Marx de Morais closest to the camera on a past Conservative litter clear up job

A FORMER Tory campaigner who spoke out against the party’s support for Brexit will be back on the ballot paper at next month’s council elections… as a candidate for Nigel Farage’s Reform party.

Marx de Morais had applied to be the Conservative candidate in the Frognal ahead of the May 7 Town Hall elections.

But he was not selected to stand in what is the party’s safest area in Camden – and a few months later he has appeared on the candidates list for the ward as a Reform candidate.

The final list of the runners and riders was published by Camden Council on Friday afternoon.

Led by the country’s biggest agitator for Brexit, national Reform policies include abolishing net zero environmental policies, cutting foreign aid and leaving the European Convention on Human Rights.

The party wants to abolish indefinite leave to remain and rescind existing awards.

In contrast, the other parties in Camden have supported it becoming a welcoming ‘borough of sanctuary’ for refugees and asylum seekers.

The ‘anti-woke’ agenda celebrated by Mr Farage does not immediately match up with the sentiments Mr de Morais shared when he walked out of the Conservative candidacy in Gospel Oak ahead of the 2018 elections.

He called for the party to shift to the left and lamented: “I joined the Conservatives as it was a party where open, liberal people wanted to shape the future… This has changed over the last few months.

“It is the right wing that has been able to expand and take over more and more relevant positions.”

He added that xenophobia was a challenge that needed to be combatted.

Mr de Morais has spent more than a decade unsuccessfully trying to get elected to Camden Council – although not always in the same party.

After the Gospel Oak candidacy incident, he later joined the ill-fated Change UK party, set up by MPs leaving Labour and the Tories.

The endeavour, also known as The Independent Group or TIG, is perhaps best remembered for its high-profile participants enjoying a meal at Nando’s.

Mr de Morais had also previously stood as an independent and for a pro-EU group called The Movement.

More recently, he has been back with the Conservatives – although tension was clearly brewing behind the scenes when he was not selected to stand in the Frognal by-election in 2024.

Local Tory organisers have indicated they are not concerned by Mr de Morais’ side-switching as they look to defend two seats in Frognal.

Reform, however, are an unknown factor at the elections, having not polled well in the borough before.

It has posted candidates in every ward for the first time in Camden. Mr de Morais’ husband, Douglas de Morais, has also previously stood for the Conservatives but is standing for Reform UK in South Hampstead.

He said in a letter to the New Journal this week that the party “was not concerned with background, identity, or labels, but with serving the nation and striving to make Britain a country we can once again feel proud of.”