The fighting talk continues over at Reform HQ as local election results continue to drip out. The Farage-founded party’s right-wing campaign has seen leader Richard Tice proclaim Reform UK is ‘rapidly becoming the real opposition to the Labour party in the North of England’. Tory defector Lee Anderson has even gone so far as to suggest he has a better chance of keeping his seat as a Reform MP than a Tory. But is the red wall Rottweiler all bark and no bite? The results of the East Midlands mayoral election would suggest so…

Six local candidates stood for the mayoralty, with the vote taking place in Anderson’s own Ashfield constituency. In first place – by a margin of 1,500 – was Labour candidate Margaret Ward, with over 7,000 votes. Up second was the Tory party’s Ben Bradley, with over 5,600 backers and in third place was the independent candidate Matt Relf, with a little over three-and-a-half thousand votes to his name. But, in a rather amusing twist, with 3,532 votes, Reform UK’s candidate placed fourth out of six – in Anderson’s own backyard. Awkward…

It’s not the most promising sign for the Ashfield MP’s new party – which, despite seeing relative success in the Blackpool South constituency by-election where it took 16.9 per cent of the vote, is yet to land itself an elected councillor in the locals. In fact, even the reasonably obscure Women’s Equality party has scooted up the inside lane to land itself more seats than Reform after it secured, er, one today.

So is Tice’s hubris all hype? As one Tory source put it: ‘A vote for Lee Anderson is a vote for Labour. Like it was in 2017 when he backed Jeremy Corbyn.’ Burn…

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Reform comes fourth in Anderson’s backyard

32 6
03.05.2024

The fighting talk continues over at Reform HQ as local election results continue to drip out. The Farage-founded party’s right-wing campaign has seen leader Richard Tice proclaim Reform UK is ‘rapidly becoming the real opposition to the Labour party in the North of England’. Tory defector Lee Anderson has even gone so far as to suggest he has a better chance of keeping his seat as a Reform MP than a Tory. But is the........

© The Spectator


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