Yorkshire party told to campaign nationally

But Yorkshire First’s ruthless focus on this region has cost it an important advantage in its campaign for the European elections.

The party has been told it cannot make a party political broadcast - because it is not campaigning in every English region.

Party leader Richard Carter said: “Obviously we are very disappointed that we can’t get a broadcast because we wanted to use the opportunity to get our message out across the region.

“However, the criteria set by the broadcasters exclude us as we have to be fighting every English region to qualify.

“This is a nonsense, of course, because as the name of the party suggests, Yorkshire First is just fighting in Yorkshire.

“This is in the same way that the SNP contests seats solely in Scotland or Plaid Cymru only in Wales.

“Clearly this does not prevent them from having a broadcast in their respective territories so the technology exists for this to be done. In my view, this is a stitch-up by the London based parties to exclude regional parties from the debate.

“Clearly we are too late to change the criteria in time for these elections but we will set about changing them for the General Election in a year’s time.”

Yorkshire First is fielding a list of three candidates for the European elections on May 22.

Its leading candidate is Stewart Arnold who stood for the Liberal Democrats in 2009.

The party, launched earlier this year, is campaigning for Yorkshire to have more control over its own affairs.