Stefan Rousseau/PA
Money has flooded in for Monty Panesar to win the Ealing Southall seat at the next general election for George Galloway’s Workers Party of Great Britain.
The former England cricketer is set to run against Labour for the London seat at this year’s vote but will have to overcome Virendra Sharma’s current 16,000 majority to give himself a place in the House of Commons.
He has been given odds of 14/1 to defeat Sharma after initially being priced 25/1.
Panesar said he will be focussing on domestic issues during his campaign and would leave talking about Israel, Palestine and Nato to Galloway.
“I think my focus is the British people,” he said.
“Let George worry about the foreign policy stuff. I’m not an expert on that. I want to make a difference in this country.
“I want to see a difference in border control. I don’t want to see illegal migration going to deprived areas where the resources then get absolutely saturated.”
Panesar said he wanted to see free school meals in state schools across the UK, not just in London where Sadiq Khan introduced the policy for primary pupils. But the bowler added he was not a fan of the Labour Mayor after the Ultra Low Emission Zone was expanded.
“I want to get rid of Ulez because Ulez actually affects the poorer people, it affects small sized businesses,” he said.
“I don’t think that is good. And also want to see a referendum on net zero.
“Is it really sustainable, who are the people who are really profertering from this. Because I’ll tell you who it affects. It affects the poor people in this country.
Mr Galloway said his party had 500 candidates in place for the general election, including almost every seat in London.
William Kedjanyi, Political Betting Analyst at Star Sports, said: “Monty Panesar’s announcement to run for George Galloway as a representative for the Workers Party at this year’s general election has certainly sent everyone into a spin!
“The former England cricketer has shown he loves to explore new boundaries and following plenty of support in the market, we’ve slashed Panesar’s earlier price of 25/1 into 14/1 to stump Labour’s Virendra Sharma and deliver a sensational victory for the Worker’s Party in the Ealing Southall constituency.”
