The House | How Reform Lost Makerfield: “Restore Is What People Wanted Reform To Be”

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage and party candidate Robert Kenyon before Kenyon casts his vote in the Makerfield by-election (PA Images/Alamy)

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“No one calls him King of the North here,” said an optimistic Reform UK staffer a day before polls opened in the historic Makerfield by-election.

It was intended as a warning against Westminster assumptions that Andy Burnham’s celebrity status would carry him effortlessly to victory in the Greater Manchester seat. Yet when the votes were counted, Burnham had not merely won – he had crushed Reform by 20 percentage points.

For Nigel Farage’s party, the scale of the defeat was sobering. Pollsters have described the result as Reform’s worst electoral performance since the general election – particularly stark given that voters in Makerfield had elected Reform councillors only a month earlier.

Reform figures have sought to downplay its significance, however, arguing that the result was less an endorsement of Labour than a protest vote against Keir Starmer. Insiders insist that many voters who might otherwise have backed Reform lent their support to Burnham in the belief he represented the strongest vehicle for removing the Prime Minister.

When Reform selected Rob Kenyon, the party believed they had found an ideal candidate. A local plumber and former army reservist, he embodied the anti-establishment credentials considered central to the party’s appeal. Even now, party insiders maintain that their pick was important for the base, showing members that there is a route from the grassroots to Parliament.

Things quickly unravelled when old social media posts by Kenyon resurfaced, leading to accusations of sexism and misogyny. Among the comments highlighted was a suggestion that women rely on abortions so they can “shag anyone they want” and that the majority are for “vanity purposes”. On one account linked to Kenyon, he wrote: “I’m sexist, sorry but I am.”

During the Makerfield Question Time special, a female audience member encapsulated the electoral problem the revelations posed when she declared: “I’d rather have a career politician than a plumber who’s a sexist.”

Incredibly, Reform UK has said it was aware of Kenyon’s social media accounts before selecting him to stand against Andy Burnham in Makerfield.

Reform’s woman problem

A pre-election Survation poll found that Kenyon struggled to win the support of women in Makerfield: Burnham led Kenyon by 21 points among women (53 per cent to 32 per cent), whereas men preferred Kenyon to Burnham by 15 points.

Sophie Stowers, research manager and pollster at More In Common, noticed anti-Reform sentiment among women in focus groups leading up to the by-election. “The Kenyon comments cut through in a more negative way with women than they did with men,” she says.

“What we saw among quite a lot of women, particularly women in their mid-50s, was that they didn’t love Kenyon, they were quite put off by Farage and thought he was a bit arrogant.”

Some Reform figures privately acknowledge concerns about the party’s ability to connect with female voters, telling The House they feel a stronger message is needed to appeal to them. And in a Substack essay, former Reform spinner and current governing board member Gawain Towler admitted the party has a “woman problem”.

Reform insiders concede that the controversy gave Labour an opportunity to attack the party’s pledge to scrap the Equality Act, which critics argued would weaken key protections for women.

Suella Braverman spearheading the launch of the party’s proposed ‘Women and Motherhood Protection Act’ was a last-minute attempt to reassure female voters, committing to bring together “key protections currently scattered across different laws”, including equal pay, sex discrimination, employment rights, unfair dismissal and maternity leave.

According to a well-connected Reform source, Reform MP Sarah Pochin is particularly interested in appealing to more female voters. They admitted, however, that a recent video in which she suggested that England should win more World Cup matches to reduce domestic abuse did not do them any favours.

A Reform spokesperson counters this narrative, saying: “We are leading with women according to the latest More in Common polling.”

More in Common polling conducted days before the Makerfield by-election does indeed suggest Reform has broadened its appeal across the sexes. Among women, the party led Labour by eight points and the Conservatives by six. Among men, Reform’s advantage over Labour was narrower, at six points, though its lead over the Conservatives was nine points.

Trouble on the right flank

Reform concerns that Rupert Lowe’s Restore Britain could siphon off enough support to deny them victory in Makerfield turned out to be somewhat overblown. Restore candidate Rebecca Shepherd finished third, with just under seven per cent of the vote – roughly in line with her party’s national polling position and not enough to change the result given Burnham’s overwhelming victory.

The performance nevertheless underscores a potential long-term threat to Reform. If Restore could replicate similar results across the country it would complicate Farage’s path to No 10 by fragmenting support on the political right. Restore figures have discussed ambitions to contest every seat at the next general election.

Restore’s decision to stand a woman in Makerfield undoubtedly helped them. Directly appealing to female voters in party campaign literature, Shepherd vowed to “give Makerfield women a voice”.

“Restore is what people wanted Reform to be”

In focus groups, Stowers identified that women actually saw Lowe as “quite a nice fella”. “They thought he was quite polite. They quite liked Restore’s canvassers,” she says.

“For those who were looking for an alternative on the right, they were quite taken with Restore. Restore has got this really radical, hyper-online, nativist reputation, but if they’re able to present themselves to some voters as an English countryside, polite, commonsense party for people who are a bit worried about Farage – who I think tend to skew to be women – maybe that is a problem for [Reform].”

Charlie Downes, campaigns director and spokesman for Restore Britain, tells The House the results in Makerfield show the party has established itself as a credible alternative: “There is a huge appetite for the agenda we are offering, and the more people learn about us, the more support we gain.”

Marlon West, a campaigner against child exploitation, is Restore’s candidate for the Greater Manchester mayoral election, where the party hopes to build on the momentum gained in Makerfield.

West is the father of Scarlett West, a victim of grooming gangs in Greater Manchester. The House understands that the focus of Restore’s mayoral campaign will draw on West’s “experiences of institutional failure”.

“We are confident that his story, his priorities and our unmatched digital campaigning machine will deliver a very good result for us – and, even if we don’t win, will be giving a platform to issues that are otherwise often ignored by the establishment media,” says Downes.

On a trip to Makerfield, The House saw many Restore activists wearing Trump-style shirts and caps brandishing the party name as they canvassed the streets. The party’s ground campaign relied on hundreds of activists travelling from all over the country – something that will prove more challenging if the party contests multiple seats or must cover more ground, as in the mayoral race.

“I’m not worried. It was an annoyance [in Makerfield] but there’s no way they’re ready,” says Towler of Restore. “The only thing [Rupert] can do right now is try and save his own seat.”

Rattled by Restore?

Farage hit out at Restore voters in a video on social media: “What do you want? We are the challenger party to the left in the country and I would urge you to think again.” This was taken by many as evidence that Reform is rattled by Lowe’s party.

Reports that Reform could sack Zia Yusuf, who is trying to pull the party closer to the right in response to the growth of Restore, were strongly denied by party spokespeople. A Reform spokesperson dismisses suggestions that the party has been rattled by Restore. “We will keep running our own race – we won’t change strategy for anyone,” they say. “They scored less than the BNP in 2010.”

Yet figures on both sides acknowledge that the contest exposes a fault line on the populist right. For Reform, the danger is that Restore offers a home to disillusioned supporters who increasingly see Farage as part of the political establishment he once railed against.

Reform’s controversial decision to welcome Tory defectors was plastered across Restore’s campaign literature, which blamed Braverman and Robert Jenrick for “betraying our borders” during their time in the Home Office.

“Restore is what people wanted Reform to be,” Andrew Bridgen, a former Tory MP who helped campaign for Lowe’s party in Makerfield, tells The House.

While Restore is still a fledgling movement, with little organisational infrastructure and no electoral breakthrough to its name, Makerfield is a reminder that Reform’s biggest challenge may not come from Labour or the Conservatives.

As Farage seeks to convince voters he is ready for government, he is also having to defend his party from a rival movement that accuses him of becoming precisely the sort of politician he once promised to replace.