Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said he is “hurt and angry” about a Reform UK canvasser using a racial slur against him.
The PM that party leader Nigel Farage “has some questions to answer”. On a campaign visit to a school in Teesside, Mr Sunak told broadcasters: “My two daughters have to see and hear Reform people who campaign to Nigel Farage calling me an effing p***.
“It hurts and it makes me angry, and I think he has some questions to answer. I don’t repeat those words lightly. I do so deliberately, because this is too important not to call out clearly for what it is.”
The comments emerged last night after Channel 4 published uncover footage of Mr Farage’s campaign in Clacton. The footage showed Reform UK activists saying people who arrive by small boat should be shot and using racist language about Mr Sunak.
Asked whether he was frustrated that some former Tory voters are leaning towards Reform UK when their activists are making racist and homophobic comments, Mr Sunak said: “When you see Reform candidates and campaigners seemingly using racist and misogynistic language and opinion, seemingly without challenge, I think it tells you something about the culture in the Reform party.
“Andrew Tate isn’t an important voice for men. He’s a vile misogynist. And our politics and country is better than that. As Prime Minister, but more importantly as a father of two young girls, it’s my duty to call out this corrosive and divisive behaviour.”
The undercover footage recorded by Channel 4 News showed Reform UK activist Andrew Parker saying the party should “kick Muslims out of mosques and turn them into Wetherspoons ”. He also said that army recruits should use asylum seekers crossing the Channel as “target practice”.
Mr Farage said he is “dismayed” by the comments, and said Mr Parker will no longer be working on his campaign in Clacton, Essex.
Describing how he’d deal with people coming by small boats, Mr Parker told an investigator: “Get the young (Army) recruits there, yeah, with guns on the f****** beach, target practice. F****** just shoot them.” And the footage also shows him encouraging a paramedic to deny oxygen to patients if they are “any of that f****** lot”. He described Islam as a “cult”.
Mr Parker said: “We’re f****** kicking all the Muslims out of the mosques and turning them into Wetherspoons.“ And in the same conversation he used a sickening racist term to describe Mr Sunak.
Giving advice on bringing up migration on the doorstep he told the investigator: “The immigration thing, use the word ‘illegal’. Emphasise ‘illegal’ especially if you open the door and there’s a bunch of p****.”
George Jones, who has been running events for Mr Farage’s campaign, told the undercover investigator that Clacton was chosen because it is “proper England”. He said: “Not like in London when you’re a foreigner in your own country, and if you say ‘hello’ to someone they look like they’re about to f****** knife you in the face.”
Keir Starmer said he was “shocked by what I heard in the report, clearly racist, and I think this is a test of leadership” for Mr Farage.
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