Barnbrook for mayor

Sonia Gable | Thursday, 7 June 2007 Source: Searchlight

Richard Barnbrook has launched his campaign for next year's London mayoral election. Barnbrook, the BNP's group leader on Barking and Dagenham council, was formally adopted as the BNP candidate on 9 May and was pictured on the party website in his trademark brown suit and petulant expression.

He had brushed up what was clearly an old CV for the occasion, full of boasts about his artistic achievements though lacking any reference to HMS Discovery, the gay porn movie that he starred in, co-wrote and directed in 1989.

The CV states he is a street leader for his local council. Residents of Barking and Dagenham, where he put himself on the electoral register to qualify to stand in last year's council elections, will look in vain for the results of his work removing graffiti and dealing with antisocial behaviour. The council he is referring to is Lewisham, where he really lives.

His qualifications to be mayor are hardly enhanced by his boast that he was "appointed as secretary and advisor to Cllr. Dan Kelley (Barking) following his landslide victory in the 2004 Goresbrook by-election". Kelley resigned eight months later after admitting that he was completely out of his depth.