Nigel Forrester@NigelForrester9
Indeed. Like most others, I was a fan of Rupert Lowe whilst he was in Reform, and for a while even after he was kicked out. I will have to check my newsletters at the time, but I know I attributed much of the tension between Lowe and Farage before his removal to being the fault of Farage and Zia. I even gave Lowe the benefit of the doubt and speculated that the reason for him giving the (apparently foolish) interview in which he seemed to say that Farage would not be a good Prime Minister, precipitating his removal from Reform, was to get in ahead of Farage before he was removed anyway. (I now seriously doubt that this interpretation is accurate.) At this time, I gave Yusuf significant credit for professionalising the party by isolating some of the worst of Farage’s ‘old guard’, but ideologically, I did not trust him at all. Lowe’s removal appeared as a hit-job by a self-promoting outsider. This was also a time in which Reform were at their most left-wing, endorsing the abolition of the two-child benefit cap and even counter-signalling Jenrick on migration, before they pivoted strongly to the right later in the year.
As such, I originally supported Lowe — very firmly — in this dispute. Furthermore, while politics is always nasty, the character of his removal did not reflect well on Farage and Yusuf, to say the very least.
I remain unhappy about some of the events when Lowe was removed (especially the police call). As events developed, I kept hoping there might be some chance for reconciliation. And yet, I cannot still say it is sad that he is no longer in Reform.
It has now become clear that Rupert Lowe is totally incapable of working within a political party that is serious about winning a general election. He is extremely vulnerable to flattery, allowing some people who are manifestly incapable (and do not even share his ideological views) into his inner circle. He is rhetorically extreme (or, more accurately, allows someone who is rhetorically extreme to squat on his social media accounts) while supporting actual policies that are functionally identical to Reform. When challenged in the media, he is irritable, brittle, and unpersuasive. This may be why he is allowed very few interviews nowadays. And, most obviously, he gave an interview effectively openly calling for the removal of the party leader — something that would get you suspended from any functional political party! That is before going into Lowe’s behaviour, not much discussed at the time, during the 2019 General Election that so infuriated Farage and many of his activists.
Not unreasonably, Lowe is still angry at how he was treated by Yusuf and Farage. But in interviews (such as with David Starkey), when asked why he is launching his new party, he gives this basically *personal* dispute as his main motive — as if the country is less important than getting his ‘revenge’. And as almost no one in Restore actually believes they can win an election, their main effect, if they do get anywhere, will be to split the right-wing vote in an FPtP system. They stand almost zero chance of winning any seats except Great Yarmouth. We can question the morality of the events of 2025 — but the country comes first.
Meanwhile, since this time, Zia Yusuf has been one of Reform’s strongest media performers. He has consistently pushed British politics, and Reform, to the right. He and his faction are also clearly the most competent element within Reform. I was wrong: Yusuf is what Reform needs, not Lowe. And again: Yusuf may have wronged Lowe, but the country comes first. Politics is always a nasty business, and the next election now matters far too much to focus on this.
