Clacton town centre is bustling, the beaches are packed and the pier’s raking in cash. We can credit the weather, but no doubt press coverage and Count Binface’s promotional videos have got us on radars too. The tourists look like they’re having a lovely time.

I moved to Clacton in 2022 and the first year was brilliant. It started with beach walks, cheap drinks and decorating a flat with panoramic sea views, and ended fat and happy from chips and ice-cream, a newborn baby in tow. Privileged with my health and stable income, albeit strained by a Truss-era mortgage, it was a place I loved, and was proud of.

Then Nigel Farage targeted us, and shit hit the fan.

With the general election in 2024, the world’s press descended, and then came thousands of social media comments that left me embarrassed, sad and fuming. You’re all thick, racist, gullible, hateful, toothless, jobless old fools, we were told. You deserve him. The worst of the snobbery was, sadly, on my lefty social media platform of choice, Bluesky.

Farage was elected with 46% of a 58% turnout. Fine, some people actually are gullible fools. But the other parties rolled over and failed to bother, treating us with contempt. I didn’t support, but I understood, why 46% voted as they did. I still loved Clacton, but it got harder to defend. Then things died down and we were forgotten........

© The Guardian