A Bromley councillor who tweeted that a rape victim was probably a sex worker has been permanently expelled from the Conservative Party.

Shaun Slator, elected last May to represent St Mary Cray ward, was booted out of the party this week.

Formerly the chairman of his local Conservative association, he must now serve as an independent councillor.

He told the News Shopper: “I am, naturally, very disappointed and will be submitting an appeal in due course.”

Neither he nor Conservative headquarters commented on whether his expulsion was linked to controversial tweets he had published last December.

Cllr Slator was suspended from the Bromley Conservative group after responding on New Year’s Eve to a News Shopper crime report about a woman raped in a park in Plumstead.

Cllr Slator responded: “More likely that it’s a punter that didn’t pay”.

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Two days earlier he had published another message on Twitter, saying that “a bunch of” people on the Conservative benches in Parliament were involved in “noncing and legalised drugs”.

“The Conservative Party has an established code of conduct and formal processes where complaints can be made in confidence,” a party spokesperson said, when asked about Cllr Slator’s expulsion.

“This process is rightly confidential. Following the conclusion of this process, Cllr Slator has been expelled.”

The council received 18 complaints about Cllr Slator's conduct after his tweet about the Plumstead rape.

However, he faced no discipline under the council’s own standards procedure, as it was claimed that he was not acting in his capacity as a councillor when he posted the tweet.

He apologised in February in a public council meeting, claiming his intention had been to highlight the issue of sexual exploitation in Plumstead.

He told the chamber: “I’m not ashamed to admit that I am fallible and I have made a mistake. I now understand that with the privilege afforded to me as a councillor to better serve my community comes a responsibility to reflect more deeply on what I say and post online.”

Despite his expulsion, Cllr Slator is still listed on the Bromley and Chislehurst Conservative Association’s chairman on its website.

The association did not respond to a request for comment.