Laurence Fox barred from London mayor race after forms 'errors'
Reclaim party leader and actor Laurence Fox will not be able to run as a candidate at the London mayoral elections in May after "errors" were identified in his nomination forms.
London Elects, which administers the mayoral and London Assembly elections, said it was too late for the errors to be addressed as the forms were submitted shortly before the 4pm deadline on Wednesday.
Mr Fox has said his team are challenging the decision, adding that they were "confident" the documentation was correct.
In a statement, London Elects said: "The paperwork was submitted very shortly before 4pm.
"Upon inspection, the nomination forms contained errors which - the deadline having passed - were too late for Mr Fox's team to correct.
"The conclusion of London Elects was that the requirements of the nomination process were not completed by the deadline.
"The Greater London Returning Officer is bound by electoral law and has no ability to allow anything other than fully compliant nominations, submitted by the deadline, to stand."
In a social media posts this afternoon, Mr Fox said all the documentation had been "checked and rechecked".
"Can you please sight what the 'errors' are @londonelects," he said.
"This team had no problem last time and all the documentation was checked and rechecked before being delivered this time. We have been asking all day. You have not responded."
He followed up by saying his team were "challenging this decision" and had "instructed lawyers to pursue the matter".
In other since-deleted tweets, Mr Fox alleged the decision was a result of "political corruption".
Mr Fox received just 47,634 votes at the last London mayoral election in 2021.
As that was less than 2% of the total votes cast, he lost his £10,000 deposit, which is only returned to candidates receiving more than 5% of the vote.
The full list of candidates for the mayoral election is expected to be published on Thursday afternoon.