Rodney Hylton-Potts

| Monday, 18 April 2005 Source: Searchlight staff

Rodney Hylton-Potts, the winner of the crass TV show "Vote For Me", has been slammed by football fans for turning up a football match to "glad-hand" fans, after the death of the popular Kent non-league footballer, Paul Sykes.

Hylton-Potts, is standing in the general election in Michael Howard's Folkestone and Hythe constituency. He has made a pact with the British National Party under which the BNP agreed to stand down its prospective candidate in Folkestone in return for Hylton-Potts urging his supporters to vote BNP everywhere the BNP is standing. The BNP believes that it and Hylton-Potts "share so much common ground".

Sykes, who was 28, died last week on the field during the Kent Cup semi-final match between his club, Folkestone, and his former club, Margate, where he was held in high regard.

On Saturday 16 April Folkestone and a number of other Kent clubs, including Championship side Gillingham, held a minute's silence in memory of Sykes. Hylton-Potts went to the club's ground to shake hands with supporters around the tea bar, where fans were discussing the tragic events of the past week.

One fan on the fans' forum described him as "making crass jokes, acting the clown … with a total disregard to people's suffering". Another commented, "Anyone who does deals with the fascist BNP is bound to be insensitive to people's feelings".