General Election 2024 in Crawley: Meet the Reform UK candidate

Here’s what the Reform UK candidate had to say.

‘Completely fed up’ with the two main parties, Three Bridges man Tim Charters has chosen to stand for Reform UK.

The dad-of-one, who grew up in Surrey and has lived in Crawley since 2016, works as a software engineer and project manager in the defence industry.

He said: “In a nutshell, I have been watching in horror as my country has disintegrated around me in every way that matters.

“The level of violent crime is intolerable. Our justice system is broken making the crime worse. Our economic situation is dire. Our public services have collapsed.

“Our values of individualism, meritocracy and fairness have disappeared along with our heroic stories and pride in our nation and people.

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“I want to pass something of value on to future generations, so I felt I had to do what I can to protect it.”

Mr Charters felt Crawley ‘suffers greatly’ with problems caused at a national level.

He said his local priority would be to ‘resist new housing in Crawley given our services have essentially already collapsed’, sharing how he had been unable to get a doctor’s appointment recently ‘despite three illnesses back-to-back’.

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Another priority would be to ‘support the police to tackle the violent and sexual crime that has escalated’.

He believes Labour will be top dogs after the General Election but isn’t a fan.

He voted to leave the EU and voted for Boris Johnson but said he felt ‘cruelly betrayed’.

His message is one of British values and placing individual rights and responsibilities over what he calls ‘group identity and woke/diversity, equity, and inclusion mindsets’.

He added: “People are not to be judged by their sex or race but instead by their merits. These ideas are ancient in these lands.

“The stories of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table take place in the 5th and 6th century, though formalised much later.

“Meritocracy isn’t just a great British value it is crucial to a fair and productive society.”