A spokesperson from Reform UK said: “Lee Anderson made it clear from the day he joined Reform UK that he would not personally campaign against a handful of his close friends.

“The party respect this decision and it shows Lee’s loyalty to his friends, which goes beyond politics.

“Reform will be standing in these constituencies and will be fighting the Conservatives across the board in England, Wales and Scotland.

“The Tories have betrayed the country by failing to control our borders and allowing our public services to crumble. We will punish them at the General Election.”

It comes as Reform UK has said it is “mortified” after sacking an “inactive” election candidate – who had actually died after being selected.

The party said it had dropped their candidate for York Central, Tommy Cawkwell, after he didn’t respond to several phone calls and emails.

A Reform UK spokesman said: “Naturally I am mortified that through ignorance I did not realise the reason for his inactivity, it must have been ghastly for his family to read about it in the way it was presented in the press.

“Having it being suggested that we had rescinded Mr Cawkwell’s candidacy for inappropriate social media messages by a local paper, I suggested that he was one of those candidates that had been removed for inactivity.”

Nick Fletcher issued his support for Lee Anderson in a post on social media.

He said: “I so wish Lee Anderson had remained with the Conservatives. However having lost the whip it would mean the Conservative Party would choose someone other than Lee to fight the election in Ashfield.

“I can understand in those circumstances why he joined Reform. Ashfield has its greatest champion and I hope they appreciate what he has done for his home town and his country at the next election.

“For the avoidance of any doubt of course I want to see a Conservative majority Government returned at the next election with as many Conservative MPs as possible.

“Lee is a personal friend but we can’t risk the damage a Labour Government would do to our country. Just look at what the Labour Council has done to Doncaster.”