The 21st Century Party, which Mr McIntyre is the leader of, was not registered in time for the September 7 poll, so will not appear on the ballot sheets, forcing Mr McIntyre to run as an Independent.

“Someone from his office rang this morning asking for advice on how to run as an independent,” Mr Windsor told The Inverell Times yesterday. 

“After all this vitriolic rubbish that he’s been articulating against me, suddenly now he wants to know how to do it as an independent. 

“Well I thought … a man of this great profile would have the capacity to organise himself as a candidate,” Mr Windsor said.

“Even though he has been running this rhetoric of being the party of the future he hasn’t even been able to organise the party of today.

“Now he wants to run as an Independent. The first question I’d ask is ‘is he going to advise people where his preferences will be going?’”

Mr Windsor said he didn’t speak to Mr McIntyre personally. 

“I didn’t particularly want to. I think he’s a very confused man.

“He’s previously said if I’d been running he’d direct preferences to the National Party - it’s common knowledge in Canberra that he’s just a ‘stalking horse’ for the National Party - they’re talking quite openly about the relationship between Jamie McIntyre and Barnaby Joyce … people out of the National Party headquarters I’m talking about, saying that McIntyre is essentially there to garner a percentage of votes.”

Mr McIntyre, who was once a member of the National Party, has already scoffed at suggestions he was running in New England as a National Party stooge to feed preferences back to Barnaby Joyce.

“Obviously this has come from Tony Windsor’s office, they’re saying ‘he’s just a stooge for the Coalition’,” Mr McIntyre said.

“I don’t think the Coalition’s that smart, if they were smart they would have done something like that.”

Mr McIntyre’s problems seem to be with his own party not the Nationals however.

On January 30, then Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, indicated the issue of writs for the 2013 federal election would happen on August 12.

“To allow for a minimum three months of processing time, the AEC recommends that party registration applications are submitted by May 13, 2013 if the party wishes to be registered for the 2013 federal election,” the AEC website states.

"There is no legitimate reason for us to not be on the ballot papers for a September 7 election as we submitted our party registration May 2nd and became a listed Party as of July 15 and therefore should be allowed on the ballot papers,” Mr McIntyre said.

However, a spokesperson for the AEC confirmed there were issues with the party’s original application and Mr McIntyre has confirmed that fact.

“21st Century Australia lodged its application with the AEC on May 2 and despite significant delays, was listed as a registered party on July 15 on the AEC website under 'Current party registration applications inviting objection’,” Mr McIntyre said.

A 30-day period follows for objections to be received. That meant the 21st Century Party was not going to be registered even for the September 14 poll set by Julia Gillard. 

Mr McIntyre has said he is considering taking urgent court action against the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) to delay the upcoming election.

“We are also considering organising a class action for every voter who refuses to vote in this year's election because 21st Century Australia is not on the ballot paper and thus the voters are being denied to vote for their preferred choice. They will join a class action and not be compelled to pay a fine," Mr McIntyre said.

FOUR candidates are now confirmed for New England.

Joining Nationals hopeful Barnaby Joyce and The Greens’ Pat Schultz will be One Nation candidate Brian Dettmann and Richard Witten from the Citizens Electoral Council.

Both Mr Dettmann and Mr Witten have previously stood for election in New England, including at the last poll in 2010.