3SEP

Lib Dems hold Kingswood on a Wednesday

1 min read

12:41UTC

The Liberal Democrats held Kingswood on Stroud District Council with 64.0% of the vote against Reform UK's 10.1%, in a poll held a day earlier than convention.

← Back to Reform's £4m arrived as cash, not crypto Jump to analysis ↓

PoliticsAssessed

Key takeaway

The Liberal Democrats held Kingswood on 64.0%, with Reform UK third on 10.1%.

The Liberal Democrats held Kingswood ward on Stroud District Council on Wednesday 2 September with 64.0% of the vote ¹. Reform UK finished third on 10.1% ². The poll ran on a Wednesday rather than the customary Thursday, which is a convention of British elections rather than a statutory requirement.

A 64.0% share at a by-election points to a local organisation that is fully intact, in a Gloucestershire market town and its surrounding parishes. Reform's showing there belongs with its inner-London result rather than with its Sheffield gain, and the party has now recorded both extremes inside a single fortnight.

The Liberal Democrats have also been the party doing the taking this summer, prising Almondbury off Reform on Kirklees council in August . Both facts describe the same thing from opposite ends. A ward with an entrenched incumbent party gives a newer challenger no soft edge to work on, and the seats changing hands are the ones where nobody had built anything before May.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

The Liberal Democrats held Kingswood ward on Stroud District Council in Gloucestershire with 64.0% of the vote, a comfortable win. Reform UK finished third on just 10.1%. The poll was held on a Wednesday, 2 September, rather than the usual Thursday polling day.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

Kingswood's 53.9-point gap between the Liberal Democrats on 64.0% and Reform UK in third on 10.1% sits at the opposite end of this briefing's spread from Dover, where the top two finished 1.3 points apart.

Not every ward covered this run is a close split; where a party holds a big enough starting majority, no amount of vote fragmentation elsewhere in the field changes the outcome.

Sources:PollCheck

Mentions:Liberal Democrats →Reform UK →Stroud District Council →London →Almondbury →Sheffield →

First Reported In

Update #17 · Reform's £4m arrived as cash, not crypto

PollCheck· 3 Sept 2026

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Different Perspectives

Scottish Labour members

Scottish Labour's published leadership nominations show 33 MPs and MSPs backing Michael Marra against 12 for Joe Fagan, with members voting until 17 September and a result on 19 September. Elected members do not cast the ballot, so the nomination gap measures the parliamentary party rather than the membership that will decide it.

Electoral Commission

The Electoral Commission published its Q2 2026 donations register on 3 September, recording Reform UK's £5.44m as the highest of any party and Ben Delo's £4m as two cash gifts. The register records a donation's form and amount, not the origin of a donor's wealth, so a cash gift shows the same as any other.

Reform UK

Danny Kruger, Reform UK's MP for East Wiltshire, called the Bill "a flagrantly partisan attempt to kneecap Reform UK" during the 2 September debate, objecting to its trade-union exemption. Reform enters its Birmingham conference having topped Q2's donor register at £5.44m, £4m of it in cash from Ben Delo, a form the new ban does not reach.

Ian Davidson, Acting Returning Officer for Clacton

Davidson's office printed a 90cm ballot paper for the record 34-candidate field, with nothing in electoral law capping candidate numbers or the £500 deposit each pays. He expects the paper's size to raise printing costs and slow the count into the early hours, a strain that follows from the major parties' boycott, not from turnout.

Labour Party

Labour gained Penistone East from Reform on 20 August but lost Harraby South to Reform the same night, a wash that undercuts any claim of momentum. The party can point to beating Reform in a genuinely fought contest, but not to a pattern running only in its favour.

Liberal Democrats

The Liberal Democrats took two of Reform's May wards, Almondbury on 13 August and St Neots Eynesbury on 20 August, the latter on a 29.8-point rise in their own vote share. Both results let the party claim it is the beneficiary when voters turn against Reform, not Labour or the Conservatives.