Following the local elections on Thursday, this has already happened:
Unsurprisingly it’s going just as we thought for Reform UK LTD.
Daniel Devaney, a candidate who won his election, resigned straight after saying he didn’t want the job! Believed to be one of many paper candidates put forward by Reform UK LTD, how many more are we going to see?
Jay Cooper who won a seat in Bootle, Merseyside, and who was known prior to being selected for having antisemitic views, such as being a Holocaust denier, is now “Not welcome” in Reform UK LTD as stated by Nigel Farage. I thought they had a robust vetting procedure now?
David Baker, just elected for a Sunderland ward, has a criminal background for beating up his then partner after getting paranoid through overuse of cannabis. His child was also taken into social services after neglect with another partner. Once again, where was the robust vetting from Farage and Reform UK LTD? It’s not like they can’t afford it!
Can I remind you it’s only been two days since the local elections? How many more are we going to be finding out in the very near future?
Mike F. Shaw
“But the Holocaust is a hoax. There weren’t even six million Jews in Europe at the time. Propaganda.”
Those are the words of Jay Leslie Cooper, a Reform UK candidate who has now been ELECTED to Sefton Council in Bootle West.
The Liverpool Echo flagged these comments BEFORE the election, yet what happened?
Not suspended. ❌
Not rejected. ❌
Elected. ✅
And it doesn’t stop with antisemitism. 😬
Cooper also shared anti-Muslim conspiracy content claiming Labour were “importing voters” and that “terror comes with it.”
This is the party that keeps telling the public it is becoming more “professional”, more “mainstream”, more “electable”.
But what is actually happening is something far more dangerous: extremism being normalised in plain sight.
If comments like these had come from almost any other party, they would dominate headlines for days. Yet with Reform, the outrage seems to fade faster every single time.
So is this what Reform means when it talks about “professionalising” the party?
On Monday morning (11/5), up and down the country, people with no previous experience of local politics will be storming into council chambers, fuelled by adrenaline and vowing to make immediate changes, but with little idea of how to make them happen. They will be relying on Reform’s national office for guidance, which will be slow in coming as it will likely be overwhelmed, unprepared and quite possibly unbothered.
The new councillors will treat the people who work for the council with utter contempt. After all, they believe they have a mandate from the people. Those very people who actually do the work in councils will continue to serve their towns, villages and cities because, ultimately, it is their job, though I doubt it will be done with much enthusiasm.
Within weeks, the cracks will become apparent. The resignations will start, the revelations will emerge and the excuses will be proffered. Reform at local council level is drunk on euphoria; sobriety will exact a terrible toll.
If you are feeling sad at the moment, allow yourself a little smile as you imagine the terror beginning to grow among elected councillors who do not have a clue. Their own supporters’ expectations will become part of their downfall.
I actually feel a little sorry for them.
Nah — I’m kidding.
Let the carnage begin!
This is Glenn Gibbins, who was elected on behalf of Reform UK yesterday in the Hylton Castle Ward, Sunderland.
In March 2024, Gibbins said, “Carnt believe amount of nigerians in town…..should melt them all down and fill in the pot holes!!”
Gibbins has described the BBC presenters Mel & Sue as the “unfunniest fat repulsive lesbian hosts ever”
The Reform UK candidate has called boat migrants an “army of Muslims who will in time turn on us” and in another post said: “OUR TOLERANCE IS The MUSLIMS GREATEST WEAPON”.
So what happened to Reform’s vetting process in relation to this man?
Oh….I know, it doesn’t exist.
Dim Conaghan
A Reform Senedd member who did not want to be elected but was – how long will he last if he did not even have time to go to the count
Joshua Kim won the sixth seat at Blaenau Gwent, Caerffili, and Rhymni for Reform but missed the count because he was doing a shift as a supply teacher.
Kim tells the BBC he was “shellshocked” and “did not think for one minute” he would be elected, appearing “distraught, utterly shocked and confused”.
The supply teacher says he hadn’t told his pupils about his candidacy and wasn’t at the count because it would have meant losing a day’s pay.
The returning officer spent a few minutes trying to find him and couldn’t quite believe he wasn’t in the hall. He turned up about 45 minutes after as the hall was being reset for a football match.
Martyn Shrewsbury
He’s not only banned from every football ground; he’s banned from entering any town or city on a day when either Swansea City or Wales is playing!
A person who does not exist was elected to Reform UK in Norfolk.
