As polling stations prepare to open at 7am in Makerfield, some voters heading to the ballot box for the hard-right Restore Britain party cannot name their own candidate. “It’s a lady, I think,” said Sean, 56, a local man who told the Local Democracy Reporting Service he plans to vote for the party anyway. “I don’t know much about her. I’m voting because of what the party stands for. And because of Rupert Lowe.”
The by-election, which could decide the future of Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, has drawn national attention. Labour’s candidate, Andy Burnham – the Greater Manchester mayor and a local son – is the favourite. If he wins, he has vowed to challenge Starmer for the premiership. But Burnham’s path is complicated not only by Reform UK, whose leader Nigel Farage said the party will “throw everything it has” at the seat behind candidate Robert Kenyon, but also by Restore Britain, an ultra-nationalist group led by its only MP, Rupert Lowe. Its candidate is Rebecca Shepherd, a 53-year-old local businesswoman. Yet even those leaning towards her party are in the dark.
“Hard-right Restore Britain voters in the crucial Makerfield by-election cannot name their candidate, Rebecca Shepherd, as they prepare to vote.”
Adam Rayley, 35, a roofer and full-time carer for his girlfriend, admitted he does not “know much about the candidate.” He said: “I just feel like Restore’s views are most like my own. They have the same views. I’m not racist, but I feel like the immigrants coming in now aren’t checked. Our borders are wide open and we’ve got our own families and homes to care for. I’m struggling myself … there’s nothing for us.” Joanna Lapniewsky, 64, an ex-Army officer who works at the Restore HQ at a local community centre, said she has never seen Shepherd but has been told “she’s really down to earth.” Only one resident reported glimpsing Shepherd from a distance on her way to “stables somewhere in Wigan.”
While the hard-right vote fragments, many residents are preoccupied with a more mundane frustration: traffic gridlock. The roads in this former mining constituency on the outskirts of Wigan are notorious. “The traffic system into the town center, it just can’t cope,” said Peter Cain, a local butcher. Rebecca Ogden, a community nurse, said: “I can be going from one visit to another and it takes forever and a day.” Another woman, who works in a supermarket and asked not to be named, added: “Bolton Road is murder sometimes.”
These grievances come against a backdrop of national discontent. Starmer has recorded some of the worst poll ratings of any British leader in history, and several senior ministers have quit his Cabinet in protest. Burnham is the highest-profile potential challenger, but first he must win here. Polling stations close at 10pm, after which a nerve-wracking count will determine whether the man who could topple a prime minister gets his chance.