Win one lose one

Sonia Gable | Wednesday, 13 December 2006 Source: Searchlight

Roger Roberts, the sole BNP member on Mirfield Town Council, was kicked out in November 2006 for not attending a meeting for six months. Roberts claims he resigned three months earlier but the mayor of Mirfield, Cllr Kath Taylor, said she never received any letter from him.

Roberts became a Conservative councillor for Hopton ward in 2003 when he was the only candidate to stand. He defected to the BNP the following year. He remains one of three BNP members on Kirklees Council.

Three weeks earlier the BNP claimed a major victory when Jeffrey Drew, a self-employed businessman, was co-opted to Roughton parish council in Lincolnshire.

Sir Peter Tapsell, Conservative MP for Louth and Horncastle, who lives in Roughton, believes parish councillors could not have known about Mr Drew's BNP membership when they co-opted him to fill a vacancy. Application forms for membership of parish councils do not ask the applicant's political party.