"Maidstone is turning purple!”

That was the confident assertion from Eddie Powell, which was greeted with cheers from his supporters, after his selection by local UKIP members as their candidate to fight the Maidstone and the Weald Constituency for the party at the next General Election.

Mr Powell came top of the poll at a hustings event in East Farleigh this morning attended by around 70 members, beating rival candidates Colin Nicholson and Roy Philpott.

The three candidates delivered speeches to the audience and then took turns answering questions from the floor.

Mr Powell, who was one of his party’s four borough councillors elected to Maidstone council last May, told the hall: “Many thousands of people are ready to support UKIP. All they need is to have the truth about us.”

He promised: “I will address the real issues that people care about.”

Among those that he identified were Maidstone Council’s excessive housing targets, the need to provide more grammar schools and the need for extra funding for the NHS.

He said: “Every bright kid deserves to get a place at a grammar school. It just isn’t fair that only those rich enough to pay for private education are able to get a good academic education for their children.”

He suggested that withdrawing from the EU would save the country £53m a day, money which could be used to plug the gap in NHS funding.

He said: “What you will get from me is a very strong voice and a commitment to make things happen.”

Mr Powell dismissed accusations that UKIP was seen as a racist party. He said: “People are fed up with the utter lies generated in much of today’s media.

“Fortunately this is a perception that barely exists today – which is perhaps why 22% of our vote at the last elections came from ethnic minorities.”

Mr Powell dismissed the threat he would face from rival party candidates in Maidstone at the election in May.

Of the town’s sitting Conservative MP, Helen Grant, he said: “She is not popular – even within her own party.”

And speaking of the Lib Dem candidate, Jasper Gerrard, he said: “Jasper only turns up for photo-shoots, he doesn’t actually do anything.”

Calling for an army of 100 leaflet-deliverers to go out and flood Maidstone, Mr Powell said: “We are the party of action."

He told supporters: “Go out of this room in the confidence that you are part of the winning party.”