Earlier this year, as Reform UK official Shaun Wilkinson was shortlisting candidates for May¡¯s local elections, he watched in astonishment as a superior remotely replaced one pick in the shared spreadsheet with a recent Conservative defector whom he¡¯d rejected.
Wilkinson said he believed the former Tory was brought in because she was friends with another defector, Reform¡¯s mayor of Greater Lincolnshire, Andrea Jenkyns. The party dismissed that charge as "completely untrue¡± and said the defector was allocated a vacant seat. Jenkyns didn¡¯t respond to a request for comment.
It wasn¡¯t Wilkinson¡¯s only conflict over candidate selection. After a wealthy local man was rejected for swearing on social media, Wilkinson says Reform¡¯s deputy chairman, Paul Nuttall, told him the candidate had to pass. That left Wilkinson with the impression the rules could be bent by those with deep pockets, and he left Reform in February.
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