Reform’s new leader sets out plans for Oldham

Oldham Reform’s ‘hard edged’ new leader who doesn’t ‘suffer fools’ has issued an ultimatum he hopes will change the borough’s politics forever next year.

Earlier this year, the party made huge gains across the borough, winning 13 seats and boosting their numbers to 16 in the council chamber. This put them just two seats behind Labour and within touching distance of running the council.

However, the local authority has been locked in a stalemate since those elections in May with no political leader. No party holds more than a third of seats in the council chamber and political divisions have prevented cross-party consensus.

That could all change in May 2027 when voters go to the polls again to elect another third of their councillors. When the dust settles, Labour might no longer be the largest party in the borough for the first time since 2010.

However Reform’s new leader councillor Paul Taylor now faces many challenges between now and next year. There is a by-election in Failsworth West next month and another election is expected in Royton North which are Reform’s to lose.

Both of Coun Taylor’s predecessors Lewis Quigg and Mark Wilkinson have left the party, the first resigning mid-investigation and the latter for health reasons. Gary Tarbuck, a St James councillor, has also been suspended pending an investigation and some supporters of the party have criticised the party’s handling of events over the last two months.

Nationally, Politico’s round up of key polls now has Labour 6% ahead of Reform and recently an undercover ITV investigation revealed controversial comments made by a number of party members and councillors. On the latter, Coun Taylor said he was glad certain people have now left the party.

However the Reform leader is optimistic Reform will gain more seats next year and by growing their numbers, his party will be ‘an irresistible force’ and have even more of a mandate to lead Oldham council. It could mean Reform ends up being Oldham’s largest party.

Known for his trademark fedoras, Coun Taylor said he stopped wearing them when he was younger after people poked fun at him but following a near-death experience as a supermarket checkout in Greenfield, he changed his mind.

He told the LDRS: “I don’t care anymore. People can say what they want about me.

“I’m far too old, I’m far too thick skinned now. That was why I started wearing hats. I will wear my hats until the day I die now. I’m not going to change my habits.”

Growing up in ‘abject poverty’ in Salford, Coun Taylor sees himself as a former Labour activist who got left behind, adding: “I was a socialist. I’ve not moved and the world has changed around me.

“I’m now a so-called far-right whatever. I’ve not actually changed my opinion in any way shape or form. I’m the same person I was then. It’s just everybody else seems to have gone to places I just don’t recognise.”

Coun Taylor said he left Labour after becoming disillusioned during the leadership of Tony Blair. Before joining Reform, he set up his own independent party, which he has now resigned from, and has stood for the Brexit Party.

He said he then became disillusioned after feeling like nothing was changing. Reform he felt on the other hand was a banner under which it was possible to bring about change.

He said: “We’ve got a vehicle with four wheels on it that’s called Reform UK. That’s the only vehicle that’s got any chance at this particular moment in time. Another vehicle may come along in the future but it’s not here yet.”

While newer to politics, Coun Taylor has touted his Masters degrees and his work as Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service’s commander for Oldham. Referring to his time in the fire service, he told the LDRS: “You can go through your career and not see a single death.

“I’ve seen a lot of death and it sort of changes you, not saying in a bad way, but it makes you very hard edged. I’m very hard edged and I don’t suffer fools gladly.”

Arguing his pitch is to ‘save Oldham’, Coun Taylor fears power in Greater Manchester is being centralised. While some have welcomed a new Mayoral Development Corporation aiming to regenerate the town centre, Coun Taylor called it ‘gerrymandering’ and will leave out people who do not live in central Oldham.

In the council chamber, Coun Taylor has been known for his blunt comments, some of which have already landed him in trouble with his colleagues. However the leader said he now wanted to build bridges across ideological divides to get things done and tackle a ‘toxic atmosphere’.

Despite being political adversaries, he said Labour group leader Coun Arooj Shah was a ‘switched-on cookie’ and that he has asked to meet with other party leaders Coun Kamran Ghafoor and Sam Al-Hamdani.

He said: “They need me to show them the way otherwise they are never going to trust each other in there.”

Asked if he felt he might have also contributed to Oldham’s divided politics, he added: “Probably in the past, I hold my hands up, mea culpa, I’ve poked fun at people. I’ve done all that in the past. You get carried away by the swell. I won’t do it anymore.

“It’s destructive. It doesn’t work. I’ve learned that and I’m always one that takes notice of the lessons learned.

“It’s what’s happened in society in general. We’ve just become so anti-each other. The sides are just like cats and dogs fighting across the street. It’s not good.

“I used to be able to have conversations as a Labour activist with Conservatives. We used to have conversations and debates and that’s all gone. Nobody does that anymore. Nobody talks anymore.”

If Reform does take over the council, he said he wanted to ramp up enforcement to tackle issues like flytipping, properly tackle problems around poor quality housing, as well as litter. However Coun Taylor also makes clear he would be willing to give up power too, something he said is key to changing Oldham.

He said: “As a brand new elected member to try and get something done, the hurdles are Herculean. It’s still the case now. I want to change that. I want to make this an open council, a high trust council.

“We have got to trust our electorate to know that we are doing a good job and we’ve got to trust ourselves to do a good job. We’ve got to talk to each other and we’ve got to work together, all councillors work together.

“We can’t carry on like this because what this will do is just alienate people and they won’t vote.”

Without a leader or a cabinet in Oldham, chief executive Shelley Kipling has been running things under emergency powers but the power vacuum has risked government intervention and the prospect of costly commissioners being brought in.

Last month, an interim arrangement was introduced looking to share responsibilities across parties and avoid this potential outcome. Coun Taylor was one of the few councillors to abstain on this key vote.

Despite not liking it, the Reform leader said he has no plans to rip up an agreement he sees as undemocratic. If commissioners had been brought in, he suggested next year’s likely council tax rise would be even higher.

Coun Taylor told the LDRS: “I pointed out the flaws. I pointed out the lack of democracy. You’re making yourself a bed to lie in potentially next year as well.

“Next year, say we get 25 and nobody will vote for us as the administration and say we’ll just roll over this interim agreement again. No, it’s not democracy.

“We won’t be doing this again next year. I’ve already been in the leader’s meeting and said I will carry you all until next May, I won’t rock the boat until next May but we are not doing this again.”

He added: “We are all basically papering over the cracks. There are cracks and I have a duty of care, I have a duty of care to the electorate of Oldham.

“Consequently I will only paper over the cracks until such time I don’t have to paper over the cracks. That comes next May.”