When an election is called and Parliament is dissolved MPs stop being MPs and, for the most part, Ministers stop being Ministers. The election campaign therefore is fought between equals and no candidate has greater rights than the candidate for any other party. In the constituency of Hastings and Rye the candidate for the Conservative party, Amber Rudd, has no special privilege that extends above and beyond that of any other candidate.

That is the theory.

On of the top trending videos on YouTube right now comes from a husting event in Hastings and Rye and appears to undermine this basic democratic principle. The full clip can be viewed below but essentially shows the independent candidate Nicholas Wilson giving a speech outlining the links between the Home Secretary Amber Rudd and arms sales to the autocratic regime in Saudi Arabia. Rudd then appears to pass a note to the moderator who then interrupts Wilson and takes the microphone away from him.

Naturally there is an assumption being made here that the note influenced the actions of the moderator but this seems to be less of a stretch than pointing out that 2 + 2 = 4.

Craig Murray is attempting to find out who exactly this moderator is and you can follow his updates here. Perhaps the more pertinent question is what was actually written on the note?

The Electoral Commission’s rules on hustings mainly cover spending but there is guidance relating to impartiality that seems to be breached here.

Another point of concern arising out of this story is the lack of attention that is being paid to it by the mainstream media. Despite now achieving 400,000 views the only core news organisation seen to be covering the tape is the Mirror in a story published this morning.

It has to be worrying when the censorship decried by Wilson in the video seems to be pervasive across the key media organisations in the UK and the story is only receiving coverage through non-traditional outlets such as YouTube and Twitter.

This is exactly the sort of story that needs proper investigation by professional journalists with substantial clout and a budget behind them. Hopefully more details will emerge in due course but for the time being we should not let this story go away or disappear without widespread attention and acknowledgement.