Nigel Farage’s deputy has said he is ‘enormously sad’ that Reform’s chairman resigned – but insisted he was wrong to oppose a burka ban.
Richard Tice said Zia Yusuf, who plunged Reform into chaos after resigning on Thursday, had worked ‘incredibly hard’ and helped the party win hundreds of council seats in last month’s local elections.
But he insisted that banning the burka was right because the Islamic veil is ‘a repressive item of clothing’.
However, Downing Street said Sir Keir Starmer did not support a ban, with a spokesman saying: ‘This Government does not believe in mandating what people should or shouldn’t wear in public.’
Mr Yusuf’s departure came just hours after he hit out at one of Reform’s own MPs for a ‘dumb’ question in the House of Commons about banning the burka.
He publicly questioned why Sarah Pochin, Reform’s recently elected MP for Runcorn and Helsby, had challenged Sir Keir about the issue in the Commons on Wednesday when a ban is not official party policy.
In a post on X/Twitter on Thursday morning, he said: ‘I do think it’s dumb for a party to ask the PM if they would do something the party itself wouldn’t do.’
By the evening he had resigned, saying he no longer felt that working with Mr Farage to try to win the next election was ‘a good use of my time’.
Asked about his departure yesterday, Mr Tice, Reform’s deputy leader, said: ‘I’m enormously sad that Zia has resigned. He’s worked incredibly hard. I’ve sent him a message of thanks.’
Asked if he agreed with Mr Yusuf that the party should not pledge to ban the burka, he added: ‘No, I don’t.
‘The reality is that I think it is right that we should have a debate about whether or not the burka is appropriate in a nation that’s founded in Christianity, where women are equal citizens and should not be viewed as second-class citizens.
‘If we’re a great democracy that believes in free speech, let’s have a calm and respectful debate.’
Asked by the BBC Radio 4’s Today programme if he supported a ban, he added: ‘Yeah, I’m pretty concerned about whether or not the burka is essentially a sort of repressive item of clothing, whether women have the choice.’
Wearing face-covering clothes is currently banned in seven European countries – France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Switzerland, Austria and Bulgaria – while other countries have enacted partial bans.
His resignation comes after Great Yarmouth MP Rupert Lowe was kicked out of Reform in March for criticising Mr Farage’s leadership.
Mr Yusuf also clashed with Mr Lowe and said he made verbal threats of violence against him.
Mr Lowe always denied the allegations and was later cleared by Scotland Yard after Mr Yusuf reported the incident.
By David Churchill, Chief Political Correspondent
Reform claimed Labour and the SNP were in a ‘coalition of the terrified’ after the party notched up a staggering 26 per cent of the vote in a Scottish by-election.
Reform deputy leader, Richard Tice made the jibe yesterday after coming third in the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse Holyrood by-election.
While Labour’s candidate Davy Russell won the contest with 8,559 votes (31.6 per cent), the SNP came second with 7,957 (29.4 per cent). This was followed by Reform with 7,088 (26.2 per cent), meaning they came within 1,500 votes of winning.
The leading pollster professor Sir John Curtice said the result showed Reform also posed a serious threat to Labour north of the border.
Last week, SNP Scottish First Minister John Swinney accused Reform leader Nigel Farage of being ‘fundamentally racist’.
Mr Tice said: ‘John is creating a coalition of the terrified and throwing around juvenile smears.’