A viral quiz called 'Guess the Party' has taken Westminster by storm, challenging players to identify local election candidates' political affiliations from their photographs. Created by Sam Hamill-Stewart, the game draws on images from Democracy Club, with logos removed to avoid obvious clues. By the close of polls on Thursday, over 3.9 million guesses had been made by approximately 134,000 people.
The game reveals that appearances can be deceptive. Green candidates are the easiest to identify, guessed correctly by 37.5% of players, followed by Reform UK on 35.4%. Liberal Democrats proved the trickiest, with only 15.2% correct guesses. Some candidates were instantly recognisable: Jacky Carr, a Green candidate in Broxborne, was correctly identified by 91.3% of players, while Reform's Alan John Outlaw in Keighley East scored 80.7%.
However, many candidates defied stereotypes. Martin Radbon, the Green candidate for Erith, was correctly guessed by just 1.7% of players, with most assuming he stood for Reform. Laura Caroline Harrison, a Conservative candidate with purple hair, was identified as a Tory by only 2.5% of players; many thought she was a Green. Colourful hair proved a common red herring: among the top five candidates incorrectly identified as Greens, four had pink, red or purple hair but were actually standing for the Conservatives, Labour or the Liberal Democrats.
