Reform UK leader Nigel Farage hot-footed it into the venue hosting tonight’s television leaders’ debate ahead of the General Election, amid shouts from pro-refugee protestors outside the studio.
Mr Farage’s appearance at BBC Question Time Leaders’ Special at the Midlands Arts Centre in Birmingham comes just hours after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak lashed out at him after a Reform UK activist was caught on camera branding the Prime Minister a ‘f***ing p***’.
Hosted by Fiona Bruce, Mr Farage appeared alongside Green Party Co-Leader Adrian Ramsay for tonight’s show.
He unsurprisingly came under pressure to answer questions from the audience over the conduct of campaigners in Clacton who were recorded making a catalogue of vile racist and homophobic remarks.
The PM, whose grandparents were from India, said earlier today Mr Farage had ‘questions to answer’ as Reform plunged into chaos in the wake of the revelations, the latest and most damaging of a string of allegations to hit it in recent weeks.
He likened the language to that used by ‘misogynist’ Andrew Tate and repeated the racial slur used against him ‘because it is important to call it out for what it is’, citing the impact on his young daughters.
Reform activist Andrew Parker, who made the remark about the PM, was also secretly recorded by Channel 4 News in Essex suggesting that migrants should be shot by soldiers as they arrive on UK beaches.
He also called for Muslims to be ejected from mosques so they can be turned into Wetherspoons pubs.
Other campaigners in the town where Mr Farage is hoping to become the MP on July 4 suggested LGBT people are ‘degenerate’, would turn the police into ‘paramilitaries’ and would bring back ‘the noose’.
During Friday night’s appearance on Question Time, Mr Farage said what had happened was ‘unbelievable’ and that most of what had appeared in the report ‘didn’t ring true.’
Appearing on ITV’s Loose Women today, Mr Farage claimed Mr Parker was an actor used to discredit him, saying: ‘This whole whole thing is a complete and utter set-up, of that I have no doubt.’
But on a campaign visit to a school in Teesside, the Prime Minister told broadcasters: ‘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.
‘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.’
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.’