Reform UK Wins Council By-Election in Latest Boost for Nigel Farage
Reform UK has secured another council by-election victory, adding to a series of recent gains for Nigel Farage’s party and giving its supporters another result to point to as evidence of growing competition at local level.
The latest result came in East Markham, on Bassetlaw District Council in Nottinghamshire, where Reform UK candidate Matthew Evans won a previously Conservative-held seat. The result was declared after the September 15 by-election, with Evans receiving 436 votes, ahead of the Conservative candidate on 250, Labour on 151 and the Green Party on 42.
The figures are significant because East Markham had previously been a strong Conservative area. According to Reform’s account of the result, the Conservatives had won the ward with 66 per cent of the vote in 2023. In the latest contest, their share fell to 28.4 per cent, while Reform won 49.6 per cent.
For Farage, the victory provides another opportunity to argue that Reform UK is capable of converting support into elected representation.
A clear victory in East Markham
The East Markham contest was not simply a close contest decided by a handful of votes.
Reform’s Matthew Evans won with 436 votes, representing 49.6 per cent of the ballots counted. The Conservatives received 250 votes, Labour 151 and the Greens 42. The result was recorded by the Association of Liberal Democrat Councillors as a Reform gain from the Conservatives.
The Conservatives therefore remained in second place, but their vote was substantially below the level recorded at the previous election.
Reform described the result as a 44-point swing from Conservative to Reform. That calculation refers to the change in the two parties’ relative support compared with the previous contest, rather than suggesting that every voter who previously supported the Conservatives moved directly to Reform.
Local by-elections can be affected by candidate-specific factors, turnout, tactical voting and the circumstances that triggered the contest. They therefore do not automatically provide a direct measure of national voting intentions.
Nevertheless, the result is another example of Reform winning a council seat from one of the established parties.
Farage celebrates the result
Nigel Farage reacted strongly to the result, highlighting the fact that Reform had not previously contested the ward in the same way.
The Reform leader described the result as an “excellent win” and argued that the Conservatives’ performance demonstrated the difficulties facing the party.
Reform’s own statement quoted Farage saying that the Conservatives had fallen to 28.4 per cent while Reform secured almost half the vote. He also used the result to make a broader political argument about the future of the Conservative Party.
Those comments reflect the wider competition between Reform UK and the Conservatives for voters who have historically supported the centre-right party.
The Conservatives, however, remain one of the major parties represented across local government, and one individual by-election cannot establish how voters across the country will behave in future elections.
The East Markham result is therefore best understood as one local contest within a much broader political picture.
Another recent Reform gain
The East Markham victory came only days after another Reform UK council by-election success.
On September 10, William Jones won the Hutton and Locking ward on North Somerset Council. He received 706 votes, narrowly ahead of Liberal Democrat candidate Georgina Barry, who received 612. The Conservatives received 281 votes, Labour 133 and the Greens 104.
The North Somerset result was also recorded as a Reform gain from the Conservatives in the wider compilation of council by-election results.
Following that election, Reform had three councillors on North Somerset Council. The authority’s political balance included 13 Conservative and independent-group councillors, 12 Liberal Democrats and independents, 10 Labour councillors, eight Greens, four Portishead Independents and three Reform UK councillors.
Taken together, the two September results give Reform activists fresh local evidence of the party’s ability to win seats in different parts of England.
Reform’s wider local-government expansion
The recent by-elections form part of a broader period in which Reform UK has been contesting more council seats.
The Association of Liberal Democrat Councillors’ by-election records show several Reform victories during August and September.
On August 20, Reform gained Harraby South on Cumberland Council from Labour, with its candidate receiving 560 votes, or 46.2 per cent. On August 27, Reform held Throckley, Walbottle and Newburn on Newcastle City Council with 901 votes, representing 38.9 per cent. Reform also retained Sheffield’s Southey ward on the same date with 1,133 votes, or 50.6 per cent.
There have also been contests where Reform did not win.
In Wandsworth’s Trinity ward on August 27, Labour retained the seat with 47.5 per cent, while the Conservatives finished second on 43.6 per cent and Reform received only 1.6 per cent. In Walkley, Sheffield, on September 17, Labour’s Hannah Cawley won with 2,315 votes, ahead of the Green candidate on 1,249 and Reform’s Andrew Telford on 541.
These contrasting results illustrate why individual council by-elections need to be viewed in context. Reform has recorded gains, but its performance varies considerably between wards and regions.
The Conservative challenge
The East Markham result is particularly relevant because it occurred in the constituency of Conservative politician Robert Jenrick.
Jenrick, the Conservative MP for Newark and Reform’s former political rival, reacted to the result by acknowledging the scale of the swing and praising the Reform candidate’s campaign. Reform quoted him describing the contest as an “incredible 44% swing from Tory to Reform”.
The movement of votes between Reform and the Conservatives has become one of the important features of Britain’s changing electoral landscape.
At local level, however, the picture is more complicated than a simple two-party contest. Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and independent candidates can all affect the outcome depending on the area.
The recent results demonstrate this clearly. Reform won East Markham and Hutton and Locking, while Labour, the Liberal Democrats and Greens have also secured or retained seats in other recent contests.
National politics and local results
The significance of the East Markham victory extends beyond the individual council seat because Reform UK is seeking to build a national political organisation while expanding its representation in local government.
For Farage, local elections and by-elections provide opportunities to demonstrate that support for Reform is translating into councillors and control of council seats.
The party has also used individual results to reinforce its argument that voters are moving away from the established parties.
However, national polling does not always produce the same picture as individual council contests. An Ipsos poll conducted between September 10 and 15, for example, put Labour four points ahead of Reform UK nationally.
That contrast is important. A council by-election measures voting behaviour in one particular ward, while a national opinion poll attempts to measure attitudes across a much larger population. Neither should automatically be treated as a substitute for the other.
What the result means for Reform UK
The immediate consequence for Reform is straightforward: the party has gained another elected councillor.
For its activists, the result also provides a concrete example of Reform defeating the Conservatives in an area that had previously returned Conservative candidates.
The party will now face the challenge of turning individual by-election successes into sustained representation across different types of constituencies.
That involves more than winning individual campaigns. It requires candidates, local organisation, councillors capable of serving constituents and the ability to maintain support between elections.
The next round of contests will therefore be closely watched by supporters and opponents alike.
A changing local political landscape
The East Markham result adds another piece to an increasingly fragmented local political picture.
Reform UK is expanding its presence in some councils, while Labour, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats, Greens and independents continue to compete successfully in other areas.
For Nigel Farage, the latest victory provides another platform from which to argue that Reform should be taken seriously as a force in British politics. The result itself is clear: Reform won the East Markham by-election with 49.6 per cent of the vote.
What it means for future elections is less certain.
Local by-elections are influenced by local candidates, turnout, campaign organisation and the particular circumstances of each ward. The coming contests will therefore provide further evidence about whether recent Reform gains represent isolated victories or part of a wider pattern in local electoral politics.
For now, however, Matthew Evans’ victory gives Reform UK another councillor, another Conservative-held seat, and another result that Farage can point to as his party continues its expansion across Britain’s local political landscape.
