A second Jewish Tory has defected to the Lib Dems amid growing signs of division within the party.

Ben Seifert had been selected to stand as the Tory candidate for the North East seat - covering Islington, Hackey and Waltham Forest - in the 2020 Greater London Assembly election before he resigned earlier this month.

At the weekend, he announced he had joined the Liberal Democrats, saying: “Neither Labour nor the Tories are fit to govern.”

It comes after a Jewish councillor in Barnet, Gabriel Rozenberg, quit the Conservative Party on Friday and joined the Liberal Democrats, becoming the only Liberal Democrat currently on that council.

Mr Rozenberg said that he had been a member of the Tories for 20 years, but added: “The Conservative Party is not the party I joined.”

Declaring his new party loyalty on Twitter, Mr Seifert said: “The Liberal Democrats are a forward-thinking party that is very clear about Brexit. We want to stop it.”

He also endorsed Lib Dem candidate for London Mayor Siobhan Benita, as well as party leader Jo Swinson.

When he initially resigned from the Conservatives, two weeks before he announced he was a Lib Dem, he said: “I stuck with the party with Theresa May’s deal.

"I thought it was a bit of a fudge but the country had voted to leave and I thought she was trying to get on with it.

“But as it went on, it just made me think more that there was no better deal than actually remaining in Europe. There isn’t one.

“In recent months, I’ve felt increasingly like the party has been taken over by a cult. I think somebody like Jacob Rees-Mogg gives the impression of wanting a no-deal Brexit, and a no-deal Brexit would be like jumping off a cliff.

“It’s crazy. I’m not sure what Boris Johnson wants apart from that he wanted to be Prime Minister.”

He added he had voted for the Lib Dems in May’s European elections but said he “could not tell anybody about that at the time.”