I was seven years old when I first delivered leaflets for this party on the streets of Yorkshire. Seven years old. Running door to door in communities I loved, for a party that told me, told us, that we belonged here – that this was our country too.
Last Thursday’s local election results were a gut punch to anyone who believes in a fair, open, and tolerant Britain. Reform UK gained more than 1,400 seats while Labour lost over 1,100 it previously held. But for me, the results that hit hardest weren’t the national headlines. They were the towns I know personally. The towns I grew up nearby. Towns whose names are stitched into the fabric of my identity.
In Dewsbury East, Reform UK swept all three seats. Across Kirklees as a whole, Reform took 29 seats, and Labour, which had held 23 going into the election returned zero councillors. Not one.
In Oldham, Reform gained 13 seats, leaving the council in no overall control.
In Rochdale, Reform seized 12 of the 14 seats up for election. In Burnley, Reform became the largest party on the council after winning 11 seats. In Bolton, the Labour leader lost his own seat.
In the days since, my phone hasn’t stopped. Messages from British Muslim friends. From British Asian neighbours. From people whose families have lived in these very towns for three generations, quietly, desperately asking: “Is it time to go? Should we just leave?”
My answer is absolute. No, we are not going anywhere.
And I’ll tell you exactly why, not as a soundbite, but as a statement of defiance rooted in something much deeper than politics.
Let’s be honest about what we are watching. This is not simply a protest vote about potholes and bin collections. Farage and other Reform figures have not shied away from painting British Muslims as an existential threat describing them as Britain’s “fifth column,” claiming they “do not subscribe to British values,” and calling public Eid prayer in Trafalgar Square “an attempt to overtake, intimidate and dominate our way of life.”
And it goes deeper than the leadership. A dossier of Reform’s local candidates revealed at least 12 had made Islamophobic comments and 10 had openly supported far-right agitators including Tommy Robinson and Britain First’s Paul Golding. One candidate reposted content calling Islam a “cancer.” Another declared Tommy Robinson a “hero.” These candidates stood and some won in your town, on your council, now making decisions about your community.
This is the ecosystem we are in. I understand the fear. I feel it too.
But here is what I know with every fibre of who I am: these towns are ours. Dewsbury is ours. Oldham is ours. Rochdale, Burnley, Bolton are ours. Built by our grandparents, sustained by our parents, and they will be defended by us. Walking away would be the greatest gift we could ever give to those who despise us.
And that brings me to what I need to say to my own party, directly and without apology.
The Liberal Democrats cannot afford to be a party that wins in leafy suburbs and waves sympathetically at the North. In Burnley, with Reform now holding the most seats on the council, we finished with just six Liberal Democrat councillors and lost ground even there. In ward, after ward in Oldham, our candidates polled in the low hundreds. In Dewsbury West, where independents held off Reform, our three Liberal Democrat candidates combined polled fewer than 2,600 votes across the whole ward.
We have to do better. We must be on the doorsteps of Rochdale and Bolton, not just Richmond and St Albans. We need candidates who look like those communities, who speak their languages, who understand their daily realities. Communities that feel abandoned by Labour and threatened by Reform are not lost, they are waiting. They are reachable. But only if we actually show up.
Because the answer to the politics of fear and division is not to run. It is to stand. To organise. To knock on every door. To fight for every vote in every town that Reform thinks it now owns.
I leafleted these streets at seven years old because I believed this party stood for something. I still do. And I intend to prove it in the North, in the places that need us most, in the communities that are asking whether anyone is still on their side.
We built this country. We are part of this country.
And we are staying.
* Kamran Hussain was a candidate for Vice President in 2025 and is a managing partner/solicitor.
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7 Comments
Something surprisingly not mentioned here and something I fear that the party has completely forgotten, is that WE were the party that stopped the BNP in Burnley! It was the only shot they ever had at taking control of a council and they weren’t that far off, and we were the ones to beat them. Not the Greens, not UKIP but us!
We also did well in other places reform are nowt surging like Redcar, Oldham, Rochdale, Ashfield, chesterfield etc.
But back then we had bold policies and messages on things that would help the cost of living and helping the life chances of people in poor communities.
We also had a strong anti establishment, probably change messaging that had been at the core of our identity, but which we have never sought to bring back.
David, nice to see someone remembers Chesterfield! We are still in contention here at Council level, but it is a tough battle in a heavily Leave voting and mainly socio economically weak community.
In last years County elections (9 Divisions reduced to 8 in that years Boundary Review) Reform did indeed surge across all Derbyshire. In Chesterfield they won 6 seats and Labour lost 6 – the first time in living memory Labour have been completely wiped out. We held 2 seats against the Reform surge and were a close second to Reform in 2 more. Under 400 votes less and we would have been wiped out like Labour. Under 400 votes more and we would have won 50% of Chesterfield instead of 25%.
This year we had a triple by election in one Ward (2 Borough and 1 Town Council seat) on 7th May, following the deaths of a LD Cllr and a Labour Cllr. Reform won all 3 seats (in one of the ‘poorest’ most working class Wards in Chesterfield-Staveley). 81 votes more and we would have won all 3 seats. 35 votes more and we would have won 2 of them. 21 votes more and we would have won 1.
In the 2000’s we were at the height of our success with the MP, over 75% of the Borough Cllrs and over 50% of the County Cllrs. But as you say, back then the Lib Dems had a clear national image and policies that were ‘on the side’ of poor urban areas as well as appealing to the more affluent corners of the UK.
“Something better change” as my favourite Stranglers song puts it.
Out on the streets I was asked by a young builder “what has the libdems ever done for working people” , and we had a discussion. His support for Reform was to “shake thing up” , which maybe Reform is suggesting so to underplay their right nationalist agenda.
As the OP has lamented LD policy or messaging as regards “working people” (assume to mean working class manual labour), it seems has been lacking at least for the general public. The Liberals have a strong history of reform and Liberalism is about enabling the lives of all people. The LibDems should stand proud and talk about what that means for 2020s working people Britain.
When I listen to Reform MPs, I’m reminded of the rhetoric once associated with the NF and BNP in the 1970s and ’80s — the difference now is that it is delivered in sharper suits and with more polished language. But beneath the presentation, the hostility and divisiveness remain much the same.
History shows that this kind of politics does not simply disappear on its own. In the 1980s, anti-fascist groups, campaigners, and principled politicians confronted it directly and refused to normalise it. Today, however, parts of the media appear increasingly sympathetic to figures such as Farage, while the muted response from many elected representatives — including some from ethnic minority backgrounds — has been deeply disappointing.
Britain is now, undeniably, a multicultural society. Defending that reality requires more than silence or cautious statements. If large sections of the political establishment, the media, and even the BBC are unwilling to challenge this rhetoric robustly, then the responsibility falls to the wider public. People need to speak up, stand together, and confront it head-on before it becomes further embedded in mainstream discourse.
Good article Kamran
Thank you for the good article and good comments. A useful reminder of what the Lib Dems once stood for and where we now fall short.
As some of us head out to join the Lib Dem group at today’s peace march for Palestine I think back to the days our MPs were out on the streets with us demanding to stay in the EU. In two and a half years of the peaceful, inclusive (ALL faith, ALL culture, ALL class) Palestine marches, not one MP has come to stand with us for international law, universal human rights, and to oppose apartheid and genocide. Given that the Met police switched our usual prime Westminster route today and gave it to Tommy Robinson and his people – and given Starmer’s attempts to smear our family-friendly events as ‘hate marches’ – one might have expected more party support. No wonder many consider the Greens to be the new liberals, and the new hope.
Strong and true words. Lib Dem leadership must listen if we are to have any relevance in the fight for the heart and soul of the people in our cities, towns and villages. You are absolutely right, this our country too and we stand united with you.
Anne-Marie Simpson (Chair of Liberal Democrat Friends of Palestine)
Kamran – Thank you for setting out a powerful piece on the realities for the Party, but also of the rising hate & Islamophobia Muslim communities are facing. Many in my family have also been having similar discussions about whether they are safe to live in a U.K. dominated by Reform type divisions & far right hate speech amplified by the Conservatives and the British media.
In previous years the Lib Dems felt like they were a home for many minority communities. It’s why I joined. I can only hope and pray that we rebuild, & ensure we seriously engage with all communities that we seek to represent. And yes, we are hear to stay.