Richard Parker Mayor of the West Midlands 2024 \u00a9 West Midlands Combined Authority.
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The Mayor of the West Midlands has described being threatened and followed by a member of the public while out canvassing in Coventry ahead of the local elections.<\/p>\n
Richard Parker, the Labour mayor, was campaigning in the city when a resident accused him of trespassing. The man then approached him aggressively before following the mayor and fellow campaigners in his car, shouting abuse.<\/p>\n
Speaking to the BBC, Parker said: ‘He proceeded to approach me, get closer to me. I tried to engage with him but not get too close. The others witnessed it from about 10 or 15 yards away and were concerned for my wellbeing.’<\/p>\n
The incident has been reported to West Midlands Police, who confirmed they had received a report of aggressive behaviour towards people canvassing for the local elections in Coventry. Inquiries are ongoing.<\/p>\n
The incident is a stark reminder that abuse and intimidation of candidates and campaigners remains a serious concern \u2014 and one that extends well beyond high-profile figures.<\/p>\n
Are your candidates and campaigners prepared? Check out: Staying Safe in Local Elections: Challenges and support for candidates<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n
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The Mayor of the West…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":947576,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7820],"tags":[8521,855,748,38480,393,4884,10751,25809,529,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-947575","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-birmingham","8":"tag-abuse","9":"tag-birmingham","10":"tag-britain","11":"tag-combined-authority","12":"tag-england","13":"tag-great-britain","14":"tag-local-elections","15":"tag-mayors","16":"tag-police","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116542793992547101","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/947575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=947575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/947575\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/947576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=947575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=947575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=947575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}