Stephenβs view
What do you think is happening in this photo?
It might not look like it, but this photo was taken this morning during the declaration of the result of a 'by-election' in a town in England.
A by-election is an election of a single member to parliament when a seat becomes vacant. In this case, the by-election was triggered when the sitting member of parliament for Clacton, Nigel Farage, decided to resign his seat.
The strange thing about this by-election, though, is that Nigel Farage - the leader of the far-right Reform Party - triggered it specifically with the intention of winning the seat back again himself.
Why would he do that? Over the last few months, Farage has been accused of receiving large amounts of money, including a gift of Β£5 million, from a crypto billionaire. According to parliamentary rules, money like this should be declared. Farage says that the money was given before he became a member of parliament, and that it wasn't necessary to tell the public.
But before a parliamentary investigation was able to finish, Farage resigned his seat and caused this by-election, saying that he had been persecuted by the media and "the establishment*".
However, all of the major parties of the UK - Labour, the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats, the Greens - declined to take part in the by-election, saying that they didn't want to let Nigel Farage set the agenda, and that the investigation into whether he broke parliamentary rules should continue instead.
The result was both that Nigel Farage was the only "serious" candidate in the election, but also that 31 other candidates put themselves forward, including many novelty candidates - some of whom are pictured above.
Over the last few weeks, the most popular of these novelty candidates - Count Binface (pictured centre) - made appearances on TV, radio and podcasts, answering questions in a silly way. When the results were revealed this morning, Binface came second to Farage, winning 9,455 votes, around 27%.
In a speech after the results were announced, Count Binface said "Over one in four people in this constituency would rather have Count Binface as their MP than the leader of Reform UK".
Farage said that (by electing him again) the people of Clacton had "stuck two fingers up to the establishment".
Perhaps the 9,455 people who voted for a man with a bin on his head were the ones who were really sticking two fingers up to the establishment.
Have a great weekend.
Stephen
P.S. *"The establishment" is a term often used to describe the people believed to be in a dominant position of power. It is often used by populist parties who want to suggest that they are not part of the powerful elite, but represent common people.
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