Reform UK has challenged Green Party leader Zack Polanski to a televised debate in an attempt to squeeze Labour into third place in a crunch Manchester by-election.
Nigel Farage’s party sent a letter to the Greens today challenging the party to a ‘head to head debate’ in Gorton and Denton later this week.
The letter, sent by Reform’s head of policy Zia Yusuf and seen by the Mail, throws down the gauntlet to Mr Polanski and adds: ‘I will even let you choose a moderator of your choice.’
It comes as the Green leader suggested that drugs being illegal is racist and that his policy on legalising heroin and crack cocaine is because he wants people to be able to ‘have a good time’ safely.
Mr Polanski said that the current drugs policy is ‘very racialised’, adding: ‘Very often it is young black people who are stopped and searched in the street… despite the fact there is no evidence they are more likely to be holding or taking drugs.’
However the London Assembly member revealed that he personally had never touched any drugs, or even alcohol.
He told the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme: ‘I’ve actually never taken a drug in my life, or even drunk alcohol, but I still don’t sit here as the fun police.
‘I very clearly believe people should be able to do what they want to do. It just wasn’t for me.’
Mr Polanski (pictured with the Greens’ candidate for the Gorton and Denton by-election) said it was ‘hypocritical’ for senior politicians to admit they had taken drugs while ‘incarcerating’ people for doing the same – adding that was ‘very often yet again young black and brown people’
The letter (pictured), was sent by Reform’s head of policy Zia Yusuf, and throws down the gauntlet to Mr Polanski
Mr Polanski appeared on the programme after Sir Keir Starmer accused his party of being ‘high on drugs, soft on Putin’ last week as campaigning for the by-election began to hot up.
The Greens are trying to inflict a devastating blow on Sir Keir in the Gorton and Denton by-election on February 26.
Both Labour and the Greens have sought to position themselves as the only party capable of defeating Reform, each playing down the others chance of success.
Meanwhile Nigel Farage’s party has pitched the vote as a ‘referendum’ on Sir Keir Starmer as Reform’s candidate, GB News presenter Matt Goodwin, seeks to capitalise on the Prime Minister’s unpopularity.
The letter from Mr Yusuf congratulates Mr Polanski ‘on the success you have had since bursting onto the scene’ and describes the Green’s polling figures as ‘remarkable’.
However it pokes fun at Mr Polanski’s previous career and claims he could enlarge women’s breasts by hypnotising them, and takes potshots at the Greens’ policies on immigration, drugs and plans to scrap the nuclear deterrent.
The letter adds: ‘I propose that we discuss these matters, as well as any topics you wish to put to me about Reform’s policy platform, in a head to head debate.
‘As you know, there is a by-election in Manchester where there is an expectation that your party will translate its polling success into challenging Reform at the ballot box. I will be there this coming Thursday, and propose we hold the debate there.’
Mr Yusuf and Mr Polanski have previously traded blows, with a feisty BBC Question Time appearance last year seeing the Green leader branding his political opposite’s views ‘racism and fascism’.
It comes after the Mail revealed that the Green’s by-election candidate, Hannah Spencer, believes prostitution should be decriminalised and has suggested she is ‘open’ to abolishing the police.
The 34-year-old plumber and trainee plasterer has also criticised last year’s Supreme Court biological sex ruling as ‘regressive and unjust’ and faced accusations that she drew parallels between the Holocaust and Israel’s actions in Gaza, which the party categorically denied.
Meanwhile the Conservatives announced former police officer Charlotte Cadden, who served for 30 years for both Greater Manchester Police and the Metropolitan Police, as their candidate for the Gorton and Denton by-election.
The prospective MP, who is also a trustee of women’s-rights charity Sex Matters, said that people in the constituency have been ‘let down’ by Labour as she vowed to be a ‘no-nonsense champion’ for constituents.
The Green Party was approached for comment.