He may have breached civil service impartiality rules
Campaigners have complained to the Home Office after it was revealed a Reform councillor also works as a decision maker on asylum and immigration claims.
Paul Bean is a Reform councillor for Crook Ward at Durham County Council. In his register of interests, he declared he works at the Home Office, a Hope Not Hate investigation has found.
The civil service code requires civil servants to maintain political impartiality. However, the anti-facist group found that an X account that appears to belong to Bean had shared posts criticising asylum seekers.
The account shared a post stating: “I work as an asylum decision maker for the HO [Home Office] and I can tell you with authority that 93% of asylum seekers to the UK are men between 18 – 35 and 92% of them are refused asylum”.
In reality, government statistics published last week revealed that almost half (48%) of asylum seekers are granted asylum, and more win their cases on appeal.
It added: “The truth is the vast majority of asylum seekers are actually economic migrants abusing the asylum system.”
The account also claimed that the vast majority of asylum seekers lie about facing persecution in their home countries. A post read: “97% of asylum seekers are lying about persecution in their home countries and the other 3% have been credible to the point of being believable. Source: me. Guess what job I do.”
Following the local election in May, questions were raised about whether Bean was eligible to stand as a councillor due to his Home Office job.
In a recent post from an anonymous YouTube account, Bean said he would join ex-Reform donor Ben Habib’s party, Advance UK. For now, he remains a Reform councillor.
Amanda Hopgood, the leader of the opposition at Durham county council, said: “It’s only right and proper that this issue is looked into in the interests of openness and transparency. I welcome the fact that the Home Office is looking into this.”
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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