Police are looking into claims that racist posts appeared on Facebook pages of three newly elected UKIP county councillors.
Spalding businessman Alan Jesson, UKIP’s county council group leader Chris Pain and Boston member Tiggs Keywood-Wainwright claim their accounts were hacked and a series of offensive posts are not theirs.
Coun Jesson said: “Somehow our Facebook accounts have been infiltrated and they have changed words and added comments that are not ours.”
He said comments wrongly attributed to him were published by “Hope Not Hate”.
Coun Jesson said: “Nothing like this has been done before we took up our councillorship. I don’t know what is going on. I am pretty sick to the stomach, to be honest.
“I am annoyed and fed up that I have been blamed by people who read them and now, because of that, my name is being dragged through the mud.”
Coun Jesson believes he and fellow UKIP councillors have been singled out by the Left Wing after they took part in what he termed “uncontrolled immigration marches”.
He and fellow UKIP councillors are now having the hacking investigated by their own “computer people”.
The Spalding South ward councillor said: “I am not racist. I have got friends from all creeds and colours. I am not racist at all.
“I am annoyed at the British Government’s inability to control its borders because we haven’t got the space in this country for any more migrants and that’s one of UKIP’s policies.
“I don’t blame people coming to this country for work and that. My view is that we have got to control our borders and we need to get out of the EU and I have put that message out.
“At the end of the day, some allegations have been made. I am a bit flabbergasted by it all.
“You go and try and help people and this is how it all blows up in your face.
“Apart from being elected, I was just a man in the street. I would like to thank all the local people for their continued support.
“I haven’t even sat down in front of my computer and had a look yet because I run two businesses and I am trying to make progress representing the people who voted me in.”
Police have appointed a detective inspector to look at the case.
A police spokesman said: “Lincolnshire Police are aware of these allegations and are information-gathering in the first instance.
“Any inquiry into alleged comments made in cyberspace and potential social media hacking is extremely complex, particularly when it may involve any historic Facebook or Twitter activity.”
County council leader Martin Hill said he doesn’t know who complained about the comments on Facebook.
He said: “It wasn’t me or anybody I know.
“Obviously it’s a police investigation and there’s not much to be said. We will have to let them get on with the investigation.”
He said UKIP councillors were saying they had been hacked, but in any event they would not be subject to any procedures under the council’s standards regime as the Facebook posts pre-dated their election.