Rishi Sunak tells Nigel Farage: ‘My daughters hear the abuse’

British prime minister says Reform UK leader has questions to answer after his party’s campaigners used racist and misogynistic language.

Rishi Sunak with wife Akshata Murty and their daughters, Krishna and Anoushka. He said it was his duty to call out 'corrosive and divisive behaviour'. Picture: Getty Images

Rishi Sunak launched an impassioned attack on Nigel Farage, saying that he had been left “hurt and angry” at being called “an effing P---” by a canvasser backing Reform’s leader.

The prime minister said Farage had “questions to answer” about the people who were working for the party and added that he wanted to “call out” the racist and misogynistic culture of Reform UK.

“When you see Reform candidates and campaigners, seemingly using racist and misogynistic language and opinions seemingly without challenge, I think it tells you something about the culture within the Reform Party,” Sunak said. “My two daughters have to see and hear Reform people who campaign for Nigel Farage calling me an effing P***. It hurts and it makes me angry, and I think he has some questions to answer. And 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. 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.”

Essex police said it was “urgently assessing” the comments by the canvasser, Andrew Parker, and another who had made homophobic remarks, to establish whether criminal offences had been committed.

Farage suggested that people with racist and homophobic views were attracted to Reform because the BNP no longer existed.

He also alleged, without evidence, that the activist who had made the comment was part of a “set-up”, while admitting that people with racist views were attracted to his party.

“Nobody has fought harder against the far right in British politics than me. I almost single-handedly destroyed the British National Party. Ironically, I think because we destroyed the BNP, they haven’t got the BNP to go to any more. I think that’s the problem.”

He added: “You do get, right across politics, people saying things they jolly well shouldn’t say, but I’ve never encouraged it.”

Farage said Reform UK canvassers filmed making homophobic remarks had been “drunken and vulgar” but insisted that Parker, who used the racist language against Sunak, had been part of a “set-up”.

“It was an act right from the very start,” he told ITV’s Loose Women. “I have to tell you, this whole thing was a complete and total set-up, I have no doubt about that.”

Nigel Farage said he had destroyed the BNP 'almost single-handedly'. Picture: ITV/Rex Features/Shutterstock/The Times

Asked whether he thought Parker had been paid, he said: “I don’t know whether he was paid or not.” He added: “I’m saying it’s possible, I don’t know. Something is wrong here.”

Parker denied that he had been “set up” but said that he regretted his comments, adding: “I’m not a racist. I’ve had Muslim girlfriends. It was typical chaps-down-the-pub talk.”

Channel 4 News, which conducted the undercover investigation, said that it had not paid Parker or anyone else in its report.

Sir Keir Starmer said he had been “shocked” by the “clearly racist” video and Farage faced a “test of leadership”.

The Labour leader said: “You have to ask the question why so many people who are supporting Reform seem to be exposed in this particular way. It’s for a leader to change his or her party, to make sure the culture is right, and the standards are understood by everybody within the party.”

Lord Kinnock, former Labour leader, urged his party to tackle the “populist nationalism” of Reform amid concern that it could pose a long-term threat.

It comes as one of Farage’s closest advisers admitted that Reform could have reached a “natural ceiling” of support. Raheem Kassam admitted that controversy over the Reform leader’s pro-Russia comments had also damaged the party. Kassam, who is embedded in Farage’s campaign in Clacton for his National Pulse outlet in the United States, has been reporting on the campaign for the last week.

He wrote: “At a national level, the Reform Party appears to have taken a dent following a weekend of Russia collusion narratives being peddled by the other parties and the corporate press. In my view, Farage lingered on the subject for too long, fighting on their turf instead of his and taking three days to deliver a real punch back on the matter.”

Kassam speculated that Reform’s support may have peaked, writing: “It mightn’t be Russia at all driving this. The party could simply have reached their natural plateau, at between 15 and 18 per cent.”

Grant StClair-Armstrong, the Reform candidate in North West Essex, was barred for a previous comment calling on people to vote for the BNP, while Raymond Saint, standing in Basingstoke, was found to be on a leaked membership list for the far-right party published in 2009.

Reform confirmed that it would not suspend Leslie Lilley, its candidate in Southend East & Rochford, who said in 2020 that he wanted to “slaughter” illegal migrants and their families.

The Times