Councillor suspended by Tories after retweeting claims…

Councillor suspended by Tories after retweeting claims mosques are 'hiding secret arsenals'

A councillor has been suspended by the Conservative Party after sharing tweets which claimed mosques were hiding ‘secret arsenals’ and branded UK immigration rates as ‘cultural suicide’. Councillor Alanna Vine, who represents Bramhall North, in Stockport, is currently under investigation and could face expulsion from the party, the Local Democracy Reporting Service understands.

When contacted by the LDRS the ‘ardent Brexiteer’ declined to comment about the string of highly controversial retweets, which also include calls for the UK to stop accepting refugees. However, the council’s Conservative group confirmed the party had begun disciplinary procedures against Coun Vine - who chairs a council licensing sub-committee - following a recent complaint.

A statement by the group reads: “The Conservative Party takes complaints of this nature extremely seriously. Councillor Alanna Vine has been suspended from the Conservative Party pending an internal investigation. Until that investigation has concluded, we are unable to comment further.”

Among the most contentious retweets is a post which reads ‘how many mosques have secret arsenals? Just waiting for when our troops are elsewhere in the world’. However, Coun Vine appears to have now ‘undone’ this retweet and it no longer appears on her timeline.

The original post, by Richard Smith - @RasSmudge - was in response to a tweet whose author claimed to have been ‘laughed at’ for suggesting the UK was facing an 'invasion' of boats. She also retweeted user ‘Nigelisback’ - @AlexAnd09667880 - who said the area of Manchester where he was born was ‘now like being in Somalia’.

The post adds: “Hundreds of Somalian ‘asylum seekers’ were placed there many years ago. There are 1000’s and 1000’s of them. Seeing is believing, they live no differently than they did in Somalia."

He then suggests the UK ‘is finished’, deploying a Union Flag emoji to represent the country. Coun Vine also shared a now deleted post from the ‘National Housing Party U.K’ - @NHPUKOfficial - calling on right wing commentator Calvin Robinson to ‘step up to the plate and be the first one on @GBNews to say we must stop accepting refugees’.

It added: “You will have an army behind you. What is happening is a disaster and is not orderly or Christian.” And she retweeted a post by @JackBarbour_ that said population growth and rates of migration between 2011 and 2021 were ‘cultural suicide’.

In his Twitter bio, @JackBarbour_ says that he is 'allergic to lefties and Islam'. Coun Vine has represented Bramhall North since 2011, having previously been the Northern Regional Director of WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) where she worked for more than 10 years.

After leaving WWF, she trained and became a Magistrate on the Inner Manchester Bench for several years, sitting on both the adult and junior benches. Coun Vine also sits on the Campaign Task Force for climate change in Stockport and is a member of the Conservative Animal Welfare Foundation.