AIBU to be utterly baffled at how many people are falling for Reform after the Brexit mess?

This is a kind of trial run for Reform. It’s the closest any of Farage’s various party incarnations have come to power and the first time they’ve been accountable for delivering results. We shall see what kind of state those councils are in when they’re next up for reelection in 2029 - bear in mind that’s likely to be the same year as the next GE so the scrutiny will be intense. There will be a lot of people who will think if they screw up running local government they can’t be trusted with national government.

It might make putting together a cabinet tricky. But it would definitely keep things interesting.

I totally agree. They should do something like a rolling election (not a general one) and, say, have a vote in a third of seats every three years.

How can the left better understand the right?

I'm not sure, do you think that Labour government are suffering because of the performance of local councils with bin disputes and bankruptcies? I don't know 🤷🏼‍♀️

I think you have fundamentally misunderstood why many people vote Reform. The lefts biggest weakness is that they really do not understand the right (while the right really do understand the left).

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election/2025/england/councils/E06000047

Here's the change in the Durham local elections, that's a gain of 65 seats for Reform (from 0) and a loss of 38 seats for Labour, leaving them with just 4.

I think the results in Durham at the local election could well be widely replicated in three years.

I think that depends on how successful Reform is at running the councils they won. It hasn’t got off to a promising start.

Labour won the general election with 35% of the vote share and declared that the Tories, with 24%, were over. Now Labour polls at 24% while Reform, who got 15% at the general election, now polls at 30%.

The red wall shifted to the Tories because they sold change and and gave up on them when they achieved none, Labour found their way back with a manifesto for change and then clearly didn't provide the change that a third of them expected or wanted. You are dreaming if you don't think those constituencies don't keep spinning the wheel until something sticks. I think the results in Durham at the local election could well be widely replicated in three years.

Clearly Labour are spooked. They've stopped talking about the Conservatives completely and focus their attention on the small band of Reform MPs - is there six now?

I’d want to see which wards were previously Labour and what the % turnover was before I was prepared to make any assumptions. The thing I find most surprising about those results is that the Tories gained/held any seats.

Okay, but my point is, the wards that used to be labour are now reform. Now I haven't interviewed every person in this election, but I don't think its ridiculous to assume that those voters used to vote labour and chose to vote reform!

It's a big problem. I remember a few years ago reading an investigation into prisons in the UK and how rehabilitation and repeat offending could be greatly improved. However it would take time and money so none of it was implemented. We now have a prison crisis.

The never thinking and planning for the long term, only for the election cycle, and thereby always kicking problems down the road, is a massive problem with democracy, and doesn't seem to be being addressed by anyone.

That’s not quite true. Reform took two out of eleven wards and two were won by the Tories. Independents and the LibDems performed well.

🤣🤣🤣

Wales doesn’t vote until next May. We have no idea what the Senedd will look like at this point.

Yes and Wales shows a similar increase in Reform.

That has typically been a strong Labour electorate.

Im not sure that is true, Preston has been a labour stronghold as long as I have lived here ( more than decade) at our last local election, they lost to reform.

I don't think that's a move of Tory voters. It's a change of Labour voters.

I have no real opinion on labour I've voted independent for a long time

He’s a great politician to be fair. A really good speaker who knows what the people want to hear. I’m not sure any other politician in history has impacted so much whilst having so little actual power.

hes got the skills for sure, it’s just a shame he’s not using them for good

Labour is neither the party of the people or the working classes. It used to be but was hijacked by a load of arrogant human rights lawyers who don't know how to run anything. Reform has positioned itself as the new working class party. I am not convinced that they are anymore competent than labour/tories but their advantage is that they don't have a record of failure in government and have convinced people they have Britain's interests at heart unlike Labour who come across as gullible incompetents.

@ScrubbedCauliflower then Labour need to behave much more the party of the people, and get properly in touch with us. It’s a poor thing when Farage pretending to be “the man in the pub” (he is absolutely not, any more than Boris Johnson couldn’t handle his hairstyle) sounds more in touch than Labour with ordinary people. Meanwhile, once the cameras go, he trots back off to his champagne breakfasts, or jets off to New York to his buddies.

There’s a phrase

you can’t use logic to argue someone out of a position they didn’t use logic to get into

In RL he is like a snake oil seller. Slippery and twitchy. Very unpleasant. Sadly I've been in a room with him a few times. 🤢

I don't believe that's true. I think people are sick to death of not being listened to and their vote doing nothing to improve their lives. Quality of life in general is far worse for many, deprivation is rife, millions are using food banks, the NHS is not fit for purpose, utilities cost a fortune, food prices are ever increasing, we have a housing crisis and life feels like a grind.

Farage points to asylum seekers and blames them and we have a perfect vote winner because it's a complex problem. He can keep pointing at them because Labour are not going to easily solve it. Meanwhile radical solutions to the status quo are not being tabled and quality of life continues to fall.

Alot of aggression on this thread and people who think insulting their opponent is the same as intelligent debate. I blame sm and the media - I remember the 80s when you used to get intelligent discussion on the TV-not anymore!