Bradley slammed as 'someone with no loyalty, no principles, and whose ambition always comes first'

SPAT BETWEEN FORMER NOTTS COUNTY COUNCIL LEADERS AS EX-TORY MP DEFECTS TO REFORM UK

- By OLIVER PRIDMORE

A FORMER Tory colleague and friend of Ben Bradley has accused him of having “no loyalty and no principles” after he defected to Reform UK.

Sam Smith was a Nottinghamshire county councillor throughout Mr Bradley's leadership of that authority and, after taking over as leader, gave him a job in his cabinet.

But Councillor Smith now says that, for Mr Bradley, “personal ambition always comes first” after the latter confirmed he was starting a new role with Nigel Farage’s party.

Mr Bradley said he thought Councillor Smith's criticism was “sad”.

It was confirmed on Thursday that Mr Bradley was joining Reform as a new “head of local government action’, working to ensure efficiency of councils run by the party and to look at fixing “fundamentally broken” parts of the system.

Mr Bradley was first elected as Conservative MP for Mansfield in 2017 and held the role until his defeat by Labour’s Steve Yemm in last year’s general election.

Mr Yemm reacted to his defection by saying: “Well, it’s not a big surprise to me, of course. There have been a number of failed Tory MPs who lost last time who have moved to join Reform.

“They all supported Liz Truss's budget that crashed the economy, just like Nigel Farage did. I guess birds of a feather flock together, don’t they?”

Mr Bradley earlier drew criticism for the number of jobs he took on while in office.