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Linden Kemkaran, leader of one of Reform UK’s most high-profile councils, has said that some voters have “taken their eye off the ball” by being “enticed” by Restore Britain.
In an interview with PoliticsHome on the eve of the Reform conference in Birmingham, which started on Thursday, Kemkaran said that people who want a right-wing government will eventually realise that a vote for Restore Britain makes that outcome less likely.
Reform figures were initially dismissive about the threat posed by Rupert Lowe’s hard-right party. However, in recent months, there have been clear signs of Restore Britain hurting Farage by taking votes that otherwise probably would have gone to Reform.
For example, last Thursday, Green candidate Ingrid Dodd secured a surprise victory in a district by-election in Dover, thanks largely to the right-wing vote splitting three ways between Reform, Restore Britain, and the Conservatives. Reform finished second, just 34 votes behind.
At the Markefield by-election in June, Restore Britain got around 7 per cent of the vote. In the end, the scale of Andy Burnham’s victory rendered the combined right-wing vote academic. However, it was further evidence that Lowe’s party is capable of attracting significant levels of support, and prompted Farage to urge Restore Britain supporters to “think again”.
Kemkaran said the Dover result would end up being “very useful” for Reform, and “a very good case in point about what happens when you vote for a protest party, and you don’t vote for the party that’s actually going to do what you want them to do in that area”.
“It was a stark illustration of what happens if you take your eye off the ball and you stop realising that, actually, Reform is the only centre-right party that is in a position to form a centre-right government at this point in time,” she said.
“Restore can’t do it,” she added.
“Some people allowed themselves to be enticed to an alternative reality that they thought might be possible for whatever the things that Restore is promising.”
However, the council leader stressed: “You can never blame the electorate. You’ve always got to look internally as to what you might do differently next time.”
In an interview with The House magazine in the weeks leading up to Reform conference, party chairman Lee Anderson dismissed the threat of Restore Britain and insisted that “decent” people who had moved away from Reform to support Lowe’s party would come back once they realise that they risk making a Labour government more likely.
“Restore Britain just want to stop us from winning. It’s as simple as that,” Anderson said.
He also accused Restore Britain activists of “bullying” Reform campaigners at the recent Makerfield by-election, a claim which a Restore Britain spokesperson said was “nonsense”.
Reflecting on the 18 months she has been council leader in Kent, Kemkaran said she has realised “how difficult it can be to make things happen”.
She became leader having not previously served as a councillor, tasked with leading perhaps the most high-profile local authority won by Farage’s party. Kent was where Reform first piloted its programme of cutting what it describes as wasteful council spending, inspired by Elon Musk’s short-lived Department of Government Efficiency in the US, and Kemkaran has since set up her own version: Department of Local Government Efficiency. Reform’s bid to cut council spending has had to grapple with the financial pressures facing local government.
“I have made things happen,” the Kent leader told PoliticsHome, “but I’m unusually strong-minded and unusually tenacious in getting a grip of an issue very quickly and not being put off when people throw little obstacles in the way.”
Every Monday, Kemkaran joins a meeting with the party’s deputy leader Richard Tice and other Reform council leaders across the country. “It’s an incredibly useful time for us to be able to receive information, to share information, to alert each other to things we might need to be aware of. It’s a really it’s a good way to start the week,” she said.
On the national picture, Kemkaran insisted that Reform can regain momentum after a difficult few months, telling PoliticsHome that the “Burnham bounce” in the opinion polls is actually a “Burnham bubble” that she predicted will “pop any day now”.
“Once our manifesto is written, it’s going to be a huge selling point for the party. It’s going to convince an awful lot of people who are maybe Reform curious… because they’re going to see that we are the right party to fix the horrendous mess this country’s in.
“The other three magic ingredients are timing, luck, and judgment. If we can get those five to coalesce, that’s what we need to happen,” she said.
Kemkaran’s interview with PoliticsHome took place before an undercover investigation aired by Channel 4 on Thursday alleged that senior Reform officials arranged party donations that breached UK electoral rules.
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