A party pushing for independence for the North of England is making its first foray into Newcastle at this year’s local elections.
The Northern Independence Party is standing eight candidates in elections across the region next Thursday, two of which are on Tyneside – David Stewart and Andrew Ehala. Mr Stewart is hoping to challenge Labour in the Wingrove ward, where the candidate for the city’s ruling group is Joyce McCarty – who is currently suspended from the party after alleging a “Muslim plot” against its ousted leader, Nick Forbes.
The 41-year-old, an academic at Newcastle University, is a former Labour member who says he left the party after Keir Starmer became leader as it no longer “offered enough differences to the Tories” and he wanted to advocate for more left-wing policies, such as nationalising energy companies. The maths lecturer says he “absolutely” believes that the party, which was founded in 2020 and also has candidates in places such as Leeds and Sheffield, has a chance of winning a seat somewhere by tapping into a sense of anger at Westminster politics and a desperation to close the North-South divide.
