Another day, another election mishap. This time it’s Reform UK under fire after one of the party’s candidates was found to have made pro-Putin comments during a hustings. Julian Malins KC, Reform’s Salisbury candidate, was booed at a recent election event after declaring that Putin ‘seemed very good’. Oo er.
Asked by an audience member at the event whether a Reform government would support Ukraine, Malins told the people of Salisbury that:
We support diplomacy. We support every possible effort to reach a compromise and a settlement over the issues in Ukraine. That is what the adults in the room do. Stop the killing and negotiate a proper settlement.
I have actually met Putin and had a 10-minute chat with him and he seemed very good. He is not the Austrian gentleman with a moustache come alive again.
Oh dear. The Salisbury Journal reports how Malins’ answer was met with ’boos and looks of disgust’, while one local accused the Reform candidate of being out of touch. Nigel Farage’s man might have considered framing his answer better – not least because Salisbury is where Sergei and Yulia Skripal were targeted by Russian intelligence officers in the infamous Novichok attack. Talk about not reading the room…
Malins is the latest Reform candidate to have been slammed for controversial comments. As Mr S revealed before the election was announced, the party had to drop ten prospective nominees after their social media use was uncovered. More recently its leader blasted Vetting.com, the company the party used to help it background check its own candidates, after further revelations about those standing for election emerged.
But the Farage-founded party is not the only one experiencing candidate catastrophes. Sir Keir’s Labour lot had to suspend several people before the nomination deadline – and more recently has faced calls to drop wannabe MPs over contentious remarks. Just last week Starmer’s army was forced to ditch its Aberdeenshire North and Moray East candidate over online posts expressing pro-Putin sentiments. It’s hardly been the smoothest election campaign…
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