The House Opinion Article | What Makerfield told me about Britain’s soul

3 min read18 May

I was out knocking doors the day after Josh Simons announced he’d be stepping down. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect.

This is, historically, a Labour heartland and a seat that went our way just a couple of years ago. But last week, 24 out of 25 council seats in Wigan went to Reform.

I knew it would be tough. It wasn’t what I expected. The first door I knocked belonged to a woman in a semi-detached, path of white pebbles across grey stone.

She wasn’t in any hurry to close it. Surprised Labour was out this early, she said. I told her why it matters, why this party needs to rebuild trust in places like this.

She called her husband through from where he was decorating. Yorkshire and Lancashire, together chatting over a doorstep, unhurried, the way politics almost never allows.

He’d voted Reform the week before, and in the general election. If Andy Burnham stood here, he said he’d have to have a “really deep think”, but could convince him to come back to Labour. Eight days after putting a cross next to the party in teal, this man was genuinely reconsidering.

That matters. A few doors down, someone else put it with a directness I won’t forget. “I’ve got a bit of Labour left in me, just need to find a way to get it out.”

These aren’t voters who have abandoned us. They are voters who want a reason to come back. There is a difference, and Westminster forgets it constantly.

Andy Burnham’s name came up again and again. Not as a political calculation, but with the warmth you reserve for someone you actually know. “He’s done a lot for Manchester. I’d be sad to see him go as mayor.”

But they’d be glad to have him as their MP too. Everybody had a story, a friend, a family member, one degree of separation from the man. That kind of proximity counts for more than any amount of targeted advertising. I also heard something generous about Josh Simons, who is standing down. “He’s a young lad who moved his family from Cambridge and chose to bring them up locally. You can’t ask for more than that.” People notice authenticity. They always have. It’s a small reminder that north and south aren’t opposing forces.

They’re simply waiting for the right moment to be bound together. There were doors that didn’t swing so easily. I won’t pretend otherwise.

Whether it was schoolchildren running excitedly around the corner ready for their weekend to start, or a group of people having a chat outside the local chippy, there was a sense that people here look out for each other, and that underneath the frustration, something is still there.

The argument that Reform voters are beyond reach is not just wrong, it is condescending. We have been here before. In the ashes of 2019, we didn’t win back the voters we’d lost by telling them they were wrong to choose Johnson and the Tories.

We asked them why. And then we listened, properly, and acted accordingly. That is how we won. It is the only way we ever win.

The people I met in Makerfield weren’t making an ideological statement. They were asking to be listened to. And they were, when given the chance, very willing to have that conversation. Nigel Farage is in for a fight here. This is a seat with Labour in its bones. The right candidate, with roots that people can feel, can remind it of that. We should rise to that challenge.