I only saw one small Reform UK poster when I went door-knocking for the Green Party in Gorton and Denton’s Levenshulme ward. It was cut out from a paper letter and displayed sheepishly on someone’s porch.
Although I was canvassing in a region of the constituency where by-election predictions put the Greens ahead, it still seems surprising that I spoke to only one person who openly said they were set on voting for Reform.
He expressed the strong anti-immigrant sentiment that is associated with Reform UK. His views reflected the arguments that have become impossible to escape. Everywhere you look, online and in the media, you find increasingly far-right figures given the platforms to spread their views. And this is an area in which Matthew Goodwin, Reform’s unsuccessful candidate for Gorton and Denton, is an expert.
On GB News last year, Goodwin hosted Renaud Camus, the originator of the far-right ‘Great Replacement’ conspiracy theory: that white European populations are being replaced with immigrants.
It is no surprise that the one person I met who was sure that they would vote for Goodwin expressed concerning views about immigrants and migrant women having children. Goodwin has cited ‘race-scientists‘ in public writing multiple times. Namely, Goodwin refers to the work of Charles Murray, whose most famous book, ‘The Bell Curve‘, argues that there is a genetic link between race and IQ and references a paper called ‘Eugenics Revisited‘, which states that its purpose is to “show that eugenic solutions should be considered” to improve national intelligence levels.
While discussing EDI policy on a right-wing podcast, Goodwin stated: “the idea that there are not inherent differences between groups… is going to look utterly ridiculous.” He has also appeared on podcast for Aporia Magazine, the publishing arm of a far-right ‘race-science’ foundation. Aporia has published an article openly defending eugenics as well as an article in which the author discusses ways of creating a culture of high-fertility so that his “genetic line [will] be among those humans who colonize the stars.”
Aporia has also published an article that proposes “increasing men’s income… relative to women’s” to increase fertility rates and another that said: “each year lost [to career investment] is fertility lost” for young women. Goodwin has also publicly engaged in this pronatalist discourse. The Independent reported that he suggested imposing a “negative child benefit tax” on “those who don’t have offspring.” He also posted a video on YouTube in November 2024 in which he says: “We need to… explain to young girls and women the biological reality of this crisis… and they would prefer to have children much earlier on.”
Reading the papers, seeing clips from GB News, watching Question Time, and scrolling social media makes it seem as if the country is full of Matthew Goodwins; that his views are shared passionately by a large proportion of the population.
But in the context of the few dozen people that I spoke to while door-knocking in Gorton and Denton, I only met one person who expressed strong ideological support for Reform. On the most part, those I met who were considering voting for Reform were not far-right ideologues, but rather disillusioned voters who had grown to distrust the political establishment.
My perceptions were most likely skewed by two factors – I was canvassing in one of the more pro-Green areas of the constituency and I identified myself as a Green Party volunteer to everyone who answered the door. However, research by Hope Not Hate into Reform’s new voting base — which has roughly doubled in size since the 2024 general election — suggests that there are significant ideological differences between groups that vote Reform. Based on the polling of 11,342 Reform supporters, the research categorises 19% of the support base under ‘reluctant Reformers’ – people who are “frustrated with political failure” and “want stability rather than radical change.”
10,578 people turned up to vote for Reform in the by-election, but research suggests that not all of these voters are ideologically aligned with each other or Goodwin himself. In this regard my experience on the door-step agreed with the research.
A lot of people who answered the door and could spare a minute to talk were generally either apolitical or unconvinced. Among those who were unconvinced, there was a significant group undecided between Reform and Green. But many of the people who told me they did not usually vote were happy to take a Green Party leaflet and consider voting for Hannah Spencer.
When speaking to people who were unconvinced, I followed my question about voting intention with: “What is your main concern for the local area?”. None of them said demographic collapse, illegal immigration or the loss of British culture to ‘foreign invaders.’
They gave answers about feeling that their area was neglected and forgotten. Most people expressed a striking lack of trust that any of the options on the ballot paper would change this.
This is no surprise; the constituency has long been deprived of key infrastructure and services. The Bee Network’s Metrolink completely bypasses Denton, and the town’s railway station is the least used in the country, with only 54 “entries and exits” from April 2023 to March 2024. Meanwhile, in 2021, 15.5% of the constituency’s population were in long-term unemployment; in 2024, the children’s social care services provided in Denton by Tameside council were deemed inadequate; and local charities report inadequate educational opportunities freezing residents out of employment.
Door-to-door, it was clear that the people of Gorton wanted an MP whom they could trust to fight their corner in the Commons. I got used to pointing out that Hannah Spencer was born and raised in Manchester, unlike Goodwin who, despite his dubious claims to a Mancunian identity, was raised in the South West. Most people expressed what I would describe as disdain upon hearing more about Matthew Goodwin; his Hertfordshire address; his six figure salary; and his opinions on when women should be having children.
One constituent pointed out that, in a clip posted by the Labour Party from a 2023 Reform Party conference, Goodwin appears to say he was “unfortunate enough to be in Manchester a few days ago.” Goodwin claims he was referring to the Conservative Party conference held in Manchester that year, but combined with everything else about him, the comments did not go down well. In short, it appeared that no one really liked him.
Typically, far-right politicians enjoy employing a façade of invincibility, making it seem as though they are universally loved by their supporters, who make up a powerful majority. But despite what Farage and Goodwin might want us to think, the people I spoke to who were thinking of voting Reform in Gorton and Denton did not seem to be doing so out of passion for their policies and ideology. They were doing so out of distrust of the current political system, and due to feeling as though Reform were the only option.
But Hannah Spencer’s campaign convinced 14,980 people otherwise, showing that The Greens have the power to win the hearts of voters in a way that Reform simply does not; by addressing what people actually care about.
With the media’s smoke and mirrors that make it seem as though fringe far-right views are the common public opinion, it is difficult to remember that the vast majority don’t love Reform. But they might just be starting to love the Green Party.
