Tory collapse continues: has Reform UK’s chance finally arrived? Or is there still a vacuum in patriotic politics?

Ben Habib (above right) with his party leader Richard Tice. He achieved Reform UK’s highest ever vote yesterday at the Wellingborough parliamentary by-election.

Regular H&D readers will know that we have been very critical of Reform UK’s ideological and organisational failures. Their results in actual elections have consistently failed to match their opinion poll ratings. Lacking a serious activist base in most of the country, they have relied on hype from Nigel Farage and his friends on certain newspapers (and at the GB News channel).

Today’s parliamentary by-elections in Kingswood (near Bristol), and Wellingborough (in Northamptonshire), seem to have shown that Reform UK has at last started to attract real votes in real ballot boxes.

Whatever our differences with Reform UK on a wide range of issues, their Wellingborough candidate Ben Habib deserves considerable credit for his earlier activism in Ulster, where together with Baroness Hoey, TUV leader Jim Allister and others he showed genuine commitment and intelligence in exposing the true nature of Sunak’s treacherous border deal. The Conservative Party – and even some so-called Ulster Unionists – have shamefully betrayed the Union, whereas Ben Habib has striven genuinely to uphold it.

Though it might seem paradoxical, many H&D readers will therefore have welcomed the fact that Mr Habib this week polled the highest ever Reform UK vote – 13%.

Just two hours earlier in Kingswood, Reform UK’s candidate Rupert Lowe polled 10.8%, which at that point was itself easily the best vote ever achieved by the party since it emerged from the former Brexit Party.

Earlier this morning Rupert Lowe in Kingswood became the first Reform UK parliamentary candidate to poll above 10%.

While congratulating Reform UK on these much-improved results, we should bear in mind that if their opinion poll scores were anywhere near accurate, they ought to be polling at least 15% in Kingswood and closer to 20% in Wellingborough, in by-election circumstances that tend to favour “protest votes”, and with so many “right-wing” voters having deserted the Tories.

The old UKIP polled 14.8% in Kingswood in 2015. Of course, UKIP is now a joke fringe party. In this latest by-election they managed only 0.5%.

It was also a very disappointing night for the anti-Muslim party Britain First, whose candidate in Wellingborough, Alex Merola, finished 8th with only 1.6%.

Britain First and their supporters now have to ask themselves two questions.

Most fundamentally, they should question whether there is political space for another non-racial, civic nationalist party competing with the much more professional Reform UK. It’s certainly necessary to expose the fact that Reform UK is essentially a system party, committed to neo-Thatcherite “free market” capitalism, and with no serious solution to the catastrophe of multiracialism.

But that serious solution – that serious challenge – needs to go beyond civic nationalism, and cannot consist merely of Britain First’s Islam-obsession.

And secondly, even if one adopts a more cynical and limited view of political struggle, one has to question the basic competence of an avowedly anti-Muslim party which wasted its time and its donors’ money in Wellingborough, while failing to field a candidate in Rochdale, a constituency which would seem to offer a perfect audience for Britain First’s message.

Yet again, the remnants of the post-BNP British nationalist movement have shown themselves to be devoid of both political principle and strategic awareness.

We can and must do better. The present situation is a shameful betrayal of our heritage and our people’s future. Within the next year, there will almost certainly be a Labour government with Keir Starmer as Prime Minister. It is vital that there is a serious racial nationalist challenge to that government.

The mystery of the disappearing candidate

On Saturday the anti-Muslim party Britain First shared a “Huge Announcement” with their members and supporters on social media, even sending out a special fundraising email.

Party chairman Ashlea Simon was to be the party’s candidate at the forthcoming Rochdale parliamentary by-election, following the death of Labour MP Sir Tony Lloyd. Her leader Paul Golding rightly pointed out that Rochdale is notorious for the “grooming” scandal, involving the abuse of young girls by men of mainly Pakistani origin.

As recently as 15th January, yet another official report documented the failure of Greater Manchester Police, social services and Rochdale Council – all of whom betrayed these girls and their families.

Golding told his followers that Ashlea Simon would be an ideal candidate who would prove “a staunch voice for the victims in the town”. He predicted there was a “strong chance” that she could defeat the established parties and be elected MP for Rochdale.

Britain First’s campaign was announced on Twitter, by email and on its website even after the official list of candidates showed that they were not in fact contesting this election. Where is the money going?

Britain First’s leader confirmed that he and other party officials were already “organising behind the scenes to get the campaign launched, including designing the banners, leaflets, placards, postal voter letters etc.”

When we read this announcement at H&D, it’s fair to say we were surprised – because the official list of candidates for this by-election had already been published the previous day, and Ms Simon was not among them.

In other words Paul Golding was soliciting donations for a non-existent campaign. Meanwhile he was sitting down with the notorious grifter ‘Tommy Robinson’ to make yet another video for his gullible followers.

We don’t know how Mr Golding intends to spend the money raised by these fundraising emails and social media posts, but one thing’s for sure. It can’t be spent on a parliamentary election campaign in Rochdale – because Britain First and Ashlea Simon are not contesting this Rochdale by-election!

Raising money for a non-existent campaign is tragic enough, but at this same Rochdale by-election Britain First’s rivals in the civic nationalist party Reform UK have dragged politics into the realms of farce.

Reform UK’s candidate in this by-election (where allegations of “grooming” are bound to become a central campaign issue) is Simon Danczuk, who was Labour MP for Rochdale from 2010 to 2017.

Mr Danczuk was suspended from the Labour Party in 2015 for sending “inappropriate” texts to a teenage girl. He shamelessly contested Rochdale as an independent in 2017 but lost his deposit with a mere 1.8% of the vote.

Reform UK’s Rochdale candidate – disgraced ex-MP Simon Danczuk – on a recent holiday in Singapore with his Rwandan bride Coco.

The ex-MP has recently married an African beauty therapist whom he met on a “business trip” to Rwanda: the happy couple plan to adopt a Rwandan baby, and doubtless if he returns to Parliament they will be able to adopt an entire houseful of happy African infants.

In other words, while the Tory government is trying (but dismally failing) to export illegal immigrants and asylum seekers to Rwanda, Reform UK’s latest parliamentary candidate is eagerly importing Rwandans to England.

You really couldn’t make it up: but this is entirely consistent with the “civic nationalism” espoused by Richard Tice, Nigel Farage and the fake patriots of Reform UK.

Rochdale voters deserve better. Whether the racial nationalist alternative comes from the British Democrats, the recently launched Homeland Party, from Patriotic Alternative (once they are registered as a political party), or from some electoral alliance between them, it has never been more obvious that the UK needs a movement prepared to defend our islands and our people.

Rishi Sunak’s ‘Conservative’ Party in crisis facing two new by-election tests

Rishi Sunak – the UK’s first Hindu Prime Minister – now seems to need divine intervention if he is to avoid electoral disaster.

This week senior members of Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party – which now seems unable to conserve anything worthwhile – are openly plotting his removal, desperate to avoid electoral annihilation.

A general election is certain at some point within the next 12 months: the latest legal date is 28th January 2025, but few observers think it will be delayed beyond mid-November.

More immediately the ruling party has to defend by-elections on 15th February in two traditionally ‘safe’ Tory seats: Kingswood (near Bristol), and Wellingborough (a market town and surrounding towns and villages in Northamptonshire).

In each case the candidates will include two from parties to the ‘right’ of the Conservatives. Wellingborough in particular will be seen as a big test for Reform UK, the party effectively owned by former UKIP and Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage, but for the time being led by Farage’s close associate Richard Tice.

Pakistani-born Ben Habib (the party’s deputy leader) is Reform UK’s candidate in Wellingborough.

Ben Habib (above right), Reform UK candidate at the Wellingborough by-election, with his party leader Richard Tice.

The anti-Islamist party Britain First also has a candidate in Wellingborough – Alex Merola, who will be well known to some H&D readers as a longstanding patriotic activist.

Meanwhile in Kingswood, Reform UK’s candidate is another of their stable of millionaires, making us wonder whether it is compulsory to be a City trader or property tycoon to have a senior role with Tice and Farage?

This time it’s the peripatetic property developer Rupert Lowe, most famous to sports fans for his time as chairman of Southampton FC. Mr Lowe was a Brexit Party MEP for the West Midlands from 2019-20, and as far back as 1997 was a parliamentary candidate for Sir James Goldsmith’s Referendum Party.

Also on the ballot paper in Kingswood is another civic nationalist candidate, Nicholas Wood of UKIP, who is a former Surrey County Council candidate. UKIP is now a feeble shadow of its former self, and the party’s remaining activists are probably less interested in the Kingswood campaign than in the internal contest to be the party’s new leader following Neil Hamilton’s imminent retirement. The most likely bet seems to be that Anne Marie Waters, former leader of the defunct For Britain Movement, will complete her political comeback and succeed Hamilton, having only last year rejoined UKIP.

Once these two by-elections are over, attention will shift to the next parliamentary contest in Rochdale (following the recent death of Labour MP Tony Lloyd), where the most interesting battle will be for the Labour nomination, with several Asian candidates seeking to become the town’s first ethnic minority MP.

Tory slump continues: civic nationalists still struggling for relevance

Reform UK leader Richard Tice with his Tamworth by-election candidate Ian Cooper and campaign team

Yesterday’s parliamentary by-elections showed Rishi Sunak’s Conservative government heading for a 1997-style landslide defeat. Despite this Tory collapse, civic nationalist parties are nowhere near the level of support that they enjoyed in the pre-Brexit era.

Each of the by-elections was in a very White constituency, so Labour’s victories owed nothing to ethnic minority support. Mid Bedfordshire is a very affluent collection of villages and small towns, and has never previously elected a Labour MP. Tamworth is more mixed socially (though not racially), with far more working-class voters, and was strongly pro-Brexit. Under its earlier name SE Staffordshire, but with similar boundaries, it fell to Labour at a by-election in 1996 and in the Blair landslide a year later, but at other times has been solidly Tory.

Apart from the Tories, the biggest losers were the United Kingdom Independence Party. UKIP polled 18.5% in Tamworth at the pre-Brexit general election in 2015, but yesterday UKIP candidate Robert Bilcliff managed only 1.7%.

Heritage Party Alberto Thomas polled only 0.2% in Mid Bedfordshire for the fast disappearing UKIP splinter group

The Heritage Party – a UKIP splinter group that in recent years has specialised in peddling conspiracy theories and anti-vaccination campaigns – had an even more embarrassing result in Mid Bedfordshire, where Heritage candidate Alberto Thomas polled only 0.2%. Just slightly ahead of Mr Thomas with 0.3% was Antonio Vitiello for the English Democrats (a party that has just reached an electoral pact with UKIP).

After these results there are bound to be serious questions as to whether UKIP, the Heritage Party or the English Democrats have any future in electoral politics. The EDs do at least have a rationale for continued existence, as they have the distinctive policy of campaigning for an English Parliament.

The much better-funded Reform UK again proved itself to be (by far) the strongest of the civic nationalist parties, and in Tamworth their candidate Ian Cooper managed to save his deposit, the first Reform UK candidate to achieve this since party leader Richard Tice almost two years ago in Old Bexley & Sidcup.

Mr Cooper polled 5.4% and finished in third place, at last breaking his party’s miserable run of twelve lost deposits.

But it’s important to recognise the following factors:

  • Tamworth was a very strongly pro-Brexit constituency;
  • The circumstances of this by-election, caused by the resignation of a Tory MP who was found to have made repeated homosexual assaults while drunk, were obviously ideal for a right-of-centre, ‘protest vote’ party.
  • The Conservative vote collapsed, but lifelong Tories chose to stay at home and were not inspired by Reform UK’s lukewarm civic nationalism.
  • A significant number of voters would have been confused by the Reform UK candidate having the same surname as the Tory candidate – previous research has shown that this type of confusion is always a factor (though only a minor one) when there are two candidates on the ballot paper with the same surname.

It’s not unduly cynical to point out that in each of yesterday’s by-elections, Reform UK just happened to select candidates who had the same name as one of the rival candidates from a major party. In Mid Bedfordshire, Reform UK’s Dave Holland lost his deposit but managed 3.6%, no doubt helped slightly by the non-coincidence that the Liberal Democrat candidate was named Emma Holland-Lindsay.

UKIP’s Tamworth by-election candidate had a regularly updated Facebook page but a less impressive campaign organisation on the streets: he polled only 1.7%

It’s a shame that Reform UK is so bereft of serious policies and serious ideological inspiration that it resorts to these shabby tricks, but even with the benefit of such ploys it’s becoming obvious that Richard Tice’s party is on the road to nowhere. Reform UK is at most a minor irritant costing the Tories a few hundred votes and will perhaps hand a few extra seats to Labour as Keir Starmer heads for Downing Street next year, but the party has nothing more to offer.

One much smaller party will be reasonably satisfied with their result. Britain First took a big gamble in choosing to stand in Tamworth where their candidate – deputy party leader Ashlea Simon – has no local connections. However, Ms Simon and party leader Paul Golding perceived that Tamworth is strongly pro-Brexit and felt that especially the White working-class section of its electorate might prove receptive to Britain First’s message.

After carrying out a serious and energetic campaign in Tamworth, Ms Simon polled 2.3% and finished in fourth place (ahead of the Greens and Liberal Democrats).

Britain First took the gamble of fighting a serious by-election campaign in Tamworth and achieved fourth place with 2.3%: not brilliant but certainly not a disaster. They will see this as a result to build on.

H&D is not especially sympathetic to Britain First’s brand of civic nationalism, with its intense focus on hostility to Islam and its insistence on multi-racialism. But we can see that while this is far from an outstanding result, it is much better than the three previous large scale BF campaigns, at the Rochester & Strood and Wakefield by-elections, and the 2016 London mayoral election.

In short, this was not a great result for Ms Simon, but certainly not a disaster – bearing in mind that the party has far less resources than Reform UK and does not enjoy the regular hype on GB News that is still given to Tice’s party.

With the BNP moribund, the NF barely functioning as an electoral party, neither PA nor the Homeland Party yet being registered, and the British Democrats yet to take off as a significant force at the ballot box, Mr Golding and Ms Simon will be regarded by some H&D readers as the next best thing to having a real racial nationalist party.

However, for some of us the lesson of this week’s by-elections is that all forms of civic nationalism are failing – not only failing to offer principled opposition to the zeitgeist, but also failing in their own terms at even the shabbiest and most ‘pragmatic’ level of politics.

The 4.6% polled at yesterday’s Mid Bedfordshire by-election by a local parish councillor standing as an independent parliamentary candidate – and the low turnouts in both constituencies (especially Tamworth) – show the extent of public disillusionment with the mainstream parties. Some form of nationalist party ought to be capable of getting its act together and mobilising this disillusionment, even with only a fraction of the funds that have been wasted on UKIP, Reform UK and various pro-Brexit splinter parties.

When is a party a “major party”?

Many H&D readers will recently have received a fundraising email from Britain First, stating that they have been classed as a “major party” by the Electoral Commission and consequently must find £6,000 to pay for the auditing of their accounts.

Some might (wrongly) imagine that this “major party” status has something to do with election results or with the number of candidates that a party stands.

In fact it seems to be largely a financial matter. Any party whose income or expenditure (or both) is over £250,000 must file audited accounts, which are published on the Electoral Commission’s website.

The most recent accounts of this type relate to the year ending December 2021, when nineteen parties fell into this category.

TUV leader Jim Allister

Some of these are the obvious “major parties” but there were some interesting anomalies. For example, Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV), which by normal reckoning might be thought a “major party” in Northern Ireland, where its leader Jim Allister is a member of the Stormont Assembly, was not among the nineteen parties with turnover above £250,000.

However, a tiny vanity party – the London Real Party, formed to support the London mayoral campaign of American-born podcaster Brian Rose – had income of £280,114 and expenditure of £273,540.

Even a tiny Marxist sect, the Socialist Party of Great Britain, had income of £551,810.

Reclaim Party leader Laurence Fox

But the most extraordinary anomaly is that the Reclaim Party, led by actor Laurence Fox, reported income of £1,850,002 – considerably more than Sinn Fein, Northern Ireland’s largest party, the long established political wing of the supposedly dormant terrorist IRA.

Sinn Fein’s reported income was £1,532,946.

Readers can judge for themselves which party’s donors (perhaps including unwilling donors in Sinn Fein’s case) obtained better value for money. Reclaim seems to have contested just three elections during 2021: receiving 1.9% in the London mayoral election, 0.3% in the Glasgow Pollok constituency at the Scottish parliamentary election; and a fraction under 1% at the North Shropshire parliamentary by-election.

Local Elections 2023

Julian Leppert (above centre) with the British Democrat team at his election count today

for updated list of this year’s nationalist results, click here

England’s last racial nationalist councillor – Julian Leppert in Waltham Abbey Paternoster ward, Epping Forest – was defeated in Thursday’s elections. Julian polled 187 votes (25.2%), which is likely to be the best nationalist election result this year, but lost his seat to a Conservative candidate.

This year Julian was standing as a British Democrat, having been elected four years ago for the now-defunct For Britain Movement (and having been a BNP councillor a decade ago).

Julian Leppert (second right) celebrating his election as an Epping Forest councillor four years ago: he lost his seat this week.

Most of England held local elections on 4th May – a first chance for voters to give a verdict on the latest reinvention of the Conservative Party under Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. These elections were also a final chance for Reform UK, the civic nationalist party that grew out of Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party but has so far failed to make any serious impact.

For H&D readers, one of the most interesting results was in Walkden North ward, Salford, where Ashlea Simon of Britain First polled 405 votes (18.2%).

This was down from 508 votes (21.6%) last year, but realistically it was another good result for Ms Simon and her party, given that this year they faced opposition from Reform UK, who finished bottom of the poll with only 68 votes (3.0%).

Britain First candidate Ashlea Simon with her campaign team at last night’s election count in Salford

Britain First focused a great deal of effort on this Salford campaign, and the result contrasted with nearby Broadheath ward, Trafford, where their candidate Donald Southworth polled 153 votes (3.6%). Paul Harding managed 214 votes (13.1%) in Hockley & Ashingdon ward, Rochford; Nick Lambert 108 votes (12.6%) in Ballard ward, New Forest; and Nick Scanlon 61 votes (10.2%) in Darenth ward, Dartford. The Britain First candidates in Bideford South ward, Torridge, polled 15%, benefiting from the fact that the Tories did not contest the ward. Ironically the second-worst Britain First result was for their leader Paul Golding, who polled 6.9% in Swanscombe ward, Dartford.

Former BNP councillor Graham Partner achieved another of the best nationalist results overnight, with 94 votes (15.9%) as independent candidate for Hermitage ward, NW Leicestershire. Another nationalist standing without a party label was David Hyden, backed by activists from the new Homeland Party: he polled 81 votes (5.7%) in Cannock South ward, Cannock Chase.

The National Front’s sole candidate this year was Tim Knowles, who polled 40 votes (1.8%) in Codnor, Langley Mill & Aldercar, Amber Valley.

One of England’s newest (civic) nationalist parties – the National Housing Party UK – had three candidates this year. Callum Leat polled 228 votes (10.3%) in Dodington ward, South Gloucestershire. Former BNP and For Britain Movement activist Gary Bergin polled 149 votes (4.1%) in Claughton ward, Wirral. And NHPUK leader John Lawrence polled 205 votes (7.6%) in Hollinwood ward, Oldham.

Dr Andrew Emerson, a former BNP candidate who has for some years been the sole candidate of his own small party Patria, polled 6.4% in Chichester East ward, Chichester.

The first British Democrat results overnight were in Essex. In Kursaal ward, Southend, former East London BNP activist Steve Smith polled 42 votes (2.6%), finishing narrowly ahead of a candidate from the Heritage Party (a civic nationalist splinter from UKIP) who polled 2.1%. Mr Smith’s Brit Dem colleague Chris Bateman fared slightly better in Laindon Park ward, Basildon, with 89 votes (4.2%).

The British Democrats had better news during today’s counts, with Julian Leppert’s 25.2% (see above) being easily the best nationalist result this year, though David Haslett faced a tough campaign in the multiracial Saffron ward, Leicester, and polled 34 votes (1.9%). In Wyke ward, Bradford, Brit Dem leader Dr Jim Lewthwaite polled 140 votes (5.1%), finishing five votes ahead of a Reform UK opponent.

Steve Smith’s 2.6% in Southend was one of the overnight British Democrat results

Some very poor overnight results for Reform UK indicated that they have very little genuine local activism, despite high profile backing at national level from the likes of Nigel Farage and GB News. (Speaking of GB News, one of their political commentators Sophie Corcoran was heavily defeated as Tory candidate for Chadwell St Mary ward, Thurrock.)

Even in Lichfield, where former Tory mayor Barry Gwilt defected to Reform UK earlier this year, neither Mr Gwilt nor any other Reform UK candidate stood for election this week.

The only good news for Reform UK so far has been in by far their best branch – Derby – where they retained six seats across their two wards, Alvaston North and Alvaston South.

Alan Graves (above, third left) is one of very few successful branch organisers in Reform UK: his Derby branch retained six city council seats.

One of the very few really active Reform UK branches is in Bolton, where they had 34 candidates, but none were elected. (Their strongest Bolton vote was 17% in Farnworth North.)

Even in areas such as Lincolnshire’s South Kesteven council (which includes Margaret Thatcher’s birthplace Grantham), where Sunak’s Conservatives lost many votes and seats, the ‘protest vote’ went to independents rather than to Reform UK or any of the UKIP splinter parties (two of which have already closed down). It seems that the Farage era is very definitely over.

Further confirmation of this came from Boston, another Lincolnshire council, which was one of the main UKIP and Brexit Party target areas of the past decade. UKIP lost their last remaining Boston council seat yesterday. Reform UK contested just one Boston ward, where they finished with only 4%, behind an English Democrat candidate on 7%.

English Democrat leader Robin Tilbrook polled 10.3% in Shelley ward, Epping Forest. Nationwide the EDs had five candidates, including Steve and Val Morris in Bury who polled 6.1% and 2.9% respectively.

Election counts continued this afternoon. H&D will have full reports and analysis on results as they arrive throughout the day.

(There were no elections this week in Scotland or Wales. Northern Ireland’s local elections are on 18th May.)

Ex-BNP official suspended by Tories

Andy McBride’s political journey took him from the Labour Party to Nick Griffin’s BNP, then via Britain First to Rishi Sunak’s Tories.

A former senior official in Nick Griffin’s BNP has been exposed in Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party. The Tories have suspended Andy McBride from party membership, but he remains a Conservative candidate on the ballot paper for Bracknell Town Council in Berkshire.

During the late 2000s McBride became notorious as an especially factional and obstreperous BNP official. As regional organiser for South East England, he was a bitter enemy of H&D and sought to obstruct or even purge Griffin’s enemies from BNP ranks. His targets included well known supporters of former BNP leader John Tyndall, including the late Richard Edmonds and Warren Glass.

Now it is McBride himself who is being purged from his new party. He is accused not only of past roles in the BNP and Britain First, but of allegedly ‘racist’ posts on social media.

Jim Dowson (left) with his on-off political and business partner Nick Griffin.

In 2011 McBride and his close ally, Ulster businessman Jim Dowson, resigned from the BNP and formed Britain First, together with former BNP official Paul Golding. Three years later, Dowson and McBride quit Britain First after a dispute with Golding. McBride made his way into the Conservative Party, while Dowson operates a series of Ulster-based fundraising enterprises alongside Nick Griffin.

McBride has written several garbled, ideologically incoherent replies to recent exposés by local newspapers. In his way, McBride is probably a sincere Christian whose politics are fundamentally reactionary and anti-Muslim rather than racial nationalist, but who ventures into colourful language and politically incorrect metaphors on social media.

The sad end to his political career shows that old-fashioned reactionaries have no future in today’s ‘woke’ Conservative Party. But equally, the fact that someone as ideologically vacuous as McBride ever became a BNP regional organiser is a damning indictment of the Griffin era.

UK Local Elections 2023

Nominations have closed for more than 8,000 contests at this year’s local elections in England and Wales. (Northern Ireland’s council elections have a slightly different timescale, and there are no elections in Scotland this year.)

The nationalist and broadly patriotic cause in the UK is still going through its post-Brexit transition, and this is reflected in the small numbers of candidates from racial nationalist parties. You can find a comprehensive list of candidates and parties by clicking this link, but these are the main headlines.

Cllr Julian Leppert (above right) with controversial columnist Katie Hopkins
  • The British Democrats are the main electorally focused racial nationalist movement, and have five candidates this year, including Julian Leppert who will be defending the seat he won four years ago in Waltham Abbey Paternoster ward, Epping Forest. Mr Leppert won that seat as a candidate of the now defunct For Britain Movement, but he joined the Brit Dems after FBM leader Anne-Marie Waters closed down her party.
  • Britain First, led by former BNP official Paul Golding, is the main electoral voice of the anti-Islam movement. It is in principle a non-racial, anti-Islam party, though it includes several veteran racial nationalists. They have eight candidates this year, and their main campaign is likely to be in Walkden North, Salford, where Ashlea Simon will seek to build on the 21.6% she won last year.
  • Another anti-Islamist party which has grown slightly during the past year is the National Housing Party, which has three candidates this year, including former BNP and FBM activist Gary Bergin in Claughton ward, Wirral.
  • Patriotic Alternative (the country’s most active racial nationalist movement) is still not registered as a political party and therefore unable to contest elections.
  • The British National Party, which during the 2000s won many council seats and elected two Members of the European Parliament, has effectively ceased to exist: once again this year there are no BNP candidates anywhere in the UK, and in all likelihood there never will be again.
  • The National Front, which during the 1970s was one of Europe’s largest racial nationalist parties, still ticks over as a guardian of racial nationalist ideals, but has only one candidate this year: Tim Knowles in Codnor, Langley Mill & Aldercar ward, Amber Valley.
  • Former BNP organiser Dr Andrew Emerson is again standing in his home city of Chichester for his small party Patria.
  • Two nationalist independents are standing this year: former councillor Graham Partner in Coalville, NW Leicestershire, and Gary Butler in Shepway, Maidstone.
  • The English Democrats, who are a non-racial party but who campaign for an English Parliament as well as immigration restrictions and other issues of interest to H&D readers, have five candidates this year, including party leader Robin Tilbrook in Shelley ward, Epping Forest, and husband and wife team Steve and Val Morris in Bury. Two former ED activists have defected to the rival English Constitution Party and will stand in Barnsley.
  • Various civic nationalist parties that grew out of UKIP remain bitterly divided and ideologically confused. Reform UK (by far the largest and best funded) have 480 candidates this year, but unless they can make a serious impact this might be their last serious campaign. UKIP itself has only 48 candidates this year, while rival splinter groups include the Heritage Party with 64 (plus a mayoral candidate) and the Alliance for Freedom & Democracy with 23.
Essex solicitor Robin Tilbrook, leader of the English Democrats

(Please note that election reports and statistics on the H&D site do not usually include parish/town council elections. We only focus on the borough/district council level and above.)

Nigel Farage’s UK Independence Party (which was the main vehicle for the pro-Brexit cause) split in 2018 with Farage founding the Brexit Party, which eventually evolved into today’s Reform UK, led by Farage’s close associate Richard Tice.

Reform UK remains by far the largest vehicle for the broadly civic nationalist cause in the UK, but it is ideologically poles apart from most H&D readers. Tice’s party is blatantly non-racist, and economically liberal. H&D has long argued that the slow death of Reform UK (and of Farageist politics in general) is necessary before the British racial nationalist tradition can revive.

Richard Tice, leader of Reform UK

After at least two years of generally dismal election results, Reform UK has (on paper) done well to field 480 candidates at this year’s council elections. But it has very few serious functioning branches. Tice’s best branch by far is in Derby, where the entire council is up for re-election, including the six seats presently held by Reform UK who have a full slate of 51 candidates for the new council.

In addition to Derby, Reform UK has three other really substantial slates of candidates: Bolton (34), Amber Valley (28), and Sunderland (24).

Who is standing where in the 2023 local elections

Dr Jim Lewthwaite, leader of the British Democrats

On this page you will find a comprehensive list of nationalist results at the 2023 elections, and also lists from various parties that grew out of the pro-Brexit movement and that some would consider broadly nationalist/patriotic despite being multiracialist.

Nationalists standing this year included –

British Democrats: 5 candidates

Wyke ward, Bradford: Dr Jim Lewthwaite 140 votes (5.1%)
Laindon Park, Basildon: Chris Bateman 89 votes (4.2%)
Waltham Abbey Paternoster, Epping Forest: Julian Leppert 187 votes (25.2%)
Saffron, Leicester: Dave Haslett 34 votes (1.9%)
Kursaal, Southend: Steve Smith 42 votes (2.6%)

Britain First: 8 candidates

Darenth, Dartford: Nick Scanlon 61 votes (10.2%)
Swanscombe, Dartford: Paul Golding 107 votes (6.9%)
Ballard, New Forest: Nick Lambert 108 votes (12.6%)
Hockley & Ashingdon, Rochford: Paul Harding 214 votes (13.1%)
Walkden North, Salford: Ashlea Simon 405 votes (18.2%)
Bideford South, Torridge: Philip Green and Anne Townsend 108 and 96 votes (15.0%)
Broadheath, Trafford: Donald Southworth 153 votes (3.6%)

Tony Martin, chairman of the National Front, at the Cenotaph with the late Richard Edmonds

National Front: 1 candidate
Codnor, Langley Mill & Aldercar, Amber Valley: Tim Knowles 40 votes (1.8%)

Patria: 1 candidate
Chichester East, Chichester: Dr Andrew Emerson 92 votes (6.4%)

National Housing Party: 3 candidates
Hollinwood, Oldham: John Lawrence 205 votes (7.6%)
Dodington, South Gloucestershire: Callum Leat 228 votes (10.3%)
Claughton, Wirral: Gary Bergin 149 votes (4.1%)

Gary Bergin, National Housing Party candidate

English Democrats: 5 candidates
Old Leake & Wrangle, Boston: David Dickason 75 votes (7.0%)
Besses, Bury: Steve Morris 139 votes (6.1%)
Holyrood, Bury: Val Morris 102 votes (2.9%)
Leighton Linslade North, Central Bedfordshire: Antonio Vitiello 133 votes (4.0%)
Shelley, Epping Forest: Robin Tilbrook 34 votes (10.3%)

English Constitution Party: 2 candidates
Dearne North, Barnsley: Maxine Spencer 118 votes (8.2%)
Dearne South, Barnsley: Janus Polenceusz 37 votes (2.1%)

Independents:
Cannock South, Cannock Chase: David Hyden 81 votes (5.7%)
Shepway North, Maidstone: Gary Butler 114 votes (7.0%)
Hermitage, NW Leicestershire: Graham Partner 94 votes (15.9%)

A broader analysis of the results and their significance will appear on this website during the weekend. Candidates from civic nationalist and pro-Brexit parties included:

Richard Tice (above right) leader of Reform UK, with his close political ally Nigel Farage

Reform UK: 480 candidates
Amber Valley 28
Ashford 1
Barnsley 4
Basildon 1
Bedford 2
Blaby 1
Blackpool 5
Bolsover 1
Bolton 34
Boston 1
Bournemouth, Christchurch & Poole 1
Bracknell Forest 1
Bradford 3
Braintree 4
Breckland 2
Brentwood 1
Broadland 5
Bromsgrove 1
Bury 1
Canterbury 3
Castle Point 2
Central Bedfordshire 6
Charnwood 6
Cheshire East 2
Cheshire W & Chester 3
Chichester 2
Colchester 4
Coventry 1
Crawley 1
Dacorum 4
Dartford 5
Derby 51
Dover 1
Dudley 4
East Hampshire 3
East Herts 1
East Lindsey 1
East Riding of Yorks 4
East Staffs 2
Eastbourne 2
Eastleigh 1
Elmbridge 2
Epping Forest 2
Exeter 1
Fenland 1
Folkestone & Hythe 3
Fylde 1
Gateshead 1
Gravesham 3
Great Yarmouth 2
Halton 1
Harborough 1
Harlow 1
Hart 1
Hartlepool 10
Havant 1
Herefordshire 6
Hertsmere 2
High Peak 1
Hinckley & Bosworth 4
Horsham 2
Hull 1
Hyndburn 1
Ipswich 1
Kirklees 1
Leeds 3
Leicester 1
Lewes 1
Lincoln 5
Lincolnshire 1 [county council by-election]
Liverpool 1
Luton 2
Maidstone 1
Malvern Hills 2
Manchester 2
Mansfield 1
Medway 2
Mid Devon 1
Mid Suffolk 2
Milton Keynes 7
Newark & Sherwood 1
North Herts 2
North Kesteven 5
North Norfolk 2
North Tyneside 5
NW Leics 2
Peterborough 1
Plymouth 2
Portsmouth 2
Redcar & Cleveland 2
Reigate & Banstead 1
Rochford 2
Rugby 2
Runnymede 1
Rushcliffe 1
Rushmoor 1
St Albans 1
Salford 1
Sandwell 9
Sefton 1
Sevenoaks 1
Sheffield 5
South Gloucs 2
South Holland 1
South Kesteven 3
South Norfolk 1
South Oxfordshire 2
South Tyneside 1
Southampton 5
Spelthorne 2
Stafford 7
Staffs Moorlands 1
Stevenage 1
Stockport 4
Stockton-on-Tees 10
Stoke on Trent 1
Stratford on Avon 1
Sunderland 24
Surrey Heath 2
Swale 4
Tamworth 1
Teignbridge 1
Tendring 4
Thanet 2
Thurrock 3
Tonbridge & Malling 2
Trafford 2
Tunbridge Wells 1
Uttlesford 3
Vale of White Horse 1
Wakefield 2
Walsall 9
Warwick 1
Watford 5
Waverley 2
Wealden 1
Welwyn Hatfield 3
West Berkshire 2
West Devon 2
West Lindsey 6
West Suffolk 2
Wigan 3
Winchester 1
Windsor & Maidenhead 1
Wirral 5
Wolverhampton 1
Worcester 1
Worthing 1
Wychavon 2

UKIP leader and former Conservative minister Neil Hamilton

UKIP: 48 candidates
Braintree 1
Breckland 1
Brighton & Hove 3
Cambridge 1
Chelmsford 1
East Cambridgeshire 1
Eastbourne 3
Elmbridge 1
Folkestone & Hythe 1
Hinckley & Bosworth 1
North Lincs 1
North Tyneside 4
Nottingham 2
Pendle 1
Rother 10
South Staffs 2
Surrey 1 [county council by-election]
Tamworth 2
Tendring 1
Test Valley 1
Thurrock 1
Torridge 2
Warwick 1
Wealden 2
West Berkshire 1
Wigan 2

David Kurten: former UKIP leadership candidate, now leader of the Heritage Party (which as you might have guessed has absolutely no connection to H&D!!!)


Heritage Party: 64 council candidates + 1 Mayoral
Arun 3
Bedford – Mayoral Election
Bournemouth, Christchurch & Poole 1
Bracknell Forest 1
Braintree 1
Broadland 1
Burnley 1
Cambridge 1
Chelmsford 1
Chichester 1
Cotswold 1
Crawley 3
Dover 1
East Devon 1
East Hampshire 1
East Herts 1
East Suffolk 1
Elmbridge 3
Hart 1
Horsham 1
Ipswich 1
King’s Lynn & W Norfolk 1
Maidstone 1
Medway 1
Milton Keynes 1
North Lincs 1
N Warwicks 1
Plymouth 2
Runnymede 1
Rushmoor 1
Slough 1
South Hams 2
South Staffs 1
Southend 2
Swale 1
Tandridge 1
Teignbridge 7
Test Valley 1
Tonbridge & Malling 1
Warwick 1
Watford 1
West Berkshire 1
West Oxfordshire 2
Wigan 1
Woking 3
Wokingham 1
Worthing 1

Dr Teck Khong, leader of the Alliance for Democracy & Freedom. Perhaps someone will one day write an academic analysis of why so many ‘civic nationalist’ parties are led by non-Europeans?

Alliance for Democracy & Freedom: 23 candidates
Blackburn with Darwen 1
Broxtowe 1
Charnwood 1
Cheshire W & Chester 1
Coventry
1
East Riding of Yorks 1
Fenland 2
Fylde 1
Havant 1
Ipswich 1
Leicester 1
Oldham 3
Preston 1
Rochford 1
South Ribble 3
Wyre
3

By-election voters reject entire nationalist movement: time for a reboot

Boris Johnson’s premiership is in crisis after two by-election defeats: but voters also rejected the entire spectrum of nationalist parties

Two dramatic parliamentary by-election results tonight delivered a potentially fatal blow to the authority of Boris Johnson. But they also showed that voters even in strongly pro-Brexit constituencies have rejected the entire nationalist movement as presently constituted.

A wide range of different nationalist parties and independents were on the ballot papers in the West Yorkshire constituency of Wakefield, and the Devon constituency of Tiverton & Honiton, offering various combinations of UKIP-style politics; criticism of immigration; rejection of ‘woke’; traditional patriotism; opposition to Islam; racial or semi-racial nationalism; and/or conspiracy theories about the pandemic. Yet the voters were decidedly unimpressed.

On the issues listed above (with the likely exception of CoVID conspiracism which has niche appeal at best) there are undoubtedly many thousands of voters across the two constituencies (as elsewhere in the UK) who agree with civic or racial nationalist policies.

As recently as 2010, the BNP (which of course no longer even pretends to function as a proper political party) polled 2,581 votes in Wakefield (5.8%).

Yet this week all six of the nationalist or anti-lockdown parties in Wakefield added together polled only half this total: just 1,293 votes!!

Ashlea Simon (above centre) at the Salford local election count last month. That was a good night for Ms Simon and her party Britain First, but they came down to earth with a bump tonight in Wakefield.

In Wakefield the most active nationalist campaign was fought by Ashlea Simon of Britain First, who had achieved the country’s best nationalist result at last month’s local elections, polling 21.6% in Walkden North ward, Salford.

Wakefield is of course on the other side of the Pennines, but this West Yorkshire city has many of the same racial problems that led to strong BNP votes in the 2000s. And the fact that the by-election was caused by a homosexual Muslim Conservative MP being jailed for sexual abuse of a 15-year-old boy, ought to have been a gift for even a semi-racial nationalist party.

Ms Simon and her team (including Britain First leader Paul Golding) put in a serious effort, but polled only 311 votes (1.1%), finishing 8th of 15 candidates.

This wasn’t a great result, but the outcome for other nationalist contenders in Wakefield was truly dire. Jayda Fransen of the British Freedom Party was bottom of the poll with only 24 votes (less than 0.1%).

Ms Fransen had to stand as an independent because her party isn’t yet registered. She and the two men who pull the strings in her ‘party’ – Ulster ‘businessman’ Jim Dowson and former MEP Nick Griffin – talk a good fight online, but are effectively seeking to con potential donors that they are running a serious political force (rather than the farce that it truly is).

In a rational world, Fransen, Dowson and Griffin would never show their face again in any political forum, online or in person. But doubtless they are shameless enough to keep the con going.

Serial political conman Nick Griffin (above left) with the nominal leader of the ‘British Freedom Party’, Jayda Fransen, who last night polled one of the most embarrassing votes in British nationalist history.

The best of a feeble bunch of civic nationalist results in Wakefield was Reform UK – successor to Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party – finishing sixth with 513 votes (1.9%). But given the comparatively vast resources expended by Richard Tice’s party, this is another shockingly meagre return. Tice’s donors must be running out of patience.

The rump of UKIP polled 124 votes (0.5%), beaten by the English Democrats with 135 votes (0.5%).

And while the anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination movement continues to make a lot of noise both online and in occasional demonstrations, their standard bearer in Wakefield – the Freedom Alliance – barely registered with 187 votes (0.7%).

Meanwhile in Tiverton & Honiton – a traditionally safe Conservative and strongly pro-Brexit seat in Devon – nationalist results were equally dismal.

Reform UK’s total here was even worse than in Wakefield: 481 votes (1.1%). UKIP again failed miserably with 241 votes (0.6%), just ahead of one of the splinter groups from UKIP, the Heritage Party (led by a half-Jamaican and focusing heavily on CoVID-scepticism) who took only 167 votes (0.4%).

The wooden spoon went to Frankie Rufolo of the anti-Islam party For Britain Movement, who polled 146 votes (0.3%). For Britain is led by a former UKIP leadership candidate Anne-Marie Waters, who is now allied to EDL founder ‘Tommy Robinson’ and claims that she is building towards winning a seat in Parliament at the next general election. On present trends she wouldn’t win a parliamentary seat if she lived for another millennium.

Frankie Rufolo (above right) with For Britain leader Anne-Marie Waters. The Tiverton & Honiton result was another in a recent series of disastrous results for their party.

Ever since the collapse of the BNP a decade ago there has been nothing even resembling a large-scale, successful racial nationalist party. The BNP no longer even pretends to function as a proper political party. Patriotic Alternative (the fastest growing racial nationalist force in the UK) is not registered as a party and so is unable to contest elections. And various smaller parties ranging from the British Democratic Party to the National Front are not yet a substantial presence in parliamentary elections.

Both of the constituencies that had by-elections yesterday were strongly pro-Brexit, and were won by Boris Johnson’s pro-Brexit Conservative Party in 2019. Yet the by-elections were caused by personal scandals forcing the resignation of Conservative MPs. So there ought to have been potential for various types of nationalist to attract voters who had previously backed the Tories.

In this context the Wakefield and Tiverton & Honiton results were frankly an embarrassment not just for the parties concerned, but for everyone who calls himself a British nationalist.

Many of those who were active in these campaigns are decent patriots. Yet their political strategies and in most cases their entire party structures should be consigned to the scrapheap.

If we cannot now escape from crank ideas and personal bitterness; if we cannot now agree some form of realistic yet principled agenda and create a serious political movement (whether that movement is electorally focused, or at least for now concentrates on non-electoral politics) – then we deserve the contempt of our fellow Britons and we are unworthy of our ancestors.

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