As Change UK launches campaign... a resignation

A CHANGE UK candidate was forced to resign hours after he was unveiled when it emerged he had made offensive comments about Romanian pickpockets.

Ali Sadjady, a former Tory standing for the new proRemain party in the European Parliament elections, was accused of hate speech against EU members.

‘When I hear that 70 per cent of pickpockets caught on the London Underground are Romanian, it kind [ of] makes me want Brexit,’ Mr Sadjady wrote in a tweet in November 2017.

Last night, after the Independent newspaper reported the comments, a Change UK spokesman said: ‘Following discussions, Ali Sadjady has reflected on his inappropriate tweet from 2017 and agreed to stand down from the list of potential candidates.’

It comes after Change UK’s launch as The Independent Group earlier this year was marred when one of its MPs, Angela Smith, described people from ethnic minorities as having a ‘funny tinge’ in a discussion about racism on live Tv.

Molly Scott Cato, a Green MEP, said: ‘I’m shocked to read this negative stereotyping of EU citizens. It’s the job of Remain politicians to defend them against the hate speech and acts that have been on the rise since the EU referendum – not to join in.’

TIG announced yesterday that Boris Johnson’s sister will take on Jacob Rees-Mogg’s sister in the European elections.

Rachel Johnson was announced as a European election candidate for Change UK. She will stand in the South West against Annunziata Rees-Mogg, who signed up to Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party.

Former BBC Newsnight presenter Gavin Esler will also be a Change UK candidate.

Miss Johnson insisted that standing as a candidate for Change UK was not a vote against her brother. ‘I’m sure that Boris understands why this is not a vote against Boris,’ she said.

In an interview with the London Evening Standard, Miss Johnson said she did not want to see Brexit ‘rubbing out’ her children’s chances of living, travelling and working in Europe. Taking a swipe at her Brexiteer brother, she added: ‘These are chances that the politicians who decided to campaign to Leave have enjoyed themselves. It is simply not fair – and sometimes one has to stand up and be counted. It is now that time for me.’

She said she had called her brother to tell him she was running, but declined to reveal his reaction. She has previously supported the Liberal Democrats.

In his speech yesterday, Mr Esler condemned Mr Farage and Mr Rees-Mogg as ‘pretend men of the people’ and the ‘posers of Brexit’ who were ‘ selling the same old snake oil’. He added: ‘They claim to speak for the people – they do not. They stole our patriotism and I want it back.’

The former BBC journalist said he had not joined a political party before but was ‘seriously worried’ about the future of Britain.

‘Our political system is a joke. It is a worldwide joke,’ he said. ‘They are laughing at us – not with us, at us. It is broken. This country cannot possibly be strong abroad when it is weak at home. We all know any version of Brexit will make us poorer.’

Announcing Change UK’s candidates, interim leader Heidi Allen said they had been chosen from among 3,700 applicants.

Former Tory Miss Allen, MP for South Cambridgeshire, described the party as a ‘pro-Remain alliance’. She said: ‘These elections are a chance to send the clearest possible message. We demand a people’s vote and the right to campaign to remain in the European Union. We are not afraid to say it as clearly as that.’

Other candidates standing for the party include former Tory Health Secretary Stephen Dorrell, former Conservative MP Neil Carmichael, former Liberal Democrat MEP Diana Wallace and former Labour MP Jon Owen Jones.

European parliamentary elections are due to take place on May 23.

‘Selling the same old snake oil’