TV footage shows Hartlepool Brexit Party councillor appearing to make highly offensive comments

A Hartlepool Brexit Party councillor has resigned and been expelled by party chiefs following footage captured by Channel 4 which shows him making highly offensive comments.
Hartlepool Civic Centre. Hartlepool Civic Centre.
Hartlepool Civic Centre.

Manor House councillor David Mincher has stood down from Hartlepool Borough Council and been suspended from the Brexit Party following comments he appears to have made to an undercover Channel 4 News reporter.

In the footage, which aired on Channel 4 News on Monday, December 9, Mr Mincher can be seen to make shockingly racist and prejudiced comments.

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It comes following an undercover investigation by the news outlet into a number of individuals associated with the Brexit Party in Hartlepool.

In the footage, the undercover Channel 4 reporter posing as a Brexit Party volunteer is seen speaking to Mr Mincher about Muslim residents in the town.

Mr Mincher is seen to say that Muslim people are ‘outbreeding us’ and that they ‘live like animals.’

He is then shown to be talking about a failed plan to bury a pig’s head in the grounds of a mosque that was being built in Hartlepool.

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In the footage Mr Mincher said: “We tried to put a big pig’s head in the concrete.

Richard Tice.Richard Tice.
Richard Tice.

“Because we were going to take a video with a pig’s head under their concrete.

“Let them finish it. Let it all get built. And then just send the video and say, ‘Look there, there you go, you’ve got a ******* pig’s head under your mosque there so you’ll have to get it all knocked down and redone again’.

“Or they just leave it, cos it’s desecrated ground innit?”

The Channel 4 report also shows Brexit Party chairman Richard Tice praising the work of Mr Mincher during the election campaign saying that he has ‘shed blood for the cause.’

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But Mr Tice has since distanced himself from Mr Mincher and described the comments as ‘heinous’.

The Brexit Party says it has also referred Mr Mincher to Hartlepool Borough Council’s solicitor for a potential breach of the rules of conduct of councillors.

Mr Mincher, who was elected in May 2019 as a UKIP councillor and joined the Brexit Party-led coalition on Hartlepool Borough Council in September, has apologised and resigned from the council.

A Hartlepool Borough Council spokesman confirmed Mr Mincher handed in his resignation on Monday.

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Richard Tice, chairman of the Brexit Party, who is standing in Hartlepool in this week’s General Election, said: “Channel 4 alerted us late on Friday of some appalling comments made to one of its many undercover reporter teams who have been following the Brexit Party.

“We took immediate action within hours by removing the whip from an independently elected local councillor, who had come over to the Brexit Party in September; we also dismissed a semi retired part time employee of a regional office.

“Both I and the Brexit Party totally condemn the hideous remarks in question in the strongest possible terms.”

A Channel 4 News spokeswoman said: "We stand by our journalism."

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The other candidates fighting for the Hartlepool constituency on Thursday, December 12, are, in alphabetical order, Joe Bousfield (Independent), Kevin Cranney (Socialist Labour Party), Andy Hagon (Liberal Democrats), Mike Hill (Labour), Stefan Richard Houghton (Conservative).