Lucy Connolly has been left with "bruises" after being 'manhandled without provocation' while serving her prison sentence, Reform UK's deputy leader Richard Tice has said.

Tice, who visited Connolly at HMP Peterborough, said the former childminder has been "stripped of privileges by prison officers".

The mother of two was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison last year for a tweet she posted in the wake of the Southport murders, where she called for "mass deportation now", adding "set fire to all the... hotels [housing asylum seekers]...for all I care...If that makes me racist, so be it."

Now, Tice has told The Telegraph that she was at the centre of a confrontation after it was suggested by officers that she would be moved to another ward.

Lucy Connolly was jailed for 31 months for a tweet about last year's Southport attacksPA

Connolly was told she would be placed in a 23-hour-a-day lockdown in an area which also held the most violent prisoners.

When she challenged the decision to move her, she was allegedly restrained by officers with handcuffs to take her to her new cell.

The Boston and Skegness MP said: "Five days after the incident, the bruises on her wrists are still significant, yellow. It was obviously horrible what she went through."

"You have to think it’s politically motivated. I think the next few weeks before her release are going to be very challenging, worrying."

Richard Tice speaking to the media outside HMP Peterborough, Cambridgeshire

It comes as Tice is set to present a bill introducing a new "backstop" against overly harsh sentences following the imprisonment of Lucy Connolly.

The bill, nicknamed "Lucy's Bill", would allow members of the public to mount mass appeals against punishments they deem to be too severe.

Tice wants to introduce the bill to protect against cases where judges "get it wrong" by providing a new avenue for the wider population to request a second opinion.

The proposals will be brought forward tomorrow in a Ten Minute Rule Bill, a variant of a Private Member’s Bill.

While it is very rare for a bill introduced in this way to become law, it is regarded as an opportunity for MPs to raise awareness of an issue and gauge support from their colleagues in the Commons as well as remain on the official Parliamentary record.

HMP Peterborough where Connolly is servicing

Tice said the bill would provide "democratic safeguards against overzealous two-tier justice imposed against particular individuals, especially who have effectively become political prisoners".

He added: "I want to reassure Lucy that many of us as MPs, we’re not forgetting about her, we’re continuing to battle for her, and that, in a sense, this could be part of her legacy."