Alan 'Howling Laud' Hope, leader of the Monster Raving Loony Party, has announced his intention to stand against Boris Johnson in the 2015 general election.
Mr Hope threw his over-sized cowboy hat into the ring for the contest to become MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip on the BBC's Daily Politics show today (Thursday, November 27).
He said nothing more about the election, but said he was 'very proud' of having stood for parliament 20 times before – and failed on each occasion.
He added: “The secret of my failure is really, I suppose, if anybody gained enough votes to even retain their deposit, there would have to be a high-level meeting to be thrown out of the party, because you're obviously not being loony enough.”
Among the party's manifesto proposals are selling the UK's castles to France to slash the national debt, forcing HMRC to award taxpayers Nectar points and making unicorns a protected species.
The party was established in 1982 by the late musician David Sutch, also known as 'Screaming Lord Sutch'.
It is known for its bizarre policies satirising British politics, which in the past have included converting an entire constituency into a giant theme park.
Mr Hope has been the party's leader for 15 years, which he said made him the longest-serving leader of any political party.
On today's programme, he was also questioned about a speech he made at the recent Rochester by-election, in which he said he was considering defecting to Ukip.
He told the programme it had been a joke, saying: “It was good fun at the time because it was all said with tongue in cheek at the big winning election party afterwards in the nightclub – after a couple of bottles of champagne.”
However, when pressed further, he added: “No, I'm not off, but there could be something in it. You never know.”
Mayor of London Boris Johnson was selected to fight the Uxbridge and Ruislip seat in September.
