Lowles says that it’s easy to think the battle against Reform is online, but it is in communities
The founder of anti-fascist group Hope not Hate has said that Reform councils “get away with stuff no one else would”, and that progressives need to be better at holding them to account.
Speaking at Left Foot Forward’s inaugural LFF Live session, Nick Lowles said that Reform’s flagship council, Kent County Council has been “an absolute car crash, yet I don’t think collectively we’ve done enough to tell people just how sh** they’ve been”.
Lowles said that Reform councils have “got away with absolute nonsense”.
As examples, he cited Reform councillors failing to run surgeries, and appointing a 19-year-old and a 22-year-old to head up children and adults’ services in Leicestershire.
“But they don’t seem to be under enough pressure,” he added.
Reform currently controls 10 councils, but Lowles warned “there is a real fear” they could gain control of more after May.
Lowles said there are lots of social media accounts that highlight “the stupidity” of some of Reform’s policies. However, he said Labour, unions, and campaign groups must “be much better at going back out into the community”.
“It’s easy to think the battleground is online, and it’s not,” he said.
Lowles said Reform has also “got away with” scandals, such as Farage failing to register his financial interests on time, and mentions of Reform figures in the Epstein files.
He stressed that progressives have to “plug away and tell it [the story] in a more effective way”.
He emphasised that community activism is “how you hold people to account and get people angry”.
“We’ve got to point to a baddie, and [find] […] issues to galvanise people around because they can see the injustice,” he said.
This can include petitions, door-knocking, and using petitions to lobby councils or MPs.
“We’ve got to make life hard for them,” Lowles concluded.
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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