Reform’s local election performance may not have been all it was cracked up to be, but the party gained 1,435 councillors across England. Several Reform councillors have since been suspended or stepped down before they really had a chance to make their mark on local government, while others have retained their council seats, ready to take decisions in spite of having been hit by scandal and controversy. Here are the best of the worst…
The one who wants to melt Nigerians.
Glenn Gibbins was elected to Sunderland city council with 1,285 votes. He was suspended from the party on 11 May pending an investigation into allegations that he posted on social media complaining about the “amount of Nigerians in town” and saying “Should melt them all down and fill in the pot holes!” in a since deleted post.
Questioned about it on 10 May, deputy leader Richard Tice refused to criticise Gibbins and accused the media of “smearing” his party.
The edgelord.
Nathaniel Menday was elected to the Woodhouse ward of Sheffield city council with 1,987 votes. But he has been suspended for bringing Reform into disrepute after allegedly sharing a picture of Berlin’s Nazi-era Olympiastadion in January 2024 and wrote: “Whichever group of people built this must have been real visionaries!”
He also previously shared pictures of swastikas, Mein Kampf and other far-right iconography like the Sonnenrad, or “sun wheel”. In other posts, he described people in Britain being “fatter, uglier and poorly dressed” than those on the European continent and said, “On top of this we have a disgusting, almost subhuman underclass of people bringing the place down.”
Menday told the Times he enjoyed “risky humour and pushing boundaries”. He said: “I am not antisemitic nor do I have any Nazi sympathies.” He admitted flirting with far-right ideology but said “I reject its core tenets”.
The one who thinks he’s part of the master race.
Stuart Prior was one of 53 Reform councillors elected to Essex county council with 2,404 votes, and also won a seat of Rochford district council. He has now been expelled from the party over allegations of racist and Islamophobic posts on social media.
Prior is alleged to have made posts saying white people are “the master race” and have “larger brains”.
Research group Hope Not Hate also claimed Prior deleted an X account named @essexpriory earlier this year. In November, the account posted “Muslims are dirt” and “Muslims are awful, globally”. He was accused of posting that genocide could not be committed against Muslims.
When Your Party MP Zarah Sultana posted on X highlighting the rape of two Sikh and Punjabi women in the Midlands, Prior is alledged to have responded: “Good. Reap it.”
Prior told the Mirror newspaper “that’s not what I would have put down” and “this isn’t me”.
Reform told the paper: “Stuart Prior informed us that he was resigning from his elected positions for personal reasons. We have also revoked his Reform UK membership.”
The one who just had an opinion.
Following the fatal shooting of rightwing pundit Charlie Kirk in September last year, Jay Cooper, who was elected as a Reform councillor for Bootle West with 705 votes, wrote a Facebook post saying: “Heartbreaking. Murdered for having an opinion.”
A commenter said that Adolf Hitler has an opinion too, asking “did he deserve to die?” to which Cooper responded: “I don’t agree with him murdering innocent people. But the Hallocaust [sic.] is a hoax. There wasn’t [sic.] even 6 million Jews in Europe at the time. Propaganda.”
Questioned on this by the Liverpool Echo, Reform leader Nigel Farage said: “Do we welcome people with these ideas? No, we absolutely don’t.”
Cooper announced he was going on a much needed holiday, before posting on Facebook saying “the Holocaust was real” and saying his previous comments were “poorly expressed” and “failed to reflect the seriousness and sensitivity this subject demands, and for that I sincerely apologise”. He resigned from Reform but will continue to serve Bootle West as an independent.
The one who just wants to be valued.
Ben Rowe was suspended by Reform pending an investigation into social media posts, days after winning his seat on Plymouth city council with 1,649 votes.
In April, the Times reported, Ben Rowe urged protesters throwing bricks at police defending a mosque to “get rid of that filthy building” during the 2024 Southport riots.
Commenting beneath a YouTube video in February of this year, he accused “the Jews” of “creating division by forcing other races on our societies”.
Following the Times investigation, Rowe posted on Facebook: “This post may be my last. My bike has been vandalised costing me hundreds, I’ve had things posted, years ago, taken out of context.
“I just want to be a valued, contributing member of society and what better way than to be a councillor for my ward, delivering on issues your tax money goes to?”
And here are just some of the scandal-hit Reform councillors who have not been suspended…
The HMO manager.
As a Reform candidate for Wigan council, Lee Moffitt pledged to reduce the amount of homes of multiple occupation (HMO). It was then revealed that he owns a company which manages three HMOs for private landlords.
On Facebook, he clarified that, “Neither I, nor any business that I own, HAVE ever owned nor WILL ever own, an HMO.” His company managed three HMOs for ten years and, “None of them have ever been occupied by illegal migrants or used as a halfway house for former prisoners.”
Moffitt was elected with 1,771 votes.
The ladies’ man.
New Birmingham councillor Darren Colling, 56, has spent his time since his election victory deleting social media posts made over the last 12 months, in which he comments on photos of young women, including an adult woman dressed up in a school uniform costume.
The internet never forgets and X account Reform Exposed managed to get screenshots of several posts.
A screen grab of Darren Colling’s social media activity. Screengrab: X/Reform Exposed
He tells the women they are “stunning”, “yummy” and have “great pins”. Replying to one post of a young woman, he said, “what does she bring to the relationship, she best be taking it up the A hole”.
Birmingham Reform’s new leader Jex Parkin said: “While they make uncomfortable reading, there is nothing illegal or a huge breach of conduct, and they were deleted before he took office” – implying that the posts could not be considered a breach of the council’s code of conduct.
Colling was elected with 2,102 votes.
The one who invited a far-right activist to speak about Islam.
When Peter Harris was chair of Barking and Dagenham’s Ukip branch in 2017, he invited Anne Marie Waters, a former associate of Tommy Robinson, to a branch meeting to speak about the need to “severely restrict immigration” from Muslim countries.
That year, Waters lost the Ukip leadership election, despite allegations that the party had been flooded with about 1,000 far-right entryists. She went on to found her own far-right party, For Britain, which folded in 2022.
Harris has now been selected leader of Essex county council, saying: “We have an incredibly strong mandate – we must move quickly to bring about the changes and improvements [voters] are desperate for.”
He was elected with 3,513 votes.
The Tommy fan.
Phil Tierney signed a petition calling for an end to the persecution of “Sir Tommy” Robinson, real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, and shared a video on “the case to ban all Islamic migration”.
Tierney also shared a post saying “I am Islamophobic” and another saying “no communist or Muslim should be allowed to hold any office”. He now represents the Chelmsley Wood ward of Solihull council with 1,264 votes.
Reform has been contacted for comment.
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