Inside Croydon will be sending the invoice for our proof-reading services to the incompetents at Croydon Conservatives’ HQ, after they made a late amendment when caught out with an untruth.
But how many more lies might be found on the Tories’ website?
Shady: Jack Barwell, running for election for a second time
When they published their list of candidates for the 2026 Town Hall elections, young Jack Barwell’s personal biography on the Croydon Tories’ website read: “My name is Jack Barwell. I’m a 23-year-old first-time political candidate.”
Today, that same page on the Croydon Tories website reads slightly differently: “My name is Jack Barwell. I’m a 23-year-old first-time Croydon candidate.”
One of those statements is true. The other is a lie.
It’s hardly the most egregious example of political deception. “More a sloppy error,” one disgruntled Croydon Tory grumbled after admitting that they had been found out this week,
But if that kind of pathetic attempt to deceive the electorate over nepobaby candidate Barwell can be so easily uncovered – and then corrected, without apology – how many other lies are there on the Croydon Conservatives website? What else, more important things, are they trying to deceive you about?
Barwell, 23, is the son of the former Croydon Conservative MP and Downing Street chief of staff, “Lord” Gavin Barwell, who was forced to withdraw from the House of Lords as a working peer when he was caught out not declaring all his business interests as required. It must be a family trait: Barwell Senior only stepped down when he got caught out, too.
Corrected by Inside Croydon: the Croydon Tories rushed to amend Lord Barwell’s son’s profile
The latest Barwell election lie is part of part-time Mayor Jason Perry’s favourite trope about being a lifelong Croydon resident. “I’ve lived in Croydon all my life,” Barwell Junior still says. Which is not strictly true.
In fact, Jack Barwell was sent to a selective secondary school in Sutton, where he was deputy head boy at Wallington County Grammar School, and then spent his university years at Exeter, where he appears very much ensconced.
His online profile says that Barwell is currently “Media Spokesperson, Honiton and Sidmouth Conservatives”, which is not in Croydon.
His CV is a litany of mostly unpaid, Tory Party volunteer positions. All of them in Devon. “Campaign manager – Honiton and Sidmouth Association”. “Campaign Assistant – Devon Conservatives”. “Campaign Manager, Devon”.
No mention of Croydon.
It is very possible that Selsdon Vale and Forestdale ward candidate Barwell’s interest in politics in Devon will resume once the local elections are over on May 8.
Read more: Lord Barwell’s son has a second go at getting himself elected
Read more: Conservatives confirm Creatura’s departure as Gatland retires
Read more: Corbyn-Sultana in-fighting scuppers Your Party’s election bid
Read more: Mayor Perry is failing to ‘fix the finances’ at his own family firm
For more information on where to vote on May 7 and who is standing for election, use our widget here:
PAID ADS: To advertise your services or products to our 10,000 weekday visitors to the site, as featured on Google News Showcase, email us inside.croydon@btinternet.com for our unbeatable ad rates
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
As featured on Google News Showcase
- Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content. Our comments policy can be read by clicking here
ROTTEN BOROUGH AWARDS: In January 2026, Croydon was named among the country’s rottenest boroughs for an EIGHTH time in nine years, in Private Eye magazine’s annual round-up of civic cock-ups
- Inside Croydon is a member of the Independent Community News Network
Not much shampoo being bought in that family is there. #boiledeggs
The curse of the Barwells strikes again. They just always seem to have memory lapses with inconvenient truths.
It’s still wrong. “I’ve lived in Croydon all my life” he says, when he lived, studied and worked in Exeter for three years.
Or more.