Photograph: Goodman/LNP/Rex/Shutterstock
The Ukip MEP Steven Woolfe has insisted his application to lead his party was sent on time, although the party has not yet confirmed whether his bid is eligible.
Woolfe’s nomination was not received until 12.17pm on Sunday, 17 minutes past the midday deadline, raising doubts over whether the frontrunner would be allowed to enter the race.
But speaking on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4, the MEP for North West England, said he was able to provide proof that the £5,000 application fee was transferred, although he likened the experience to a Little Britain sketch.
“I did feel like I was in a scene from Little Britain’s ‘computer says no’,” he said. “But at 11.35 yesterday I managed to be on my phone to my bank to prove the £5,000 had been transferred over.”
Woolfe said he was on the phone to Ukip when he hit send before midday and provided photographic evidence.
“I was actually on the phone with one of the Ukip officials at four minutes to 12 telling them I’m pressing the button for submit and he was saying, ‘We can’t see it, take photographs of it,’ which I did. I sent them at eight minutes past,” he said.
Asked why he left it to the last minute, Woolfe said he had attempted to send his application on Friday but had problems with the system and was at a conference on Saturday.
He said: “I didn’t expect to spend 30 minutes at the bank, talking to them on the phone, 40 minutes to press a button for our own systems and it proved to me what I’ve said in this campaign, that the party systems and operations have not been working for the party and this system has had complaints before and we really need to professionalise.”
Woolfe said he hoped the party would accept his application and he did not have to challenge any adverse decision in court.
“I hope it wouldn’t come to that,” he said. “I hope they’d recognise everyone in the country sometimes looks at their computer screens and screams at it when it’s not working but we have a system in place before it worked that day.”
He also denied a story in the Telegraph claiming that his Ukip membership lapsed in 2014 and had only just been renewed. “It is false,” he said.
The MEP was one of five Ukip politicians to put their names forward to succeed Nigel Farage, with nominations closing at midday on Sunday. The other four candidates are Lisa Duffy, a party organiser and chief of staff to Patrick O’Flynn; Jonathan Arnott, a former party general secretary who is MEP for North East England; Bill Etheridge, the West Midlands MEP; and Liz Jones, Ukip’s deputy chair in Lambeth, south London.
Woolfe is seen as the frontrunner, with the backing of the influential Ukip donor Arron Banks, who is close to Farage.
Steve Crowther, the party’s outgoing chairman, has said any attempt to exclude Woolfe from the contest would be ludicrous and could put the party in jeopardy.
