Nadine Dorries: Reform Would Have Won Against Any Other Labour Candidate

[00:00:00]I was delighted with the fact that we got 16,000 votes and came second considering we're up against Andy Burnham. I think if it was any other individual in the Labour Party, Reform would have won very comfortably. So, I'm not as gutted as anybody else is, to be honest, in Reform.

[00:00:16]>> Let's have a look now at what happened with Reform. It was a disappointing result for them. Let's listen to what Nigel Farage had to say.

[00:00:26]>> As for the Reform vote share, well, I thought we'd get 18,000 votes. We got just shy of 16, so I'm disappointed by that, no question about it. But, I would say this, there's a couple of thousand voters there who would normally have gone out and voted Reform that voted Restore. And I would say directly to them, "What do you want?" We are the challenger party to the left in this country, and I would urge you to think again. I really, really would.

[00:00:54]>> Now, when the by-election was announced just over a month ago, Farage promised to throw absolutely everything at the race, and it's worth remembering that Reform has led the polls for 2 years.

[00:01:05]They've had an extraordinary run leading all the opinion polls, and they topped every ward in Makerfield a few weeks ago. Well, let's now speak with Nadine Dorries, of course, is the former Conservative Culture Secretary, long-serving Conservative MP who defected to Reform UK. Nadine, welcome.

[00:01:25]>> Hi, Aisha. Hello.

[00:01:26]>> How are you doing?

[00:01:27]>> I'm great, thanks. How are you?

[00:01:29]>> I'm very well. So, look, what happened here? What went wrong?

[00:01:34]>> Oh, gosh, that's a big question. You know, I don't think I'm as disappointed as Nigel is.

[00:01:39]Um I you know, Andy Burnham is the most popular MP, well, he wasn't an MP, so he's an MP today, but the most popular member of the Labour Party. And so, it was always going to be a big battle to to for Andy. He's been the mayor of Manchester, he's from that area. He's been an MP for that area.

[00:01:59]He's well-known in the Northwest. I mean, he is Mr. King of the Northwest, you know? So, so to have beaten Andy Burnham would have meant that we'd probably win in every Labour seat across the country, which is slightly unrealistic. So, so I wasn't as disappointed. I was delighted with the fact that we got 16,000 votes and came second considering we're up against Andy Burnham. I think if it was any other individual in the Labour Party, Reform would have won very comfortably. So, I'm not as gutted as anybody else is to be honest in Reform.

[00:02:32]>> And, you know, given that this is such a high-profile uh race, and you are right, of course Andy Burnham has, you know, huge personal brand which which pulled much better than the national brand of the the Labour Party at the moment. But, you know, Reform were very popular in in that area. Why do you think Reform picked such a bad candidate? Because he was poor, Nadine.

[00:02:57]I mean, that Question Time was awful.

[00:03:01]>> So, you know, we're we're going to disagree on this, Aisha, because, you know, Rob Kenyon, he was he was challenged over comments he'd made on a rugby forum 15 years ago. And, of course, they were all going to come out, but this is the world of social media that we live in. Andy has been in politics for a very long time. Of course, anything about Andy would have come out a long time ago. So, I hear what you say, and I hear that, you know, Rob had a past, but I would say in politics moving forward, and we see it time and time again in all parties, with all MPs [snorts] now and all candidates, time and time again, we're going to have these issues because of social media and the fact that it's been around now for 10, 15 years. There are always going to be people who had lives before they went into politics, who said and did things that people may not agree with today now they're older.

[00:03:53]>> And and you know, Reform are very spicy and very punchy in terms of digging through what other people have said.

[00:03:58]That is horribly what post-modern politics is. It's like, oh, you you tweeted this in like, you know, 1832. You know, you're a wrong kind [laughter] of thing. Right, that is that's where the debate is now. Nadine, you and I sort of know that, but it was more on you know, his ability to sort of communicate cuz listen, when I saw him on paper, I was like, this guy's a brilliant candidate. He's local, he's a plumber.

[00:04:20]Everyone loves a plumber these days in a by-election. I thought, you know, he could have had his a slogan, all cisterns go. But, he couldn't really like I thought this guy's going to be Mr. I'm an everyday person, but I'm really >> Oh, come on, Aisha. How many How many plumbers have you met?

[00:04:37]Aisha, how many There's a There's a plumber downstairs right now fitting my new sink into my kitchen. How many plumbers have you met, Aisha? Plumbers aren't You know, they're >> I've met some plumbers that are were more articulate than that chap.

[00:04:50]>> Oh, Aisha, I think you're just being rude now.

[00:04:53]>> I'm not being rude.

[00:04:54]>> Rob is not Rob is a typical Makerfield guy, and I know I'm from that area. I trained in that the hospital that serves that community.

[00:05:02]>> I think the people who lived in that area I think that's a disservice to the people of Makerfield. I mean, the point is what are you going to do as a party to select better candidates when you have by-elections?

[00:05:12]>> Well, the candidate the selection process is is very robust. It's But, Rob had stood before for Reform in that area. Nobody raised these issues last time he stood. He's already an elected councilor. But, you know, this was a high profile This was a battle to the death. This was possibly the most important by-election we will ever know.

[00:05:34]We will ever what will ever come to pass. But, what I will say is this.

[00:05:38]That's That's That was It was yesterday's It's this morning's news. It won't be tomorrow's news cuz tomorrow's news is going to be how quickly Anti-Burnham removes Keir Starmer out of number 10. And this is going to move on very quickly stuff because next week if we thought this by-election was important, next week is going to be seismic because Andy Burnham hasn't taken on this by-election to just go and spear back bench >> Of course I'm not disagreeing with you.

[00:06:02]We are both grown-ups. We we are we are smart cookies. We we we know what's going on. So look, do you think that Reform have sort of reached their peak of of support?

[00:06:13]>> No, gosh. I'll tell you why. We got 16,000 votes and came second in an absolutely solid Labour seat that's been Labour forever. So you know, don't lose sight of that and that the candidate was Andy Burnham and that the vote from a lot of people in that constituency was to get Starmer out. As Nigel said, we were slightly hoisted by our own petard because that was our campaign slogan during the local elections and people carried it on. We won all of the council seats in that area on the campaign of vote reform get Starmer out. And the reason why people in Wakefield went and voted for Andy Burnham was because Andy Burnham's subliminal message was vote me get Starmer out. It worked for us. It worked for Andy Burnham. We came second.

[00:06:56]We got 16,000 votes. You extrapolate that across the country, Reform are going to do incredibly well at a general election. But as you and I know, you can't extrapolate by-elections to general elections. I speak from experience. I resigned my seat in 2022.

[00:07:11]There was a by-election. A Labour candidate won it. It went back to the Conservatives two years later. What happens in a by-election doesn't mean that's what's going to happen in general election.

[00:07:19]>> And just before I let you go, Nadine, there was an interesting by-election in Aberdeen South last night where you know, the Conservatives did very well.

[00:07:28]Kemi Badenoch is doing well at the moment her personal ratings. Do you think the Conservatives could be having a bit of a revival?

[00:07:34]>> So what happened? And you know, congratulations I mean I should I should say as well, you know, congratulations to Andy Burnham and congratulations to the Conservatives for winning Aberdeen South. It's you know, it was a night of there were winners as well and they should be congratulated. But what I say about up teen south is we threw everything at Makerfield and Nigel Farage was you know, backwards and forwards to Makerfield. The Conservatives threw everything but the kitchen kitchen sink at the Scottish by-election. Kemi Badenoch, I don't even think she went to Makerfield was all over Aberdeen South and and that's kind of what happens they become these kind of like these these microcosms of political activity in those areas. It's it's the the nature of a by-election and they did do well and as I just said to you in my previous answer, who knows if that will translate to a general election. But they fought that seat against the SNP total meltdown who are mired in scandal with Nicholas Sturgeon's husband just having come through the the the embezzlement scandal. I mean, it would have been hard not to have won in that seat. I don't want to distract from how well they did, but against that backdrop it would be hard to have lost in that seat. We didn't put any effort into that seat at all. We focused everything on Makerfield and did incredibly well.

[00:08:49]>> But lost. Okay.

[00:08:50]>> Well, we came second.

[00:08:52]>> Nadine, second we we don't we you don't get prizes for coming second. You know that.

[00:08:56]>> You don't. You know that. I know that.

[00:08:58]Nadine, as ever it's always good to catch up with you. Thank you very much and I'll speak to you soon.

[00:09:03]>> Bye-bye. [laughter] >> That is Nadine Dorries.