Nigel Farage has come under fire after resurfaced remarks showed he was ‘dazzled’ by ‘Rivers of Blood’ Tory Enoch Powell when he was a schoolboy at Dulwich College
Nigel Farage has come under attack for his gushing admiration of notorious “Rivers of Blood” Tory Enoch Powell.
The Reform UK chief – who is accused of making racist and pro-Hitler comments while he was a schoolboy – outraged staff at Dulwich College with a “spirited defence” of Powell. Mr Farage wrote in 2011 that he had been “dazzled” by the ex-Conservative MP, who was dismissed from the shadow cabinet following the infamous hate-filled 1968 speech.
While he was a schoolboy, Mr Farage recalled, he was “awestruck” by Powell. Labour peer Baroness Luciana Berger told The Mirror: “It’s appalling that Nigel Farage has dismissed allegations of racist and antisemitic behaviour from his teenage years.
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“His open admiration for Enoch Powell speaks volumes about the kind of politics he champions.” The wannabe Prime Minister’s schooldays are under new scrutiny following allegations by former classmates.
Mr Farage wrote in autobiography Flying Free, published 14 years ago: “I attended every lecture on politics, philosophy and current affairs given by visiting speakers and was prominent when questions were invited from the floor.
“Red Ken Livingstone (former Labour leader of the Greater London Council) addressed us and was assailed by a fervent Farage. Enoch Powell visited in 1982, a day before his seventieth birthday, and dazzled me for once into awestruck silence.”
And he admitted that some teachers had not been impressed with his “spirited defence” of Powell. Mr Farage wrote that headteacher David Emms made him a prefect “to the astonishment of my peers and the outrage of many in the staff common-room who particularly deplored my spirited defence of Enoch Powell”.
Powell’s vile speech in 1968 led to his sacking as shadow defence secretary by then-leader Edward Heath. He likened Britain to a nation heaping its own funeral pyre, saying: “Like the Roman, I seem to see the river Tiber foaming with much blood.”
He also outlined a constituent’s fears that within 20 years “the black man will have the whip hand over the white man”. It sparked an outcry, with four Tory frontbenchers threatening to quit if Powell was not sacked.
Mr Heath later said he axed him because the speech was “inflammatory and liable to damage race relations”. Powell never again held a frontbench role and later defected to the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP).
In 2014 it emerged that Mr Farage had tried to enlist Powell’s help when he first tried to become a Parliamentary candidate in 1994. In a letter uncovered at the archives of Cambridge University, Mr Farage wrote: “I have everything in place to fight a good, aggressive campaign but a voice from you could transform things.”
He was also reported to have driven Powell to an election rally at Newbury Racecourse, stating: “He had spoken at my school and I was later asked to drive him to a by-election rally, I think they chose me because everyone else available had a Morris Minor and I had a Merc! It was scary.
“Protesters smashed the back of the car when we arrived but Enoch didn’t blink.” Powell, who died in 1998, was also invited to stand for UKIP in 1995 and 1997, but rejected both requests.
Ex-classmates from his time at Dulwich College, in south London, alleged he made pro-Hitler comments, joked about gas chambers, and put someone in detention for the colour of their skin.
Peter Ettedgui, who was 13 at the time, told The Guardian last week that the Reform leader would tell him “Hitler was right”, or “Gas them” before adding a hiss to replicate the sound of the gas chambers.
Another former pupil, who was not named, described being in a youth organisation called the CCF, during which they claimed Farage had taught songs about gassing Jews. Patrick Neylan, 61, an editor, who was in the year below Mr Farage, also recalled the singing of the “gas ’em” song on CCF camps.
Tim France, 61, was in the same year as Mr Farage and claimed he would “regularly” perform the Nazi “Seig heil” salute. A Reform UK spokesman denied all the allegations last week, and claimed it was an attempt to smear the party.
In an interview with ITV News on Monday, Mr Farage was asked if he racially abused fellow pupils. He replied: “No. This is 49 years ago by the way, 49 years ago. Have I ever tried to take it out on any individual on the basis of where they’re from? No.”
Asked to categorically state that he did not racially abuse fellow pupils at school, he said: “I would never, ever do it in a hurtful or insulting way.” The interviewer said: “That’s not quite the same as not doing it.”
Mr Farage retorted: “It’s 49 years ago. It’s 49 years.” Asked what difference this made, he said: “I had just entered my teens. Can I remember everything that happened to school?
“No, I can’t. Have I ever been part of an extremist organisation or engaged in direct, unpleasant personal abuse, genuine abuse on that basis? No.”
Told he had caveated it and was not quite ruling it out, the interviewer asked again if he had racially abused fellow pupils. Mr Farage said: “Not with intent.”
Pressed again, he said: “No, no I have never, directly, really tried to go and hurt anybody.” There was no suggestion that Mr Farage as the adult holds the same views ascribed to him by others as a child, and other students have no recollection of the remarks or behaviour suggested by Mr Ettedgui.