Fake Reform Candidates

[dyqik]

Yes. I do know the full details but all campaign material - including stakeboards - need to have an imprint that says who's responsible (normally the candidate, I think). You need an election agent and they have to make sure that everything is done legally (expenditure is within limits and recorded, for eg). The agent is also responsible for making sure all the paperwork is filed correctly.

But is there a requirement for the candidate to have actually approved the material? Auto-generated campaign materials can easily have the imprint added, without the candidate having seen it. My concern here is about a central party nominating an agent for a paper candidate, and generating large amounts of campaign materials for paper candidates who aren't actually involved in campaigning.

[Boustrophedon]

On the other hand the Tory candidate Michael Fabricant, despite all indications to the contrary is actually real.

[Gfamily]

He looks real

"He didn't have a picture wearing the appropriate Reform candidate colour tie"
https://x.com/PrivateEyeNews/status/1810327043827249452

[Fishnut]

Yes. I do know the full details but all campaign material - including stakeboards - need to have an imprint that says who's responsible (normally the candidate, I think). You need an election agent and they have to make sure that everything is done legally (expenditure is within limits and recorded, for eg). The agent is also responsible for making sure all the paperwork is filed correctly.

But is there a requirement for the candidate to have actually approved the material? Auto-generated campaign materials can easily have the imprint added, without the candidate having seen it. My concern here is about a central party nominating an agent for a paper candidate, and generating large amounts of campaign materials for paper candidates who aren't actually involved in campaigning.

I just realised my post has a typo and was supposed to start."I don't know....". But it's a good question and I will see if I can find out

[Sciolus]

The Green parties fielded candidates in all 575 seats in E&W. Of those, 4 were target seats, maybe 4 more were stretch targets, and 567 were no-hopers. The candidate selection process for those 567 was presumably to get the local party together in a phone box, ask for someone to volunteer to come fifth, and lock them in until someone blinked; or failing that get the central party to pick a sacrificial victim to put their name on the ballot paper. The resulting mug won't necessarily have been particularly active. Plenty of people have no social media presence. There will have been a minimal amount of campaigning, maybe a leaflet or two, but the party's limited resources will have been focussed on winable seats.

[dyqik]

The Green parties fielded candidates in all 575 seats in E&W. Of those, 4 were target seats, maybe 4 more were stretch targets, and 567 were no-hopers. The candidate selection process for those 567 was presumably to get the local party together in a phone box, ask for someone to volunteer to come fifth, and lock them in until someone blinked; or failing that get the central party to pick a sacrificial victim to put their name on the ballot paper. The resulting mug won't necessarily have been particularly active. Plenty of people have no social media presence. There will have been a minimal amount of campaigning, maybe a leaflet or two, but the party's limited resources will have been focussed on winable seats.

The Green party at least has a history of running local and county council candidates all over the place, meaning that there is some party infrastructure there.

[Stranger Mouse]

There’s a ceiling on Short Money because they didn’t get 6 MPs. If not for that 4 million votes would turn into quite a bit of cash at around £40 for every 200 votes

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/re ... s/sn01663/

Worth their while paying a Tory £200k to defect, given that it would potentially unlock £800k in Short Money (I don't know whether the money only applies to votes and elected members in a GE)

It does, so not worth it.

Why would anyone think that you would need as much as £200k to buy a Tory?

[dyqik]

A candidate must presumably provide evidence they are 18 and a citizen.

There must be some ID check. Would be hilarious if you need ID to vote but not to stand.

Being on the electoral register somewhere would suffice for the first. The number of candidates from certain places raises the possibility of corruption or hacking in certain localities in getting them on the electoral register there.

After that, I doubt the guy from Gibraltar flew to the constituency to show ID in person.

It seems that checking candidates and nominations is expressly forbidden beyond the most basic scrutiny of the form!

https://x.com/fascinatorfun/status/1810423484712878536

In particular, the names on the nomination forms should not be checked.
https://x.com/fascinatorfun/status/1810424057533464811

Electoral Commission guidance: https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/ ... ominations

[jimbob]

A candidate must presumably provide evidence they are 18 and a citizen.

There must be some ID check. Would be hilarious if you need ID to vote but not to stand.

Being on the electoral register somewhere would suffice for the first. The number of candidates from certain places raises the possibility of corruption or hacking in certain localities in getting them on the electoral register there.

After that, I doubt the guy from Gibraltar flew to the constituency to show ID in person.

It seems that checking candidates and nominations is expressly forbidden beyond the most basic scrutiny of the form!

https://x.com/fascinatorfun/status/1810423484712878536

In particular, the names on the nomination forms should not be checked.
https://x.com/fascinatorfun/status/1810424057533464811

Electoral Commission guidance: https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/ ... ominations

Yup

Accepting nominations at face value
You must not:

undertake any investigation or research into any candidate. Your duty does not go beyond seeing that a nomination form is correct on face value2
You should not:

investigate whether a name given on a nomination form is genuine
You should:

disregard any personal knowledge you may already have of the candidate
determine nominations on the basis of the form itself

[dyqik]

And candidate's eligibility is solely a question for candidate, not the returning officer.

No checks are allowed to be made into whether a candidate is 18 and eligible to be on the electoral register.

[dyqik]

If your aim was to cause disruption of the democratic process, by spreading uncertainty and doubt about the validity of candidates that split the right wing vote, it's hard to imagine a system that's more friendly to you.

[Boustrophedon]

Any regulation to prevent this sort of (assumed) abuse of the electoral process would likely ban the likes of Count Binface, Screaming Lord Sutch, Howling Laud Hope and the rest of the raving loonies. I am in two minds as to whether this would be a good or a bad thing.

Anyway Richard Tice has vehemently denied that any of their candidates are not real, so that's OK then.

https://x.com/itvpeston/status/1810419823643439139

[dyqik]

Any regulation to prevent this sort of (assumed) abuse of the electoral process would likely ban the likes of Count Binface, Screaming Lord Sutch, Howling Laud Hope and the rest of the raving loonies. I am in two minds as to whether this would be a good or a bad thing.

Anyway Richard Tice has vehemently denied that any of their candidates are not real, so that's OK then.

https://x.com/itvpeston/status/1810419823643439139

Count Binface etc. would be fine, since they stand under their own names ("known as Count Binface"), as registered voters, and with nominations from real voters within the constituency.

Tice has immediately claimed defamation​, which is always the sign of someone who knows that there's no truth to the allegations.

[Stranger Mouse]

Any regulation to prevent this sort of (assumed) abuse of the electoral process would likely ban the likes of Count Binface, Screaming Lord Sutch, Howling Laud Hope and the rest of the raving loonies. I am in two minds as to whether this would be a good or a bad thing.

Anyway Richard Tice has vehemently denied that any of their candidates are not real, so that's OK then.

https://x.com/itvpeston/status/1810419823643439139

Count Binface etc. would be fine, since they stand under their own names ("known as Count Binface"), as registered voters, and with nominations from real voters within the constituency.

Tice has immediately claimed defamation​, which is always the sign of someone who knows that there's no truth to the allegations.

Binface is one of the few genuinely witty comedy candidates. Even if he were to be banned from standing (which I don’t see happening) I’m sure he would have the comedy chops to make some great jokes about it.

[Woodchopper]

Comments by Jack of Kent: https://emptycity.substack.com/p/what-i ... -candidate

[dyqik]

Comments by Jack of Kent: https://emptycity.substack.com/p/what-i ... -candidate

(The "thanks to tweeters overnight" was quite possibly partially me being liberal with the electoral commission link in my above post)

[bob sterman]

Binface is one of the few genuinely witty comedy candidates. Even if he were to be banned from standing (which I don’t see happening) I’m sure he would have the comedy chops to make some great jokes about it.

Not just witty - but also makes some serious points...

E.g. check out his General Election 2024 manifesto...

https://www.countbinface.com/campaigns- ... ction-2024

Includes..

All Water bosses to take a dip in british rivers, to see how they like it

National service to be introduced for all former prime ministers

I pledge to build at least one affordable house

MPs to live in the area they wish to serve for 4 years before election, to improve local representation

[Tristan]

We do all know this is very very likely absolute nonsense right?

[dyqik]

We do all know this is very very likely absolute nonsense right?

No, we don't.

That Reform has a large number of paper candidates is undeniable. Theat they used AI to generate local campaign materials for them, likewise. This in itself calls into question argument about their vote share and short money.

We also know that far right parties have previously used fake candidates, and got caught (EDs, 2017)

I think it's unlikely that most, if any, of the candidates are non-existent, but I think the nominations are a more open to abuse. And the general thing of nominations requiring no ID checks means that this is a future avenue for attacking the UK political system.

[dyqik]

We do all know this is very very likely absolute nonsense right?

No, we don't.

That Reform has a large number of paper candidates is undeniable. Theat they used AI to generate local campaign materials for them, likewise. This in itself calls into question argument about their vote share and short money.

We also know that far right parties have previously used fake candidates, and got caught (EDs, 2017)

I think it's unlikely that most, if any, of the candidates are non-existent, but I think the nominations are a more open to abuse. And the general thing of nominations requiring no ID checks means that this is a future avenue for attacking the UK political system.

And at a minimum, it reveals the sheer hypocrisy of voter ID checks.

[IvanV]

Accepting nominations at face value
You must not:

undertake any investigation or research into any candidate. Your duty does not go beyond seeing that a nomination form is correct on face value2
You should not:

investigate whether a name given on a nomination form is genuine
You should:

disregard any personal knowledge you may already have of the candidate
determine nominations on the basis of the form itself

There is a bit more than that. Here is Guidance on determining a nomination invalid.

It is grounds for rejecting a nomination if it does not state the candidate's home address in full. So, in principle, if they don't live there, which they won't if they don't exist, that is grounds for rejecting the nomination. But the difficulty is that you can only go on what you are given.

Fictitious candidates, ones with rude names, etc, are invalid. But you can only determine that they are fictitious if it is obvious. Comments elsewhere on how Count Binface is nominated.

As was pointed out at The Empty City link, and other people, there is precedent for fake (right wing) candidates being discovered in the past, and the person orchestrating that was found guilty of a criminal offence. I think Reform would be a bit stupid if they fell for that in this day and age when it is easier to find these things out.

As others say, it is made that voters have to prove their identity but candidates don't.

[monkey]

As was pointed out at The Empty City link, and other people, there is precedent for fake (right wing) candidates being discovered in the past, and the person orchestrating that was found guilty of a criminal offence. I think Reform would be a bit stupid if they fell for that in this day and age when it is easier to find these things out.

Honestly, I think it's unlikely that Reform have broken the rules/law, given its so easy to get someone on the ballot (and that's not a particularly bad thing).

It's still very embarrassing for them that they had so many paper candidates*, and were obviously scraping the bottom of the barrel to fill the seats. This actually gives me a bit of hope because it shows that they're not very well organised, so less of a threat, and the proper scrutiny that they're finally getting is showing this.


*All parties have them, I bet there's a few Labour MPs who are only accidently in the commons today.

[Martin Y]

I must say I'm rather startled by how easy it is to become a candidate and also by the way any attempt to discover whether the claimed candidate genuinely exists is strongly discouraged.

I too doubt that Reform actually fielded any non-existent candidates but it appears that all you need is a real person to lend their name and address to the process. They can have exactly zero interest in their constituency. Not even knowing where it is is no barrier.

All campaign literature can be generated by party HQ. An AI-generated 'photo' might well look nothing whatever like the candidate (so long as you don't claim it's really them I suppose) likewise bland next-to-meaningless AI-generated biographical stuff about being a 'dedicated and experienced leader'. The candidate doesn't need to take any part in any proceedings whatever and they don't need to live anywhere near the constituency. Just lend their name and address (redacted from the ballot paper) and then face the vanishingly small risk of being elected. All this appears to be within the rules.

[dyqik]

As was pointed out at The Empty City link, and other people, there is precedent for fake (right wing) candidates being discovered in the past, and the person orchestrating that was found guilty of a criminal offence. I think Reform would be a bit stupid if they fell for that in this day and age when it is easier to find these things out.

Honestly, I think it's unlikely that Reform have broken the rules/law, given its so easy to get someone on the ballot (and that's not a particularly bad thing).

I think the nomination signatures are the most likely place where they may have broken the law. That requires 10 signatures in each constituency where the paper candidates are running, so ~5000 people to organize.

Since quite a few of the paper candidates are from significant distances from the constituencies they were running in, that's probably a sign that Reform did not have many organized activists in those constituencies, and were quite possibly struggling to find people willing to sign things. And those candidates couldn't easily just stand on the street trying to find people to sign nomination forms.

[monkey]

As was pointed out at The Empty City link, and other people, there is precedent for fake (right wing) candidates being discovered in the past, and the person orchestrating that was found guilty of a criminal offence. I think Reform would be a bit stupid if they fell for that in this day and age when it is easier to find these things out.

Honestly, I think it's unlikely that Reform have broken the rules/law, given its so easy to get someone on the ballot (and that's not a particularly bad thing).

I think the nomination signatures are the most likely place where they may have broken the law. That requires 10 signatures in each constituency where the paper candidates are running, so ~5000 people to organize.

Maybe, but also 10 signatures is f.ck all. One person with a few friends could get that done with very little effort, and it's a lower bar than putting your name on the ballot, even if it's only nominally.