One has to chuckle at the Telegraph’s “exclusive” report today. There is nothing in it that hasn’t been abundantly obvious for quite some time. Once again, there won’t be anything new or surprising to readers of this particular Substack. Restore Britain has very much soiled its own nest.
The stand-out quote from the report is this one… “According to one senior party figure: “This problem is systemic in the party. I think it’s been there from inception. I think that when the party transitioned from being a think tank into being a party, certain individuals brought with them a big online following who were the core initial membership, and they boosted the numbers – and I think that’s where the rot set in, in the form of these so-called ethnonationalists, racists, and anti-Semites. I think that they have agency at the centre of the party.”"
Shocked. Shocked I tell you!! But the report also delves deeper in to the row surrounding Pink Ladies activist, Orla Minihane, who describes a rather vile misogynistic culture within the party. It does tally with my experience of these people - but Restore supporters are now insisting Minihane brought a torrent of abuse upon herself by voicing support for Lindsay Clancy (which she categorically didn’t).
Moreover, none of this bickering started with Orla Minihane. From the outset, Restore set out to attract the very grotbags who were always going to rock the boat. From day one they wanted the party to be more of a doctrinal ethno-nationalist party, and never intended on supporting it for what it actually is.
Under the surface they were already complaining that Alistair Harrison (Lowe’s right hand man) is a Zionist, and some of its lead activists in Makerfield were known antisemites that the party turned a blind eye to. They've since been outraged by the appointment of Howard Cox and Henry Bolton because they are "cringe boomer civnats" and eventually turned on the Orla Minihane for having the audacity to suggest that we have an obligation to all girls to prevent abuse and FGM.
They've not been subtle about where they stand. They've been shitting the bed for Restore for months on end, and they were always going to take their bat home. They were never going to allow the party to proceed on any basis other than their own ideology - which runs counter to that of Rupert Lowe, who is seemingly oblivious to what is going on under his nose.
They've been so obnoxious that they've actively repelled a lot of good and serious people from joining. My hunch is that the appointment of Henry Bolton was an attempt to rebalance the top team for this very reason. Only it hasn't worked, because they hounded Orla Minihane with a torrent of abuse, making it quite clear their attitudes to women in general.
Certainly Minihane could have handled the fallout better, but none of this was instigated by her. She was forced out fundamentally because she is viewed as a civnat (i.e. not a terrible human being).
While Steve Laws et al have now left the party, so has Minihane, taking her politically productive campaign group with her, having been completely abandoned by Rupert Lowe - meaning that quite a lot of decent people now want nothing to do with the party, while the very online ethnat brigade are now determined to destroy Restore.
As such, the Telegraph report suggesting there has been an ethnat takeover is not strictly accurate. The party is still essentially an oblivious Rupert Lowe, along with Beavis and Butthead (Messers Pitt and Downes), presiding over ever more ridiculous factional infighting - that they could have avoided had they not wooed the grotbags in the first place. They who were doing to Restore what they've done to every other political entity they've ever been involved with.
What's left now is a badly mauled and tainted fringe party, and nobody even understands who they are or what they're actually for. Having made an enemy of Talk TV, GB News, The Spectator, the editor of the Sunday Telegraph, and half the staffers at The Times, all they've got now is a feral twitter account run by god knows who, trotting out hackneyed mantras in the hope of peeling off some of Reform's dwindling support base.
All of this could and should have been avoided, but the running of the party was entrusted to morons, and cheered on by the Lotus Eaters dickheads - and now I don't think even the most gifted political strategist could salvage it.
The Telegraph goes on to say:
A senior branch official blamed Mr Lowe for a total lack of control at the top of the party, saying: “A millionaire has bought a sweetshop and left the children in charge.” None of those who spoke to The Telegraph believed that Mr Lowe shared the ethnonationalist beliefs of his most extreme members, but they were clear that if he did not act soon, he would see an exodus of the more sensible members.
One senior activist said: “I would like a piece to camera [from Rupert] absolutely stating that the party is not ethnonationalist… stating the position on ethnicity and skin colour, and also saying that we have no truck with racism, anti-Semitism… ethno-nationalism, any of it… and to also say that anybody in the party that’s found out to be partaking of this is going to be thrown out on their ear and made an example of.”
So far, there has been no sign that Mr Lowe is minded to go down that route, meaning the bullies are winning. As one Restore member put it: “It’s sick and it’s scary, because you’re sitting thinking: OK, well, I’m next. The minute my views or my tone doesn’t seem to fit, you can pretty much guess you’re next.”
This has been the central dysfunction from the beginning. Lowe set out on a principle of not denouncing his own supporters, believing the worst of them to be the average Tommy Robinson fan club member, oblivious to the fact that the people he was attracting really aren’t the sort of people you want to be seen making excuses for.
This is precisely what should have been addressed by publishing a formal definition, and setting their values out clearly, with the main X account taking its cues from party documentation. But as I’ve hopefully demonstrated beyond all reasonable doubt now, the party is run by idiots.
If the party is to survive, it has a lot of work to do and it will take a long time to shake off a lot of the stink. I suspect, though, that the people involved don’t have the skill to pull it off. Crafting a party ideology that fits with the politics of Rupert Lowe, to the right of Reform that doesn’t wade into this particular sewer, takes a kind of structured thinking that isn’t generally found on the Slop Right.
Moreover, fixing it starts with the leadership of the party realising that there is a problem. On present trajectory, Restore might not even exist a year from now.
The facts are very clear that Rupert Lowe in turning Restore from a movement into a party completely failed to take ANY advice on setting up the essentials to ensure his new party became main stream instead of a cult for those on the fringe of the Right in politics.
Pete - you've been writing about the anticipated and expected demise of Restore for a while now - in parallel, you've done a good hatchet job on Farage and his bunch of rank amateurs.
Both horses have been flogged to death albeit with, maybe, a little bit of life still left in Reform - but still a dying horse.
As a reader of your sunstack are there more productive areas of research that you could write about - else, just change the record and discuss flight take-off patterns at Biggin Hill.