Kemi Badenoch says former neo-Nazi candidate should be able to stand as a councillor but not an MP
Badenoch made the comments after former MP Luciana Berger said there should be 'a bar when it comes to standing for public office'
Kemi Badenoch has once again defended the Conservatives’ decision to select a former neo-Nazi as a Tory candidate, arguing that it is acceptable for him to stand as a councillor but not for national office.
Joshua Bonehill-Paine was sentenced to three years and four months in prison in 2015 for harassing Jewish former Labour MP Luciana Berger.
He also has a conviction for assaulting a police officer and burglary of a police station and for malicious communications over an anti-Islam hoax that led to death threats against the owners of a pub in Leicester.
Speaking to Radio 4’s Today programme this morning, Badenoch said what Bonehill-Paine did was “appalling and abhorrent”.
However, she said that it was fine for him to run as a councillor because it is “a local platform” focused on “looking at parking” and “putting out bins”.
In an interview on BBC Radio 4, Berger, who is now a Labour peer, argued that “there is a big difference between going back into society and teaching others possibly about what you did and why it was wrong to making the leap to standing for public office”.
Berger pointed out that Bonehill-Paine had engaged “in a sustained campaign not just against me, but many others”.
The Labour peer said: “I think that we need to have a bar when it comes to standing for public office and I strongly believe that today this individual falls very very short of that.”
Badenoch said she had listened to what Berger said and understood her position.
However, she said she had looked at Bonehill-Paine’s case “very carefully”, and defended her decision, stating that he had served his sentence and is “actively working on anti-radicalisation” now.
Badenoch said: “What Luciana is talking about is not rehabilitation, but forgiveness. I can understand that she might not want to forgive this man. I might not if I had been his victim.”
“But I am not giving him a national platform. He is standing to be a councillor in Somerset. It is a local platform, looking at parking, putting out bins, that’s what councillors do. It’s not a national platform.”
She added: “This man is not standing to be an MP. There’s a huge difference.”
“At a local level, where someone is actively working on anti-radicalisation, fighting for Jewish people knowing the harm that he caused – he did a lot of terrible things, I do not minimise that at all.”
Badenoch said it was “a judgement call”, adding: “I think in this case he should be allowed to stand”.
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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