UKIP Candidate Sorry For Offensive Remarks

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A high-profile UKIP Westminster hopeful has been forced to apologise over making racist and homophobic remarks.

Kerry Smith, a member of both Essex County Council and Basildon District Council, issued a statement just days after being reinstated as the party's general election candidate in one of its top target seats.

He suggested he had been stressed at the time of the comments and taking strong pain killers.

In recordings of phone calls obtained by the Mail on Sunday, Mr Smith is said to have mocked gay party members as "poofters", and referred to someone as a "chinky bird".

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Gallery: The UKIP History In Pictures

1993: UKIP is founded by Alan Sked in response to the Maastricht Treaty, which set out the modern day EU and paved the way for the Euro. He left the party in 1997 saying it had become a "racist party for the far-right". He is now the leader of New Deal, which has been called UKIP of the Left.

1999: The party takes its first three seats in the European Parliament, under the leadership of the millionaire businessman Michael Holmes. Nigel Farage is one of those MEPs.

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2000: Michael Holmes resigns and Jeffrey Titford takes over as leader of UKIP. He leads the party to field 420 candidates at the 2001 General Election and secure 1.5% of the vote.

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2002: Former Conservative Roger Knapman takes over at the helm.

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2004: The party wins 12 seats at the European Elections, among the UKIP MEPs is the chat show host Robert Kilroy Silk.

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He also joked about shooting people from Chigwell in a "peasant hunt".

After his words - which he claimed were made two-and-half years ago - became public, Mr Smith said: "I wish to issue a wholehearted and unreserved apology to those I have offended within the party and anyone else."

In a bid to explain his comments he pointed out "at the time of this recording I was considering my resignation due to major management changes which I have since discovered I completely misread and misunderstood".

"For the record I was also on a strong morphine based prescription medication for a back injury," he said.

Mr Kerry also accepted claims he made in the calls about party leader Nigel Farage and other senior figures were "completely wrong" and "fuelled by frustrations at the time".

Mr Smith was deselected as the candidate for South Basildon and East Thurrock in October - with Neil Hamilton, the former Tory minister who is now UKIP's deputy chairman, in the running to win the nomination.

But Mr Hamilton ended up endorsing the Essex county councillor in his hustings speech after Mr Smith was reinstated.

It led the ex-Conservative to hit out at party insiders over a "dirty tricks" campaign being run against him.

UKIP MEP Patrick O'Flynn said of Mr Smith's comments: "He needs to learn to express himself more respectfully about minorities of all kinds now he is off the prescription drugs and he is our candidate."

But he added: "He is very popular... He is a young man, he is learning politics.

"We don't want to become so anodyne and speaking in such non-colloquial language that we lose touch and I think some of the other parties risk doing that.

"But clearly what he said there is unacceptable. He has apologised unreservedly. There are big mitigating circumstances.

"It is from some time ago and we are willing now to judge him on his performance going forward from now."

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