Essex Police has strongly denied claims by Nigel Farage it "bussed" counter-demonstrators to a protest outside a migrant hotel in Epping. The Reform UK leader had called for the force's chief constable to resign over the accusations.

Designated protest areas are directly opposite the Bell Hotel ‘and will have their own designated entry and exit routes’, the assistant chief constable added. There will also be sites near the Civic Centre, and he said ‘if you move from the Bell Hotel to the Civic Centre, you will not be able to return’.