To Reform UK, which is in its third week of its crime crackdown campaign which looks to tackle ‘Lawless Britain’. The party claimed Monday’s press conference was the most significant one yet, with two new recruits unveiled. The first was former MEP Rupert Matthews, who – after 40 years as a member of the Tory party – has switched sides to become Reform’s first police and crime commissioner. He immediately took aim at Labour’s early prison release scheme and claimed jails were full ‘of foreign criminals who should be deported the day they are convicted’. And the second was former prison officer Vanessa Frake, the party’s new justice tsar whose comments on female prisons have caused something of a stir…
In a Times interview, Frake suggested that trans women should not be automatically banned from women’s prisons. Cases should be assessed on an ‘individual basis’, she claimed, adding: ‘There are equally vile women as there possibly are trans women – so it’s all about the risk assessments for me… People who want to just say a blanket ban clearly have never stepped foot in a prison.’ Well, she does have the experience – having overseen the detention of serial killers Rose West and Myra Hindley – but Mr S is fairly certain that is not Reform’s party policy.
Indeed party leader Nigel Farage has attempted to dispel confusion today, taking to Twitter to repost an endorsement of the Supreme Court ruling – that backed the biological definition of a woman – and writing: ‘I have never supported men in women’s prisons.’ That clears that up then, eh?
His followers aren’t satisfied, however – with Farage’s decision to hire Frake remaining a point of contention. Referencing Farage’s remarks at Monday’s presser, former Reform man Rupert Lowe wrote in response: ‘You did yesterday.’ Ouch. Will Farage be forced to further clarify his party’s stance on the subject? Could Frake’s position be in trouble? Stay tuned…
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