Mother of PC Harper ‘bitterly disappointed’ that son’s killers remain eligible for early release – UK politics live

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has faced down awkward questions from reporters today after the Conservatives selected as a local election candidate a man who was once jailed for harassing a former MP.

Joshua Bonehill-Paine was jailed in 2016 after he was convicted of racially aggravated harassment of former Labour MP for Liverpool Wavertree, Luciana Berger. He labelled the Jewish MP “an evil money-grabber” with a “deep-rooted hatred of men” and claimed the number of Jewish Labour MPs was a “problem”. He was previously jailed for producing an antisemitic ad illustrated with a picture of Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz.

Speaking to reporters on a trip accompanying a police raid in Surrey today, Badenoch said her party believed in second chances. She said:

double quotation mark I want to be very clear – and I think people can look at me and know that I’m not a person who would be recruiting neo-Nazis. Josh is someone who actually has been certified by the Home Office to train police officers on antisemitism and on countering extremism.

Yes, he is somebody who had been previously convicted but he is someone who has shown contrition for his crimes, has been rehabilitated and is spending every day working to solve the very problem which he knew that he had caused previously. And the Conservative party believes in second chances.

This is not just someone that we’ve picked up who’s a convicted criminal – this is somebody who is actively working to help communities.