Former Peterborough MP Stewart Jackson has emerged as favourite to become the Tory choice to replace Jason Ablewhite as Cambridgeshire Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC).

Mr Jackson, who has won through to a short list compiled by Conservative Central Office, will take the stage tomorrow night (Friday) before a hustings meeting of Cambridgeshire Tories.

Acting PCC and Peterborough councillor Ray Bisby is not thought to be on the short list.

Neither is Cambridgeshire county councillor Simon Bywater, considered at one time to be the Tory Party's favoured choice.

Mr Jackson, 55, served as MP from 2005 to 2017 before being beaten by disgraced Labour MP Fiona Onasanya: she was later removed from office after a recall petition.

Since leaving Parliament, Mr Jackson worked for a time as chief of staff to the then Brexit secretary David Davis.

He is from the right wing of the party and among causes close to his heart was his opposition to same-sex marriage.

Mr Jackson has also come under fire on social media: in 2018 he responded angrily to a photo of a young boy being treated in Great Ormond Street hospital while wearing an EU flag.

He replied: "What a pathetic cretin".

Anti-Brexit Tory MP Anna Soubry described at the time as a "bitter man gone badly wrong".

If adopted he would face - among other declared candidates- Lib Dem Rupert Moss-Eccardt.