popular party among the young.

It feels like only yesterday that, with Germany economically strong, that Chancellor Merkel decided she had to show her ‘’caring’’ credentials and threw open the door to 1,500,000 migrants, mainly from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.

She was viewed as saint like. At first main stream media embraced the newcomers claiming the surge in immigration would lead to an economic boom. A decade later that optimism has disappeared.

Were Germany’s economy booming things might be different but Chancellor Scholz’s three party coalition is presiding over an economy that is shrinking with no recovery in sight.

In a good piece by Lisa Haseldine in The Spectator, she says Germany has been slow to adapt to the digital world, with its over-reliance on old analogue industries, leaving the country as the growth laggard of Europe.

And, unbelievably, the size of its workforce is expected to decline faster than in any other major economy. No wonder the young are turning to the far Right. Bjorn Hocke, leader of AfD in Thuringia, says the popularity of his party is due to a rising crime rate, schools ‘’bursting at the seam’’, housing being unaffordable and German ‘’culture’’ under threat.

But their main policy is what they refer to as ‘’the mother of all crises’’- immigration. What I don’t care for is his use of the phrase Alles fur Deutschland –-Everything for Germany- which is an old Nazi motto still illegal to be repeated in Germany.

When Hocke did so he was fined £11,000. There will be people in the United Kingdom who would like to see Reform go down this route. They would be wrong and I’m pleased to see Nigel Farage has put a lot of distance between Reform and AfD.

I don’t believe the far Right would ever do well in the ballot box over here. And Farage knows it. I expect the party to do really well in Welsh Senedd elections in 2026. It would not surprise me if they took 33%- the same percentage as AfD achieved in Thuringia.

Welsh Labour voters will never vote for the Conservatives but could go down the Reform route.

Next year the Germans will go to the polls in the national elections. It is clear they will be destroyed. The question is will AfD do as well nationally as they do locally.

I asked this question of Lisa Haseldine last night in the green room of GB News shortly before she went on the excellent Patrick Christy show to discuss the German upheaval.

She was quite clear. She thought it would be replicated. Europe is going through a revolution. I have my doubts that Tories, no matter who the leader is, can climb back up the pole in the short term, so a reasonable bet is that Farage will be in any coalition come 2030.