‘Clacton voters need a serious person’: the independent candidates taking on Nigel Farage – and Count Binface

Attieh Fard, an independent candidate in the Clacton byelection says it is ‘a shame’ Nigel Farage and Count Binface have failed to attend street hustings. Photograph: Joe Giddens/PA

In the town square in Clacton, in the blazing midday sunshine, some of the candidates for the upcoming byelection made their pitch to a scattering of potential voters, passing Deliveroo drivers and a giant gull.

But as the independent candidate Attieh Fard shouted into a megaphone that she would be a voice for Clacton, a passing youth shouted: “Where’s Binface?”