Nigel Farage has said he would ban foreign nationals from social housing and then deport them if they could not find private-sector homes, in a hardening of anti-immigration rhetoric before the Makerfield byelection.

Two recent polls in Makerfield have suggested Farage’s Reform UK is continuing to leak potentially crucial support to its far-right rival Restore Britain, which is led by the former Reform MP Rupert Lowe.

On Sunday, Farage used his first post on a new Substack account to try to appeal to Makerfield voters tempted by Restore, which has an even more extremist stance on immigration than Reform.

In an essay that mentioned white people more than 60 times, Farage said: “Thanks to the mass migration policies of Conservative and Labour governments, white Brits will become a minority in this country before the end of the century.”

He wrote: “Anti-whiteness is institutionalised into every aspect of public life” and said Reform would ban foreign nationals from welfare, including social housing. He added: “Foreign nationals who are unable to relocate to private rented accommodation after a three-month grace period will lose their right to remain and be liable for deportation.”

Farage vowed that “veterans and long-term local residents will be preferenced for social housing” if he were in power.

In his 6,800-word essay, Farage also described the result of diversity, equity and inclusion policies as a “deeply sinister act of social cleansing” and confirmed Reform’s plans to abolish the Equality Act. He said: “No recruitment, training or promotion policies that favour one group over another will be lawful: we will restore meritocracy so your skin colour, sex, age or sexuality has no bearing on your job prospects or treatment as an employee.”

In healthcare, Farage said Reform would “cap the recruitment of foreign doctors to ensure that British patients are not being put at risk”. And in education it would insist that university admissions were “purely meritocratic” to stop white students being “squeezed to make way”, he said.

Farage made no mention of Restore in his lengthy essay, but pointedly said: “Only Reform has the will and the ability to ensure that no young white person ever has to grow up feeling ashamed of who they are again.”

A poll in the Times on Friday suggested support for Restore could cost Reform the chance of winning the Makerfield byelection. The survey by More in Common and the UCL Policy Lab showed Labour’s candidate, Andy Burnham, on 45%, compared with 40% for Reform and 8% for Restore.

Another Makerfield poll by Convergence reported in the Sunday Times suggested Burnham had stretched his support to 49%, 12 points ahead of Reform on 37%, with Restore on 5%.

With the rightwing vote continuing to split four days before the byelection, the Mail on Sunday gave its backing to Reform. It also splashed its front page on a report that Restore were being backed by activists who had attended a recent neo-Nazi summit.

Those campaigning for Restore this weekend included Callum Barker, who attended a “remigration summit” in Portugal last month that discussed the rightwing great replacement conspiracy theory, the paper reported. Speakers at the conference included Lucy White and Lorcan Barker who, like Callum Barker, had been pictured with Lowe, the report said.

Lowe dismissed the report as a sign of Restore’s success in Makerfield. Writing on X, he said: “The Daily Mail have dedicated their entire Sunday front page to some bullshit hit piece about how a handful of Restore Britain activists attended some deportation conference. They are terrified. Why? We are winning.”

Asked about Farage’s comments on Substack, the culture secretary, Lisa Nandy, told Sky News: “I think he should take his nasty hate and anger and division somewhere else. Frankly, I’ve had enough of it, and I think a lot of us round our way have as well.”

The chief executive of the housing charity Shelter, Sarah Elliott, said Farage’s plan was “racist and morally wrong”.

“These divisive plans risk kicking thousands of our friends, neighbours and colleagues out of their homes and the communities they are part of, without justification,” she said. “This would lead to increasing homelessness, put extreme pressure on councils and rip apart the fabric of our country for no reason.”

Instead of political points-scoring, Elliott urged politicians to focus on building 90,000 social rented homes a year for the next decade.