Rupert Lowe launched his party on Friday (Image: Getty)
Reform UK has suffered a blow with seven councillors previously members of the party defecting and moving to the new ‘Restore Britain’ created by the Great Yarmouth MP Rupert Lowe. It comes just days after the member of parliament formally established his new political party announcing policies such as banning the Burqa and imposing a policy of mass deportations. Welcoming the defections as a “very important day” for the new party, Mr Lowe, 68, wrote on X: “I am delighted to announce that seven Kent County Councillors have today joined Restore Britain, and they will form an official Restore Britain group on the council. This is a very important day for our party. There will be many more to come.”
The defectors at Kent County Council will now form an official grouping on the local authority, which is currently run by Reform. Mr Lowe, himself a former member of Reform who was elected in 2024 for the Great Yarmouth constituency, was kicked out of the party. A former businessman, he established a self-run ‘inquiry’ into grooming gangs across the UK, and initially founded Restore Britain as a pressure group before making it into a political party. The group attracted members from across UK politics, including Conservative London Assembly Member Susan Hall, who left the group after it became a party.
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Defectors announced today include Maxine Forthergill, a Sevenoaks Councillor who stood for Reform in the 2024 general election for the Old Bexley and Sidcup seat, coming second. Robert Ford, Paul Thomas, Dean Burns, Isabella Kemp, Brian Black and Oliver Bradshaw complete the list of defectors – all having moved from Reform UK.
Mr Lowe has previously grappled with large amounts of media attention after X owner Elon Musk said he would like the MP to replace Nigel Farage as leader. He was soon ejected from the party after a separate dispute which saw him accused by Reform donor Zia Yusuf of abusive behaviour – allegations Mr Lowe denies.
Over the weekend Mr Lowe announced the formation of the party from his farm in Great Yarmouth. He said: “I have chosen to speak to you today from the farm, because places like this are what proper Britain is about. Hard work, responsibility, effort, duty, stewardship. This is the England I know, and this is the England I love.”
Nigel Farage denied that he and Rupert Lowe had ever been ‘friends’ (Image: Getty)
Speaking earlier today at a press conference in central London, before the defections, Mr Farage denied that he and Mr Lowe had ever been “friends”.
He added: “There are, last time we counted, 11 parties that claim to be on the right or centre right of British politics, from the Heritage Party to goodness knows who else. There is only one proper brand of centre-right politics in this country, it’s call Reform. People think ‘oh, Farage has done it, we’ll just set a party up, it’ll be marvellous, we’ll sweep the next election’, it just isn’t as easy as that!”
Speaking about his past troubles with Mr Lowe, Mr Farage commented: “Does he have a profile on X? Yes he does. Is Elon [Musk] going to support him? Probably. But you see, when he stood up and said ‘we’ve got to consider the mass deportation of entire communities, including those born in the United Kingdom’, that just moves way beyond the point of reasonableness, decency, morality. That was the moment at which I just realised we had to get rid of him, and get rid of him as quickly as we could.”
It is understood that all the defectors where suspended by Reform prior to making the move.