The brutal killing of Ann Widdecombe earlier this year has given us all cause to pause about the state of our politics. We do not yet know why she was killed, and it would be wrong to speculate. But Britain already knows where political violence can lead: Jo Cox. David Amess. Still others whose plots were mercifully foiled by the police.

In a previous era of political murder and intimidation, Margaret Thatcher said after the Brighton bombing:

“We must never never never be stopped; never be stopped from going among the people by a few men of violence, because that is what they want, and if they stop us democracy would not be able to continue.”

As Caron Lindsay pointed out on this site two years ago, political violence is nothing new. Yet today the danger is not merely that violence happens. It is that we are starting to accept it.

The rot starts with smaller acts. Intimidation becomes ordinary; violence becomes accepted, even mocked. What was forbidden becomes normal.

My withdrawal from restanding as Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate for Kettering in 2024 was never just about the treatment of my stammer. It was about intimidation, threats and the fear that the next angry encounter might not remain verbal. A fear that too many candidates and councillors have come to expect.

Nine years ago, during a council by-election in Barton Seagrave, a man squared up to me on the doorstep, so angry that his own wife had to hold him back. The cause? My opposition to a Parish Council tax rise to fund a village hall.

Seven years ago, during the 2019 General Election, I was called a “traitor” online and at least one local man fantasised about hanging me from a lamppost. I stopped feeling safe alone in my own hometown. I went to the count in a Christmas jumper, but did my Christmas shopping elsewhere.

Five years ago, while delivering leaflets during the local elections, a man recognised me and chased me down the street. I ran and hid. By then there were places I would not canvass alone, fearing verbal abuse might become physical — as later happened to our own Kevin Lang.

Then, one year ago, I found myself reluctantly back on a ballot paper in Higham Ferrers.

I had stood nowhere else, not even as a paper candidate, because I did not want to expose myself again to that abuse. But our candidate died, and a quirk of electoral law left me the only person able to take his place.

I agreed, but with precautions: a panic alarm, staying close to help, and police advice on staying safe.

But what struck me most was not that I was frightened. It was that everybody seemed to be frightened.

My two Labour opponents had been threatened with violence in an anonymous public post. Several Reform activists behaved towards me in ways I found intimidating. And when I challenged one of my Reform opponents about it, they told me of voters screaming at them, threatening them and chasing them down people’s drives.

They were frightened too.

Different rosettes, same fear.

Across parties and across years, the same disgraceful story: Lib Dem Kevin Lang, grabbed by the throat. Conservative Carla Hales, punched three times. Labour’s Cathy Cordiner-Achenbach, punched in the stomach. Reform’s Thomas Kerr, violently shoved while campaigning.

The ugly truth is violence is not unusual. Neither are threats, abuse or intimidation.

And if your reaction changes according to the colour of the rosette, then you are part of the problem. A problem that falls disproportionately on women and people of colour.

In Parliament, Lisa Smart MP and Zöe Franklin MP are working hard to tackle these issues. I fully support them, though the mountain remains dauntingly high.

In 2024, I said that the problem with our political culture was simple: “What we walk past, we accept.”

That is what makes the footage from the Reform conference so disgraceful. A young woman is pulled from behind, grabbed by the hair and around the upper body. She is then beaten with a stick. It must have been terrifying.

Then came the reaction. Nigel Farage, himself a victim of political violence, mocked it from the stage. Robert Jenrick: “Oh boo-hoo.” Lee Anderson, Party Chair? “If anybody wants to have a quick whip round later, we are collecting for a new walking stick.”

In 2026, we are no longer merely walking past political violence. Too many of us are stopping to watch, laughing, minimising, and finding reasons why it matters less when the victim is on the other side.

A bully unchallenged is a bully undaunted. After all, all it has ever taken to cede control is for the decent to look the other way.

The men of violence are back in British politics, and this time they come with permission. We now face the choice so many generations before us have faced. Who governs us: is it the ballot, or is it the fist?

* Chris Nelson is a Liberal Democrat member, teacher, and charity director. He was a Lib Dem parliamentary candidate across four general elections, for the Kettering and Wellingborough constituencies.