UKIP Tried To Stand In Wrexham – Fresh Forms Submitted Minutes Before Deadline

UKIP are not standing in Wrexham for the General Election, despite gaining 5,072 votes two years ago, however they did attempt a nomination of a candidate.

Ron Hughes from Caergwrle was set to be the fifth candidate on your ballot papers next week (or sooner if you are a postal voter!) however due to issues with nomination papers expected from Cardiff meant a last ditch local effort ran out of time.

Wrexham Council’s Electoral Service are running the elections for Wrexham and Clwyd South as usual, and published the Notice of Poll that includes the election nomination deadlines, with the relevant rule 3:

We are told nomination papers for a Wrexham UKIP candidate were due to be brought up to the Wrexham area on the Wednesday evening before the Thursday deadline by a UKIP representative – possibly a UKIP Assembly Member.

They did not arrive that evening, nor by the morning of deadline day. We are told eyebrows were raised locally by UKIP activists at the lack of concern from the UKIP representatives at the lack of paperwork and possible issues that caused.

That morning local UKIP members looked to solve the issue by getting a new set of ten people to nominate their candidate via fresh paperwork.

Just after lunchtime on the Thursday, just two hours before the nomination deadline closed, local UKIP activists attempted to submit a valid nomination.

Part of the nomination process involves checking those nominating a prospective candidate have valid electoral roll registrations, with a space on the forms for their registration numbers. Two of the ten people listed on the nomination form were confirmed to be from Clwyd South by Wrexham Council’s Electoral Services and therefore the nomination for Wrexham was invalid on that single point – with all other paperwork correct.

With just over an hour to go before nominations closed local UKIP members went out into the Wrexham constituency to gain the required two further nominations. This was achieved from people described as ‘a good friend’ of local activists and a second person who was asked three times if they were on the electoral roll – and confirmed they were.

Ten minutes before the 4pm deadline the papers were submitted to Wrexham Council’s Electoral team who discovered the final signatory was not actually registered to vote and therefore the nomination was invalid.

We are told the local UKIP team were ‘devastated’ at this news leaving no time to get a replacement nominee, leaving Wrexham with no UKIP candidate.

We understand there will be four candidates in Wrexham for the General Election – no UKIP or Green standing. Official info imminent.

— Wrexham.com (@wrexham) May 11, 2017

We have asked various UKIP media contacts for official comment, however nothing was forthcoming.

Wrexham Council told us they would not be commenting.

In the last three General Elections there has been a relatively consistent number of voters turning out in Wrexham: 30,385 (2005) 32,976 (2010) and 32,719 (2015) – with the gap of the winner last time around being just 1,831 votes.

The question of if the 5,072 UKIP voters from 2015 will still turn out, and where their X will end up in 2017 will have been answered this time next week.