Asked to picture a snake-oil salesman, most people would imagine a slimy character with superficial charisma travelling from town to town to hoodwink unsuspecting victims into lapping up all manner of lies.
It is an association Labour seems particularly keen to conjure in relation to the leader of Reform UK. Speaking at the party’s conference in Liverpool, Keir Starmer said Labour offered an alternative to the division and decline under the “snake-oil merchant” Nigel Farage.
The prime minister’s chief secretary, Darren Jones, also described Farage as a “snake-oil salesman”, comparing him with the misogynist influencer Andrew Tate. The health secretary, Wes Streeting, criticised him for allowing anti-vax lies to flourish within Reform. “Nigel Farage is a snake-oil salesman of British politics, and it’s time to stop buying what he’s selling,” he said.
Nor is it just Labour. The former Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon told the Wigtown book festival that Farage was “selling snake oil”.
It seems the vintage US term is back in the political lexicon. It originated in the late 19th century to describe someone whose wares did not deliver on their promises. The original snake-oil salesman was probably Clark Stanley, the self-proclaimed “rattlesnake king” who sold a topical treatment for joint pain, which he said came from snakes.
It turned out to be mineral oil, beef fat, chilli pepper extract and turpentine, but it took more than two decades for the lie to be uncovered and he eventually slipped away with a $20 (£15) fine, avoiding a much-warranted public backlash.
