News

COUNCILLOR SHORT-LISTED TO SUCCEED HOWARD

Susan Carey, the Shepway and Kent County Councillor has made it through to the first shortlist of hopefuls to become the prospective parliamentary candidate for Folkestone and Hythe. After this stage, there are a further two steps to the selection procedure .

Two other priority candidates, including Simon Walker, a former media adviser to the Queen, and Priti Patel, a former Tory press officer, have also gone forward to the next stage of the local selection process.

The seat is being vacated by Michael Howard, the former Tory leader, at the next election.

But Adam Rickitt, o­ne of the most controversial members of David Cameron's priority list of prospective MPs, has failed in his first attempt to be accepted as a Conservative candidate.

Mr Rickitt, 28, a former member of the cast of the television soap opera Coronation Street, did not make a shortlist.

His inclusion o­n the 100-strong A-list of priority candidates, designed to make the party's MPs more representative of society at large, angered many party traditionalists.

They objected to party members in winnable seats being expected to pick celebrities or "beautiful people" over long-term local activists with political experience.

Senior officials in Folkestone and Hythe are insisting that four local candidates go through to the next round of selection. They may follow the example of Bromley and Chislehurst which snubbed the A-list to choose London Assembly group leader Bob Neill to fight a by-election