Makerfield by-election — campaign plan for each party

Six parties on the ballot, six different objectives. An operational briefing for the 18 June 2026 Makerfield by-election: a campaign plan written from inside each party’s own goal — Labour, Reform, Restore Britain, Conservatives, Greens, Lib Dems. Built bottom-up from the 2024 baseline, the May 2026 local elections, ward-level deprivation, and turnout patterns since 2016. No party is being argued for or against.

Six parties on the ballot, six different objectives. Each plan below is built bottom-up from the constituency data: the 2024 general election baseline, the May 2026 local elections, ward-level deprivation, and turnout patterns across five contests since 2016. No party is being argued for or against.

Labour — Andy Burnham

Objective. Win the seat with a margin that closes the leadership question rather than re-opening it. The 2024 majority was 13.4 points. A win under 3 points functions as a draw; a loss ends the leadership pitch entirely.

What the data says.

• Labour’s 2024 share was 45.2%. Labour’s share across Makerfield wards in May 2026 was 22.7% — a 22.5-point collapse in 22 months.
• Reform won all 11 Makerfield-area wards in May on 51.1% of the vote.
• Labour’s residual vote is no longer in the traditional red-wall heartland. In May, Labour’s highest shares were Golborne & Lowton West (32.9%), Hindley Green (32.7%), Ashton South (32.5%) and Winstanley (31.0%) — the more prosperous, higher-turnout wards. Labour’s lowest shares were Ince (19.6%), Hindley (21.4%) and Abram (24.2%) — the deprived former-mining core. The old Labour coalition has inverted.
• Turnout differential matters more than usual. Prosperous wards turned out at 42–43% in May, the deprived core at 33–35%. The 2024 general election turnout was 52.5%. A by-election turnout closer to 50% systematically favours Labour’s modern coalition; closer to 40% favours Reform’s.

Targeting.

• Primary hold: Orrell, Winstanley, Hindley Green, Ashton South, Golborne & Lowton West. These five wards are the only ones where Labour was within striking distance of Reform in May.
• Recover: Worsley Mesnes (Labour 25.2% in May) and Bryn (31.6%). Mid-IMD, reachable.
• Mobilise without expecting to win: Hindley, Abram, Ince, Leigh West. Every Labour vote banked here adds to the constituency total even where the ward is lost.

Message.

Treat Burnham-as-mayor as the asset, not the liability. The data argues against apology mode. Every event a delivery announcement — named projects in named streets — turns “stepping stone” from an attack into a redundancy: an MP who is also Mayor delivers things a backbencher cannot. The answer to “why Makerfield?” is volume of local commitments, not denial of national ambition.

On Reform, stay disciplined on a Labour-vs-Reform binary. A four-way right-of-Labour split (Reform, Restore Britain, Conservative, other) is structurally helpful to Labour; talking about any of the smaller right-wing parties reminds soft-Reform voters they have somewhere else to go.

Operational priorities.

1. Postal vote operation, weighted to the five primary-hold wards. Labour’s modern coalition skews older (65+ at 20.2% locally vs 18.6% nationally), home-owning (71% vs 61.5%), and postal-prone. Bank these votes before 3 June and the GOTV problem on 18 June is half-solved.
2. Burnham personally in Hindley Green, Ashton and Orrell, not in Ince. The marginal voter is suburban.
3. Avoid every leadership-question framing. Every minute spent on Starmer is a minute Reform’s local story runs unanswered.

What would change this plan. A Labour national polling collapse below 25% means Burnham needs to stand visibly apart from the national party, possibly to the point of refusing to share platforms with cabinet members.

Reform UK — Robert Kenyon

Objective. Two-stage. Upside: win the seat. Floor: within 5 points of Labour, which establishes Reform as the durable challenger across red-wall Labour seats. A 10+ point loss after winning every ward in May would be read as a ceiling, not a baseline.

What the data says.

• Reform’s share across Makerfield wards in May 2026: 51.1%. Reform’s 2024 share: 31.8%. The 19-point gap between these two numbers is the campaign’s real question — which is closer to the by-election result?
• By-election turnout is likely 45–55%, against 37% in May. The marginal 8–18% of extra voters are disproportionately less-engaged and less-locked-in to a protest choice.
• Reform’s largest absolute margins in May were Ince (+1,201 votes), Abram (+1,114) and Hindley (+1,082) — all deprived core wards. Kenyon’s strongest single result was Bryn (68.5%), his home ward as a sitting councillor.
• The Conservative vote dropped from 10.9% in 2024 to ~6.7% in May — most went to Reform. The remaining Conservative pool is concentrated in Orrell (787 votes, ~19% of the ward).

Targeting.

• Defend and maximise: Ince, Abram, Hindley, Leigh West. The deprived core. High-turnout differential is Reform’s friend — these wards have a structural floor at ~33%. Get every May Reform voter back; mobilise non-voters through person-to-person contact.
• Squeeze: Worsley Mesnes, Bryn, Hindley Green. Reform was 51–68% in May; the job is to hold that share.
• Consolidate the Conservative remainder: Orrell specifically. The 787 Conservative voters there are the single largest pool of consolidate-able right-of-Labour votes in the seat.

Message.

“Plucky plumber vs Open Borders Burnham” is data-supported: Kenyon was born in the constituency, Burnham is the Greater Manchester Mayor with no Makerfield residency. The contrast is genuine. Two cautions from the numbers.

First, lean local, not national. The May vote was a protest of national Labour delivered through a local ballot. The by-election will be read more nationally by voters, which paradoxically requires Reform to localise harder to keep what it has. Kenyon’s biography — plumber, councillor, second in 2024, local — is the lead story or there is no story.

Second, don’t open fronts against smaller parties. Restore Britain’s likely vote draws from the same pool as Reform’s, but attacking it raises its profile. The Conservatives are the larger and weaker target; squeeze them.

Operational priorities.

1. Turnout, not persuasion. Reform’s May voters exist; the question is whether they vote on 18 June. A GOTV-heavy ground operation in the deprived core is worth more than new-voter persuasion in the suburbs.
2. Postal vote operation in the deprived core. These wards have historically low postal uptake; there is upside in pushing applications, because a postal voter is a banked voter and the deprived-core voter is the most “soft” to election-day non-attendance.
3. Manage Kenyon’s exposure. He is a councillor and a tradesman, not a national broadcaster. Use Farage as the broadcast surrogate where useful and keep Kenyon on doorsteps, in pubs, on town-centre stalls.

What would change this plan. If polling shows Burnham’s personal favourability collapsing into the campaign — the “career politician” attack landing harder than expected — pivot from a 40–45% ceiling strategy to an actual-win strategy and push into the prosperous wards.

Restore Britain — Rebecca Shepherd

Objective. Two-stage. Floor: save the deposit (5% of valid votes, roughly 1,750 votes on a 35,000-vote turnout). Ceiling: third place ahead of the Conservatives, which keeps the party regionally viable as a successor vehicle to the Lowe split from Reform.

What the data says.

• Right-of-Labour vote available is roughly 60% of voters in May 2026 (Reform ~51%, Conservative ~7%, other-right ~2%). Restore Britain’s path is to peel off a slice of this — primarily from soft-Reform and 2024 Conservatives — not from Labour.
• The wards with the largest non-Reform-right bloc are Hindley Green (Con 174, Lib Dem 106 in May), Ashton South (Con 285) and Orrell (Con 787 — by far the largest single Conservative pocket in the seat).
• Self-employment is highest in Hindley Green and Orrell (8.1% each, against the 7.3% constituency average) and the broader Wigan economy is a skilled-trades, small-business economy: 98% of enterprises employ under 50 staff, construction accounts for 10% of employee jobs (double the national share), professional services 5.5% (roughly half).
• Turnout in the realistic target wards is among the highest in the seat: Hindley Green 38.9%, Ashton South 38.5%, Orrell 43.1%. Doors knocked here convert more reliably than in the deprived core.

Targeting.

• Primary: Hindley Green, Ashton South — the two wards where the message fits and turnout is strong.
• Secondary: Orrell. Not for a full canvass operation but for targeted literature to the streets that voted Conservative in May, and a visible weekend presence. The largest movable right-of-Labour pool in the seat is sitting there.
• Coverage only: every other ward. A new party with no name recognition cannot fight an 11-ward war and should not pretend to.

Message.

The structural weakness is identity. Voters need a one-sentence answer to “why aren’t you Reform?” The honest answer is the Lowe split: less national-protest, more local-delivery, more parliamentary discipline. Shepherd’s local-businesswoman biography is the asset; the contrast with Burnham (parachuted-in mayor) is sharper than the contrast with Kenyon (also local), so the candidate framing should be local-vs-Westminster rather than Restore-vs-Reform.

The specific argument worth making, because the data supports it: Wigan has roughly double the national share of construction jobs and roughly half the national share of professional-services jobs. The borough builds, makes, sells and cares more than it does office work. A small-business and trades-focused pitch is concretely true here, not generic.

Operational priorities.

1. Confirm the postal vote deadline with Wigan Council elections office on day one. The first procedural milestone the campaign cannot afford to get wrong.
2. Regional media plan. A 100-volunteer ground operation caps out around 5%. The next 2–3 points come from Shepherd on regional TV and in the hustings looking serious.
3. Define against Burnham, not Kenyon. Every minute attacking Reform raises Reform’s profile and confirms Restore Britain as the smaller party.

What would change this plan. Early polling at 1–2% means the campaign has no vote-share path and should pivot to using the by-election as a recruitment and local-membership-building exercise.

Conservatives

Objective. Save the deposit and demonstrate the party still exists in red-wall seats. The honest realistic target is 5–7%. Below 5% is worse than not contesting.

What the data says.

• 2024 share: 10.9% (4,379 votes). May 2026 share: about 6.7% across wards.
• The vote is concentrated, not spread. Orrell delivered 787 votes in May — roughly 19% of the ward’s valid vote. Every other ward returned 100–300 Conservative votes (3–8%). One ward is carrying the party.
• Badenoch has confirmed contestation and ruled out a Reform pact. No candidate is named with under a month to polling day.

Targeting. Orrell first, Winstanley second, then triage. The party cannot field a full-seat operation with this lead time and should not pretend to. Treat the other nine wards as literature-only.

Message.

The Conservative pitch has to thread a needle Reform does not: be right-of-Labour without being Reform-lite. The data-honest argument is durability — “we’ll still be here after the by-election, fighting council seats and holding the council to account.” It is a long-game pitch, not a winning-this-seat pitch. Internal communications should be candid about that.

Operational priorities.

1. Pick a clearly local candidate within seven days. A late or parachuted candidate confirms the perception of an absent party.
2. Refuse to debate the “vote-splitter” attack from Reform. Restate the durability argument every time.
3. Don’t compete with Restore Britain for the same voter in Hindley Green. The Conservative natural vote sits in Orrell; the only realistic harvest is there.

What would change this plan. A late Reform misstep — a national gaffe, a Kenyon controversy — that opens space for a respectable establishment-right alternative. Unlikely, and the only scenario where the ceiling lifts.

Greens

Objective. Defend the May surprise. Greens took 10.9% across Makerfield wards in May; the by-election ceiling is lower because attention concentrates on the Labour-Reform binary, but 6–8% would keep the local foothold.

What the data says.

• May 2026 share across the wards: 10.9% — third place overall.
• Strongest wards: Orrell (470 votes, 11.6%), Ashton South (12.7%), Abram (11.3%). The vote comes from two different sources — a soft-left prosperous-suburb vote and a protest-left deprived-core vote.

Targeting. Orrell and Ashton South for the soft-left vote; Abram and Leigh West for the protest vote. The party will probably have to choose one track because the messaging that wins each is different. The higher-confidence play is the soft-left environmental track in Orrell and Ashton — the deprived-core protest vote will likely return to Reform under by-election attention.

Message. Quality-of-services and environmental issues in the prosperous wards; cost-of-living and anti-establishment framing if the protest-vote track is chosen instead. Single coherent narrative across the campaign, not both at once.

Operational priorities.

1. Single candidate visible at hustings — the only realistic broadcast vehicle for a sub-10% party.
2. Targeted canvass in Orrell and Ashton South; literature-only elsewhere.
3. Don’t engage with Labour-vs-Reform framing. Stay on the issue ground.

What would change this plan. A further Labour national collapse expands the disillusioned-Labour pool and makes the Greens a more credible left-protest vehicle. The targeting would then widen.

Liberal Democrats

Objective. Save the deposit. May share was 3.1% across wards; 2024 was 6.8%. A 4–5% result would be a creditable defence; below 4% confirms the party has no foothold here.

What the data says.

• Lib Dem strength is thin and unconcentrated. The largest May totals were Leigh West (200), Orrell (199) and Winstanley (176), mostly under 150 elsewhere. No ward carries the party.
• There is no targeting strategy that materially improves on uniform coverage.

Plan. Literature-only constituency-wide. One visible hustings appearance. No volunteer operation justifiable. A by-election with two major-party flagships is the wrong environment for a Lib Dem revival here.

What every plan turns on

Turnout shape. At 45–50% turnout the prosperous wards (Orrell, Winstanley, Hindley Green, Ashton) carry disproportionate weight and Labour’s modern coalition wins comfortably. At 38–42% turnout the deprived core’s relative weight rises and Reform’s path opens. Every plan above should be stress-tested against both scenarios.

The single most useful piece of intelligence available to any campaign in the next three weeks is not a vote-share poll but a turnout model — and the party that commissions one first has an information advantage that compounds with every operational decision.