ESSEX’S policing chief should resign over his steadfast defence of the force’s investigation into a social media post by a leading journalist, a senior councillor has claimed.

Tony Cox, a former Southend Tory who switched allegiances to Reform, has slammed Roger Hirst “for his cowardice” after he cancelled a public meeting on Monday citing “public safety concerns”.

The meeting was cancelled after Mr Hirst faced backlash for defending the investigation into Daily Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson and telling LBC “we can’t go round ignoring crimes just because it’s politically sensitive”.

Ms Pearson was visited by police on Remembrance Sunday and told she was under investigation for allegedly stirring up racial hatred over the tweet.

Mr Cox said: “He thought there were going to be thousands of people attending. He should go, absolutely he should go. He went on radio and said a crime had been committed. What position is he in to say a crime has been committed? Quite rightly he’s been rounded upon by senior figures within the Conservatives, like Zac Goldsmith.

“The fact is it was for a tweet a year ago that no longer exists. It started under the Conservatives and it’s been going at speed under Labour and the problem is, rather than police the streets we’ve got police who want to police tweets.”

Former Southend Conservative MP Anna Firth also criticised Mr Hirst for his defence of the investigation.

Speaking on X, formerly Twitter, she said: “Putting aside the obvious legal issue as to whether Essex Police had reasonable grounds to suspect that a crime had in fact been committed, where is the public interest in pursuing a middle-aged woman on Twitter as opposed to getting out there and catching real criminals?”

A spokesperson for Essex Police said they had invited a woman to “come to a voluntary interview” related to an investigation into an alleged offence of inciting racial hatred.

Mr Hirst said: “The Chelmsford public meeting was postponed in the interest of public safety following advice a large number of people from outside the county were expected to attend, a number which would far exceed the capacity of the venue booked for the meeting.”