A man wearing a trash can on his head dances on the beach, silver cape glinting in the sun as he spins beneath a wheel-topped pier, singing “England needs a new hope” from under an enormous helmet. The scene is Clacton-on-Sea, the centre of one of the east of England’s poorest constituencies and home to around 92,000 people and now the focus of international attention over what locals and observers have dubbed a political circus. The video is part of an extremely online campaign by Count Binface, who is running to represent the Essex town in Parliament. In an ignoble first in British electoral history, he is one of 34 candidates on the ballot.
One of Britain’s most high-profile and perennial candidates, Binface has stood in six previous elections across England over the past decade (UK politicians do not have to live in a constituency in order to represent it in parliament). This Thursday, he faces Clacton incumbent Nigel Farage—leader of the right-wing anti-immigration party Reform UK and a friend of Donald Trump—in a by-election triggered by the latter’s resignation amidst allegations that he and his party accepted and failed to declare financial support, including a £5 million gift from a Thailand-based cryptocurrency tycoon. Reform did not respond to WIRED’s request for comment.
Photograph: Isabella Ward
Farage maintains he has done nothing wrong and wants to recontest his seat to let voters judge his actions. Major parties, including governing Labour and the opposition Conservatives, refused to field a candidate in the contest, branding it a “gimmick” and a “circus.” When then chancellor of the exchequer Rachel Reeves accepted Farage’s resignation, she said: “If he wants to spend the summer arguing with a bin, I won’t stop him.”
In the vacuum, campaigners have rushed to use a high-profile vote to push their own issues, from psychosexual theory to Bible messaging to white-nationalist conspiracy theories. There are also a number of novelty candidates, three from satirical party Monster Raving Loony Party alone, Nick the Incredible Flying Brick, Baron Von Thunderclap, and Howling Laud Hope, who plans to shrink hospital waiting lists by reducing the font size. The only requirements for standing is that candidates are older than 18, and a British national.
The 34-candidate list is unprecedented; the 3-foot-long ballot papers are reportedly bigger than the tables used to count them on and have proved difficult for organizers to fit into envelopes for postal votes. The parties are fighting frenziedly for voters’ attention. Rosie Morrell of the Everyone Is God party–whose policies include creating a “stable world economy” and “to map and fully comprehend the complete spectrum of human psychology and sexuality”–offers to take off her Union Jack dress so I can snap a photo of her in her matching bikini. That’s what other press have been asking for as her partner contests the byelection, she says, pink feathers dangling from her ears.
In national coverage, Count Binface has broken through. A common figure in British politics, he most recently ran against Prime Minister Andy Burnham in June and has contested several other general and London mayoral elections before. Inside the trash can is comedian and writer Jon Harvey, who has worked on satirical television shows including Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, weekly British news quiz Have I Got News for You, and iconic BBC comedy The Thick of It. With Farage’s popularity collapsing across the country, Britons nationally want a victory for Binface–who pledges to nationalize singer Adele, cap ice cream prices, and hold a referendum on whether Pluto should regain its planet status.
