A former Labour MP who was suspended from the party for sexting a 17-year-old girl is standing for the Reform party in Rochdale.
Simon Danczuk represented the Greater Manchester constituency for seven years but was blocked from running in the 2017 general election after a series of lurid tabloid scandals came out.
The final straw for Labour high command came in 2016 when he was exposed as having sexted a teenage dominatrix who “sold her toenail clippings for £10”.
The teenager in question had apparently contacted Danczuk about a job in his office as she was interested in a career in politics.
Danczuk will face George Galloway, another former Labour MP, in the by-election, while Labour’s candidate is Azhar Ali.
The byelection will be held on 29 February after the death of Tony Lloyd last month.
Talking on Thursday from Rochdale’s Baum pub, Danczuk said the portrayal of him as a “sex shame MP” was “absolute nonsense, a tabloid creation”.
He added: “The real reason that I wasn’t allowed to stand for Labour in 2017 is because I was, as described by the Financial Times, Jeremy Corbyn’s fiercest critic.”
Describing himself as “old Labour”, he said that the party under Keir Starmer had gone from “work to woke”.
He said Reform’s policies appealed more to him, particularly “stopping the boats and illegal immigration and coming out of the European convention on human rights”.
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