The Makerfield By Election Will Be A Bloodbath
It's not about Andy Burnham, it's Restore Britain against Reform UK.
One of the more tiresome phrases in current politics is “Unite the Right”, normally referring to a proposed alliance of Reform, the Tories and now Restore Britain. The phrase is usually used by mischievous pundits or, occasionally, senior party members who worry about the right-wing vote being “split”. Fear of such a split led to the Brexit Party (as Reform then was) standing down candidates where the Tory candidate was not a Remainer. (Disclosure: I was one of those stood down. The Tory who was elected advanced her career by advocating Boris Johnson’s awful deal). The decision to hand Boris the shires and the red wall might have saved the country from Corbyn; it didn’t do much good for Brexit. Boris’s tenure in Number 10 was far from a complete success, too. Politicians who listen to psephologists rather than their party members and (most importantly) the electorate are in trouble.
It’s therefore hugely amusing to see Reform rolling out arguments for Restore not to put up a candidate for the Makerfield by-election. So far the various authors have suggested that Restore is too small (wrong – over 130,000 members in about one month, already more than the Tories and the Lib Dems); too focused on East Anglia (wrong, over 400 branches covering all the country); or acting against the national interest (wrong, the country is stuffed and it needs high quality people in Westminster to fix it, not careerist politicians.)
It’s instructive that Nigel Farage’s Reform now believes that it has a right to win and that only Reform UK is there to serve the national interest. This arrogance, about which I have written before, was Reform’s undoing in Wales. It blew what was a genuine chance of winning a majority in the Senedd and came a distant second to Plaid Cymru. It came first in just five (of 16) constituencies; for every nine people that voted for Reform, 11 supported Plaid. Reform’s campaign started late and their candidate selection was repeatedly delayed and corrupt.
Reform UK may be better led in the northwest than it is in Wales (low baseline!). It is far from clear that Reform is capable of winning a by-election. Its recent track record isn’t great; it lost the Senedd by-election in Caerphilly, then it lost the Westminster by-election in Gorton (also in the Northwest). Both campaigns had huge support from Reform members plus the benefit of Reform’s expensive canvassing software. Yet Reform lost both elections, badly. True, Sarah Pochin MP won the Runcorn by-election (also in the northwest) way back in May 2025 by just six votes, but that was then and this is now.
In contrast, Restore has only stood in one council election. All nine of its candidates romped home comfortable winners, each with at least twice the votes of the Reform candidates. It’s Restore that has the form and momentum. Restore is already selecting a local candidate for Makerfield; its members across the country are already making plans to go and help campaign. A fair few of those members used to support Reform, many of whose supporters are a bit low (or so they tell me when I meet them at Restore meetings, which have more people turning up than the Reform ones I used to attend).
Of course, it’s far from clear that Andy Burnham (assuming he gets the numbers) will command the support of all branches and factions of the Labour Party. Whether the Streeting gang, Ange’s acolytes or even Miliband’s minions will turn out to support Burnham’s election campaign is questionable. The Greens and Lib Dems will be there to offer a home for the disillusioned Labour vote, which might also stay home. Indeed, his hubris is comparable to Nigel Farage’s.
Our devious, process obsessed Prime Minister would be best served by some other party winning. He’s got a massive majority so one MP more or less is neither here nor there. If an anti-Starmer candidate lost a safe Labour seat, other plotters would have pause for thought. If Andy Burnham must resign as Manchester’s mayor before he stands and he then loses, it’s entirely possible that he would not be re-elected in Manchester – no one likes a loser. Or a traitor, come to that. Indeed, the NEC might not allow him to run to be mayor – our Prime Minister is vengeful and, frankly, Burnham is a man who needs kicking when they’re down. Like all careerist politicians, he’s easily replaced – one of the few things the UK is not short of is ambitious lefties lusting after power.
Stepping back, the United Kingdom’s political leadership has been failing for decades. Poor policies ineptly implemented have delivered the economic hole that we’re in. The global financial crisis didn’t help and the lavish Covid handouts made it even worse, but the rot had already set in. It’s systemic; consider HS2. The ambitious plan to connect the nation by high-speed rail went massively over budget; the £100 billion spent will save 20 minutes on a journey from London to Birmingham. The ineptitude is staggering and arises from the inability of politicians to hold civil servants accountable. The management structures, reporting lines and control mechanisms are inadequate. The government machine is not fit for purpose. It needs radical reform.
It’s instructive that Streeting thinks the UK should rejoin the EU, something even the intellectually challenged Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy recognised as a dumb assertion. Andy Burnham thinks the same – and he’s hoping to get elected in a seat where 65% voted to leave the EU.
One of the most compelling arguments for Brexit was that leaving the EU would make mandarins accountable solely to Parliament and the MPs sent to Westminster by their constituents. With the EU layer of government gone, poor policies that damaged the UK could be altered without reference to Brussels. The United Kingdom’s governance would be driven solely and exclusively by the needs of the UK and the entire government machine would have no other purpose or constraint.
Unfortunately the toxic Tory combination of May and Boris compromised the UK’s exit deal; our government structures remain largely unchanged. (The number on the public payroll has increased, though.) Richard Tice kept Reform going (after Nigel retired from politics to make money) just in case it was needed to deliver a real Brexit and to get government working. That’s what we in Reform (then) fought the 2024 election on.
Reform has now drifted closer to the establishment. That’s partly due to its recruitment policies (Jenrick, Braverman, Krueger, etc.) but also because the establishment now believes that Reform could win. So it’s cosying up. (In Wales the Tories largely carried out a reverse takeover of Reform through the abused candidate selection process, whhc is why I left).
Reform has become less radical and more timid and has flip-flopped on policy. Rather than undertaking root and branch restructuring of the ridiculous welfare system, Reform gets trapped into wasting time arguing about the two child benefit cap. The real questions should be why parents need benefits and why people are having children that they can’t afford to bring up. Fix them and you don’t need a cap (and the bond markets will be happier).
Similarly, the pension triple lock is unjustifiable, yet Reform sticks by it. Taxing the young to pamper the old was a Tory policy, as was cutting welfare (largely paid to the young of working age) to cover unfunded pensions. This makes electoral sense; pensioners are thought more likely to vote than the young. But the triple lock is economic suicide as well as socially iniquitous.
With Reform moving into conservative territory in order to put Nigel Farage in No. 10 (as Reform often now frames their mission), there is a desperate need for a party to point out that the government machine is inept and iniquitous and stand on a platform of change. That party is Restore Britain.
Reform fights dirty and routinely pays the man not the ball. They need to be careful about that; while questions continue to be asked about Nigel Farage’s personal funding, it is a matter of record that Rupert Lowe, a successful banker, donates his parliamentary salary to charity.
At the time of writing, Burnham hasn’t announced his intentions and Streeting has yet to submit a challenge. It could all be a silly left-wing squabble. At most it will set the scene for which, if any, socialist career politician will replace the chief apparatchik as prime minister. Whatever the outcome, it won’t save the country from the economic doom loop that it is in. History shows us that Labour can’t control the government machine. Thatcher’s Conservative party could, but today’s Tories aren’t of the same calibre (no matter how hard Kemi tries).
The looming fight between Reform and Restore is therefore existential for both parties and this country. I’m among an increasing number of former Reform activists and ex-candidates who were appalled when Rupert Lowe was treated so badly and am now delighted to be in the happy ship Restore. We’re here to fix the country for our children, not further our careers. First past the post, winner takes all fight with Reform and sundry lefties.
Bring it on!
PS, if you want to do something about the sorry state of the country you could join Restore Britain. Click here.
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The argument that Restore is best placed to win a massively important by election because it did well in the one council election it stood in is proper hilarious! 🤣
The Triple Lock for Pensions was introduced because it finally struck home that ever since 1945, the State Pension has been set deliberately at poverty level to force individuals to beg the State for help, had the advice offered by the Pension experts, a State Pension Fund, managed by the existing pensions industry, with a board made up of 50/50 Government/Pension to guide investment decisions, had the Labour Party listened then, today our State Pension would be a self financed sovereign wealth fund, paying out European level pensions instead of the miserable pittance returned. But you can claim Pension Credit if you have little to no savings, and a myriad of other “benefits”. And before you jump in and say that there are well off pensioners as well as poor pensioners, think of that property you are sat in, worth hundreds of thousands more than you paid for it!, no doubt your suggestion is to go and downsize, downsize to what, a shoddily built “modern” home, ah, well go and get equity release, just watch some smart individual call around and value your property at 50% of its current value………sorry but for all your claims of wisdom, you fail to understand that the root cause of the problems these Nations feet today, is decisions taken in the 1945 Labour landslide and worse still, each and every Labour & Conservative Government since has never changed direction and put the Country first and political parties second- each wanted to be remembered……….hence the mess.