Farage is in the new Millbank Reform media centre to give a law and order press conference. He said it will be the “most significant event of our crime campaign so far”…
Former prison governor Vanessa Frake is also in attendance having been announced as the party’s new justice adviser. Another guest is billed…
UPDATE: Rupert Matthews, Tory Police and Crime Commissioner for Leicestershire, defects to Reform. Matthews was re-elected Leicestershire PCC in 2024 with 35.3% vote compared to Labour’s 34.8%. Leicestershire County Council was won this year by Reform with 32.4% to the Tories’ 28.4%…
He accuses Badenoch of “cowardly capitulation to establishment orthodoxies.” Tory since 1984…
UPDATE II: Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland Conservatives call for a PCC by-election:
“The thousands of members and residents across Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland who elected Rupert Matthews as a Conservative Police and Crime Commissioner will feel let down by Rupert’s decision to defect to Reform UK.
He was elected on a mandate to deliver the Conservative Police and Crime plan. It is therefore democratically correct that if Rupert wants to continue under different political colours he should seek the permission of the electorate and call a by-election.
In the meantime, the Leicester, Leicestershire & Rutland Conservatives will be focussed on holding him to account on the issues that matter to our residents; safer streets, protecting communities and property, and supporting victims of crime and anti-social behaviour.”
Sarah Pochin at Reform Scotland’s manifesto launch event: “I really wanted to come on in a Reform tartan burka, but apparently I wasn’t allowed… One day let’s do one of these events not live-streamed. We’ll do all the naughty stuff…”