Like an extended voice note from a friend you fell out with but can’t remember why, Rupert Lowe posted a 12-minute-long video on X asking Nigel Farage to be pals again.
The Restore Britain leader’s brand of ethno-nationalism-dressed-as-country-squire has eaten into Reform UK’s support recently. That it is happening just as Reform has dipped behind Labour in some polls means Lowe spies an opportunity.
Last week Restore won almost 9 per cent of first-preference votes in the Greater Manchester mayoral by-election, ahead of the Conservatives. Lowe’s time is now.
Lowe used to be a Reform MP until an almighty bust up with Farage saw him splinter off to form a far-right alternative. The wounds haven’t yet healed. So how would Farage react to the olive branch in which Lowe set out a series of conditions for an alliance including mass deportation of illegal migrants including women and children, a ban on halal and kosher slaughter, the burqa, cousin marriage and sharia courts?
For two men who fell out so spectacularly and have spent the last year trading insults in public and private, (Lowe called Farage a “narcissist,” Farage described Lowe as “one angry man saying stuff on the internet”), the Reform leader was surprisingly emollient when asked about Lowe’s overture at a news conference on Monday morning.
