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Farage vs. Lowe 3. The Big Tent vs. The One-Man Island. Farage: Even when he’s the “dictator” of a party, he keeps the machinery moving toward a single goal (Brexit, Reform). Lowe: Recently launched Restore Britain (Feb 2026) because he couldn’t play nice with others. His “my way or the highway” approach suggests a Prime Minister who would resign by lunchtime if his Cabinet didn’t like his choice of stationery.
– Steve Scrase
Read the whole thing, its both on the money & quite humorous.
I met Rupert Lowe at the Paul Staines Guido Fawkes goodbye dinner, SWMBO was sat next to him and I was next to her. Well, a couple hours at the same table turned my previously very favourable opinion of Lowe 180 degrees. He does not like to be questioned and trots out personal prejudices as if they were evidence. If he can piss off natural supporters who come predisposed to like and agree with him, I don’t think this is a man who can build a party machine to “restore” anything.
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So what happened to those allegations Reform made against Lowe about making threats and bullying? Although they managed to get the armed police to raid Lowe’s home and seize his legally owned firearms, the CPS ended the investigation with no charges made. People can draw their own conclusions…..I have issues with Lowe but on this none of my conclusions are favourable to Reform.
It does not really matter if Perry is correct about Rupert Lowe and Ben Habib.
The laws of mathematics would apply even if they were both angels from Heaven.
Splitting the right vote by setting up a new parties – plays into the hands of the left.
The main argument of both Rupert Lowe and Ben Habib is that Nigel Farage is out of date – that Mr Farage does not understand that “immigration” is no longer the main issue, if mass immigration had been ended in, say, 1968 (when Enoch Powell called for it to be ended) things would have been fine – but it is NOT 1968, or even 1997, it is 2026 – and now the main threat is from the NATURAL INCREASE (births) of hostile populations that are already here, Ben Habib adds that, as a man from Pakistan, he understands what Islam is better than Nigel Farage does – with Mr Farage thinking of religion as just a private (individual) belief system – which Islam is NOT.
Rupert Lowe and Ben Habib may be entirely correct about all of the above, but that does NOT alter the laws of mathematics.
Splitting the right vote is still a disaster.
“Advance U.K.” has picked a popular local person as its candidate in the by-election in the Manchester area – but he has no chance of winning the by-election.
“Reclaim Britain” may well pick Carl Benjamin (“Sargon of Akkad”) as its candidate at the next by-election – and Carl Benjamin is an intelligent man, but he also has no chance of winning an election.
I am reminded of the claims of Imperial Japanese commanders that “spirit”, courage, could overcome the basic laws of warfare – of logistics.
They were mistaken – “spirit” can not overcome the laws of warfare, or the laws that govern elections.
Imperial Japanese soldiers were starved of supplies, indeed (sometimes) even literally starved – of food (“we can fight for ever on a handful of rice” was proved to be incorrect), and the candidates of Advance U.K. and Reclaim Britain have no chance at all of winning elections.
“But we are correct about…..” – it-does-not-matter.
Martin – yes the treatment of Mr Lowe, lying about him and bringing in the British police, was bad. It was the work of Zia Yusuf – but Mr Farage does appear to have gone along with it.
Politics is a despicable thing.
If I had my life over again I would avoided politics – and become a librarian.
Sure, which is yet another reason to dislike Lowe as he spends more Twitter time attacking Reform than Labour. But I’m not unduly concerned as I also suspect a year from now people will be saying “Rupert Who?”
Yes, the fact that none of them criticised the police sending armed units and seizing Lowe’s legal property forces me to conclude that Yusuf, Farage, Tice, Anderson supported it. Had Starmer done anything similar towards any of them they’d be making comparisons to Stalinism I’m sure of it.
Paul Marks – “Splitting the right vote by setting up a new parties – plays into the hands of the left.”
We know this, Paul. It has been decided by a great number of people on the right that the above is a price worth paying if it helps to destroy the Conservative Party. It has already been decided. And while a certain amount of Advance/Reclaim tomfoolery is to be expected, I am not at all sure that this is just the Establishment trying to obstruct a Reform breakthrough.
When I first heard this announcement I thought “Not a chance.” Sure, he has a lot of supporters amongs the Xing classes but I doubt if more than 1% of the population know who he is. And then I heard a poll had Restore on 10%. After 2 days! And then I noticed his tweet had got 30m views.
10% in the polls would put you in a very strong position when negotiating with Farage.
True. If Restore fails to pick up more than say 1% of the vote in any constituency where they stand it may not matter much, but if they take e.g. 10% that could easily deny a Reform victory. The best hope for the supporters of the new right wing parties is that one, and only one of them gains enough traction to be a contender for government, destroying the Tories along the way.
There’s another aspect of the present situation to consider in the UK. At the moment, we have 5 parties that each poll in the ~15% to ~30% range for UK general elections, i.e. Reform, Tories, Labour, Greens, and Lib Dems. The first past the post electoral system could be quite unpredictable in the resulting distribution of seats across these parties. If Restore manage to gain significant traction without killing Reform or the Tories, then we’d have 6 parties in this vote range with even more unpredictability.
I thus suspect we’re in for a sustained period of electoral instability. When the old Liberals split after WWI and went into decline, it took until the end of WWII for their successor to achieve a majority government. In the meantime, the 20s and 30s formed a period with a lot of minority and national governments. That was the impact of having one of the previously major parties sinking, resulting in a long period before its replacement finally displaced them. With both of the previously major parties sinking, and their votes peeling off to potential replacements, might it take even longer before a new duopoly is established? Assuming of course that the push for PR doesn’t succeed in such circumstances.
Finally, the Greens appear to making a concerted effort to grab the Muslim vote from Labour – what Konstantin Kisin has called the ‘green-green’ alliance. In this scenario unpredictable election results could throw up governments that pander more strongly to Muslims and Islamists than we’ve seen so far.
We shall see if this vote splitting is important in the Manchester area by-election – Advance U.K. (Ben Habib’s party) has picked a popular local candidate – he will NOT win, but he might pick up enough votes to give the seat to the (utterly totalitarian – tyranny supporting) Green Party.
Rupert Lowe is a good constituency Member of Parliament, and his inquiry into the Islamic Rape Gangs is very important – and he was also treated very badly by the Reform Party. However, I still think his setting up a new political party is a mistake.
I absolutely don’t believe that 10% number has any baring on reality. Also Farage would need to have a screw loose to talk to Lowe let alone negotiate with him. If Lowe can’t see the bigger picture, which he obviously can’t, treat him like any other chancer & ignore him.
It is a LITTLE bit funny to read the Reformists complaining that Restore will split the vote and result in a conservative loss.
It’s true. But it’s still a little bit funny.
Then:
Tories: We’re triangulating, trying to build a coalition across ideologies, it’s all the art of the possible.
Reform: You’re too compromised, too wishy-washy, might as well be progressive.
Now:
Reform: We’re triangulating, trying to build a coalition across ideologies, it’s all the art of the possible.
Restore: You’re too compromised, too wishy-washy, might as well be progressive.
It’s true. They now have more MPs who have been formerly Conservative MPs than have never been Conservative MPs and their rhetoric sounds increasingly like the Conservatives.
There is some truth in the warnings about vote splitting. But the argument ‘if you don’t vote for us you’ll get Labour’ is why we got Harold Macmillan, Ted Heath, John Major, David Cameron, and Boris Johnson. So if Reform are going to resort to this type of rhetoric, experience would suggest to be prepared for disappointment.
To be honest if my former employer had conspired to have my house raided by armed police over some obviously fake accusations, I’d probably not see the bigger picture.
The key difference is “conservative rhetoric” from anyone in the Conservative Party can be ignored, as what the party says & what they do has very little relationship. Why? Because there is an institutional soggy wet core in the Tory Party that is entirely willing to defenestrate the party leader if they *actually* try to change anything by acting on their words.
Reform is a very different creature institutionally and that matters. They don’t have to worry about the Heseltines & Clarkes et al, the “grown-ups”, the pro-civil service “safe pair of hands” grandees who saturate the party. Former Conservatives in Reform can say conservative things and have some hope this might actually get put into action.
The conversation assumes that elected politicians are actually “in charge”.
I doubt that is the case in the United Kingdom – either locally or nationally.
@Paul Marks and others
Well I, for one, am looking for a bit of hope.
This is where Farage is very good. He portrays, almost embodies, an optimistic outlook.
Clovis Sangrail – that is true.
For example, walking home today I bumped into one of the new councilors, elected last May, who reminded me of Mr Farage’s visit to Kettering last year – and how effective a campaigner he was.
What Mr Farage said was nonsense “send in the auditors” (as if North Northants Unitary Authority did not spend thousands of Pounds on auditors, internal and external, every year) – but it made voters think that things would be better, would improve, if they voted for the Reform Party.
Nothing actually is better (we both agreed on that), the roads are more full of potholes than ever, the Council Tax continues to increase at the maximum, and so on – but what mattered was giving people the impression that things would improve.
https://x.com/Nigel_Farage/status/2023740914514993169
Nigel Farage admits the real reason why he threw Rupert Lowe out of Reform.
The OP said this about the impression of Lowe: “”to the right of Genghis Khan.” I’m curious, in what way was Genghis Khan right wing? I’m pretty sure he was not for smaller government, and he was definitely pro immigration — he immigrated his troops all over Asia.
I think it is part of the “right of XXX” theme, where XXX is a bad historical character like Hitler, or Mussolini or maybe Satan. Hitler and Mussolini were both pretty left wing as far as I can see. Though I’m not 100% sure where Satan stands on the issues.
We shouldn’t accept that sort of crap.
Fraser Orr: the new prog shorthand is, we are evil. So, “Right” is evil. So, “further to the right” simply means, more evil. No more subtle ideas about political philosophies.
This allergy to strong leaders is why nothing all that serious will ever get done, and the left keeps winning.
He’ll not win in the first place because of his distain for the centre, so his leadership doesn’t matter a damn. And without the centre, it’s all just political pantomime, shrill headbangers jeering from the cheap seats. And that would be a damn shame.
At most, if Restore gains a modicum of traction beyond EthNat twitter (I have my doubts), they can make it hard for Reform to win marginal seats, probably leading to a decade of Labour-Green government. And that would mean literally lights out for Britain.
“the centre”
Nigel Farage started his campaign for UK to leave EU in the 1990s. For many, many years he was viewed by “the centre” as a bit of a loon, a crank extremist. Nigel didn’t change his position to appeal to the center, he focused on his message and delivered his message consistently over many years. Eventually large swaths of the centre came ’round to his view and Brexit happened. Took about 20 years or so.
Great political leaders don’t cater to the centre when the centre is wrong (and it’s almost always wrong). The key is to deliver a message that causes the centre to move, to change its opinion on something important.
I’m not trying to persuade you that Rupert Lowe is right or wrong or that what he is trying to do will work or not work. I’m just saying what great and strong political leaders do.
Regarding “lights out for Britain” – a firm kick in the pants might not be the end of the world, especially if changing the opinions of the centre is considered a worthwhile endeavor.
Expect a decade of Labour-Green if the target audience is remigration maximalists.
The way is to move this is incrementally… criminal action by foreigner? Auto-deport for anything worse than a speeding ticket, that’s not controversial. No welfare at all for non-UK nationals will outrage the Left but not controversial in the middle. Gradually extend to NHS as well. That’s what Farage will do. Lowe will demand the Sturm und Drang approach because that’s what he’s like. And it’s why he’d fail. First generation citizenship should be revokable, but FFS don’t try and deport people because they are “wogs”. The flak Reform Sikhs have taken from elements of the supposed “right” (whatever that means) is unsurprising & actually presents Reform with opportunities to differentiate from Restore in statistically useful ways (Farage is probably getting déjà vu from UKIP days). Likewise, dark muttering about Jews by more than a few Lowe boosters is hard to miss in twitter.
@Perry de Havilland (Prague)
And that would mean literally lights out for Britain.
Sometimes that is just a figure of speech.
Ben Habib seems to have joined up with Rupert Lowe – and Mr Lowe is claiming 70 thousand members and growing.
On the other hand – the argument of Mr Farage and others that this is just vote splitting, seems sound.
As for the Conservative Party – excellent event on Shrove Tuesday – meeting people I have known for so many years. But the hang over of 14 years “in office but not in power” is a bit much to overcome.
People are quite impressed with Kemi Bedernoch – but have not forgiven the Conservative Party for 14 years of in-office-but-not-in-power.
Please! I was already sold on the man!
“splitting the right vote by setting up new parties – plays into the hands of the left.”
That depends on your definition of right and left.
Steve D
Yes it does – but I would rather have Nigel Farage or Kemi Badenock as Prime Minister than Sir Keir Starmer or Sir “Ed” Davy.
It is true that ending mass immigration would NOT, in the long run, save Britain – it is too late, natural increase (births) of hostile populations have taken over. But ending mass immigration would delay the destruction of this land – so that those of us who are old could live out what remains of our lives in a place that was sort-of England.
And I believe that both Nigel Farage and Kemi Badenock (yes Kemi as well – in spite of her own origins) are sincere when they say they will end mass immigration – although neither would undertake the mass deportations that are needed to actually save the nation – sadly saving the nation does not appear to be an option.
The establishment (including the Monarch) would never tolerate mass deportations – but they might (might) tolerate an end to mass immigration.
And, as stated above, ending mass immigration would delay the process of the destruction of England – it would give us a few more years.
And a few more years are worth having.
It’s the weekend before a big by election Reform have a chance of winning, although polls suggest Green Party lead is increasing. Green Party leader Zack Polanski visited the constituency on Friday.
Where’s Farage? Making a spectacle of himself in the Maldive Islands. Guess by this time next week we’ll see if it helped their campaign or not.