Nigel Farage will ‘go to struggle’ with union after academics had been advised to ‘educate pupils who vote for racist Reform’  – as he clashes with GB News over its protection of feud along with his personal MP

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has pledged the party will ‘go to war against the teachers’ unions’ after the country’s largest education union branded it ‘far-Right and racist’.

The National Education Union is to demand at next month’s annual conference that pupils are taught the dangers of voting for Reform.

Teachers are set to debate a motion accusing ‘far-Right and racist organisations, including Reform’ of scapegoating refugees, asylum seekers, Muslims and Jews.

The motion, seen by The Mail on Sunday, claims four million votes were secured by Reform at the 2024 election on an ‘anti-immigrant platform’.

It calls for teachers to ‘educate and challenge’ pupils who are drawn to ‘racist beliefs and far-Right activity’ and for anti-racist resources to be developed for use in schools.

Reform has always rejected suggestions it is ‘far-Right’. Last year, the BBC was forced to apologise for calling it far-Right in a news report.

Meanwhile, the party’s popularity among the young has soared. An exclusive Mail on Sunday poll last month found that 30 per cent of 16- and 17- year-olds would vote Reform if the voting age was lowered.

Last night, Mr Farage said: ‘This is happening up and down the country. Reform is subject to endless propaganda at the hands of teachers. When we are in a position to do so, we will go to war against the teachers’ unions.’

In the motion, to be debated at the Harrogate event, union activists also criticise the Government for seeking advice from ‘members of racist governments, such as Georgia Meloni’ of Italy.

The NEU’s leader Daniel Kebede has called the UK ‘a brutally racist state’ and dubbed the education system ‘institutionally racist’. He even called the national curriculum ‘a Little England, white saviour narrative’.

Concerns were also raised last night that the NEU was disregarding the legal duty on teachers to maintain political impartiality in their teaching.

‘It is deeply disturbing that members of our largest teachers’ union should want to bring politics into the classroom by linking immigration concerns with racism,’ said Professor Alan Smithers, director of the centre for education and employment research at Buckingham University.

‘It is indoctrination rather than education at a time when the current Government stated intention is to lower the voting age to 16.’

Reform MP Lee Anderson said: ‘The NEU has revealed its true colours.

‘By indoctrinating our youth, silencing free speech and spreading hateful rhetoric, they have abandoned their legal duty of political neutrality.’

Teachers at the NEU conference will also attack academies and call for all schools to be returned to local authority control.

Labour is accused of bowing to union pressure in its controversial Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, which had its third reading last week, and its new curriculum review.

The proposed reforms, described as a ‘wrecking ball’ by opposition MPs, will curtail academy freedoms.

Fears have also been raised that education union ‘wokeness’ is influencing the Government’s Curriculum and Assessment Review, which published its interim report last week.

Led by Professor Becky Francis, the review said that it was governed by ‘a social justice lens’ that would deliver a curriculum that reflects the ‘issues and diversities of our society’.

Last year, the NEU caused outrage by debating a motion calling Israel the ‘main driver’ of violence in Gaza.

A spokesman for the NEU said: ‘It is vital we take on racist behaviour and language, in schools and in wider society. The NEU makes no apologies for holding that view.’

Farage has a ‘bust-up’ with GB News over channel’s coverage of his feud with suspended Reform MP Rupert Lowe

By Glen Owen, Political Editor

Nigel Farage has had a bust-up with his GB News bosses over the channel’s extensive coverage of his feud with suspended Reform MP Rupert Lowe.

Mr Farage admitted last night he had not been ‘overly thrilled’ about how GB News dealt with the fall-out from the row with Mr Lowe, which exploded after Mr Lowe questioned Mr Farage’s leadership in a Daily Mail interview.

Sources at the station claimed Mr Farage had refused to present his prime-time show in protest.

This was disputed by Mr Farage and GB News who said he was due to be off-screen as part of the pre-local election ‘purdah’ period – and had decided to do so a week early in order to attend Reform dinners and honour commitments in America.

Mr Farage said: ‘We weren’t overly thrilled about how GB News devoted more airtime to the issue than any other channel. We had a right go at them about it.’

Mr Lowe, 67, was ousted by Reform two days after his interview, in which the Great Yarmouth MP called Reform a ‘protest party’ led by ‘the Messiah’.

The party is probing allegations that Mr Lowe bullied staff, while police are investigating claims he verbally abused party chairman Zia Yusuf.

Mr Lowe denies all the allegations and says he was targeted for questioning the party leadership. 

WhatsApp messages were leaked in which a staff member asked Mr Farage why Reform had not let a lawyer complete an investigation into Mr Lowe before removing the whip.

Mr Farage said: ‘Because he is damaging the party just before elections. Disgusting.’

Mr Lowe hit back: ‘These messages prove the Reform leadership has zero integrity. I will not work with the rotten and deceitful Reform leadership… Nigel Farage must never be prime minister.’

GB News editorial director Michael Booker said: ‘We like to have a good relationship with all the parties.

‘We owe it to our audience to treat every story on merit, without fear or favour.’