Reform UK withdraws support for three election candidates amid racism scandal
29 June 2024, 16:46 | Updated: 29 June 2024, 20:07
Reform UK have withdrawn support for three election candidates who allegedly made derogatory comments and racists remarks, it is understood.
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Edward Oakenfall, Robert Lomas and Leslie Lilley will still appear on the ballot paper as Reform candidates but a party spokesman has said they would sit as independent MPs should they be elected.
Despite this, he said if voters wished to register support for Reform, they should still vote for the candidates.
The spokesman added: "I’m not saying the situation is ideal, but the size of the Reform vote share nationally is what matters."
While discussing the three candidates on Question Time on Friday, party leader Nigel Farage said: “I want nothing to do with them”.
He added that "you get people in all parties saying bad things and wrong things” and argued the party had a small amount of time to find candidates after the surprise announcement of the general election in July by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.
Warning: This story contains language readers may find offensive
Last year, Mr Oakenfull, standing in Derbyshire Dales, posted derogatory comments about the IQ of sub-Saharan Africans on social media but has previously said the remarks were taken out of context.
The Times reported on 8 June that Mr Lomas, standing in Barnsley North, said black people should "get off [their] lazy arses" and stop acting "like savages".
Reform claimed at the time the comments were "out of context part quotations" and it needed more time to respond.
Mr Lilley, standing in Southend East, reportedly described people arriving on small boats as "scum" in a social media post, adding: "I hope your family get robbed, beaten or attacked."
It comes as Sir Keir Starmer has urged Mr Farage to "set the tone" - after a supporter of his Reform UK party used a racist slur when talking about the Prime Minister.
Reform UK campaigners heard making racial slurs in Channel 4 sting
The comments of Andrew Parker, that were shown on a Channel 4 broadcast, have been condemned by all political parties.
The Labour leader accused Mr Farage of not doing enough after the incident, saying that it is the leader who sets the “tone, the culture and the standards” of a political party.
Mr Sunak has said the comments made him “angry” that his daughters had to see a Reform campaigner directing racist language towards him.
He 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."
Sunak says Reform campaigner’s racial slur hurts and Farage has questions to answer
Reform UK has since claimed to have reported Channel 4 to the elections watchdog - alleging its reporting was fake.
Mr Farage maintains the recording - which was made in secret - was a set up.
He added: "The Channel 4 broadcast has clearly been made to harm Reform UK during an election period and this cannot be described as anything short of election interference."
Despite this, reports suggest the Electoral Commission claims to have not received any such complaint from Reform and would not investigate the issue anyway due to Channel 4's exemption as a licensed broadcaster.
A spokesperson for Channel 4 News said: "We strongly stand by our rigorous and duly impartial journalism which speaks for itself.
“We met Mr Parker for the first time at Reform UK party headquarters, where he was a Reform party canvasser.
"We did not pay the Reform UK canvasser or anyone else in this report. Mr Parker was not known to Channel 4 News and was filmed covertly via the undercover operation.”
In a statement, Mr Parker said he wanted to "apologise profusely to Nigel Farage and the Reform Party if my personal views have reflected badly on them and brought them into disrepute as this was not my intention".
Essex Police have said they are "urgently assessing" comments in the programme "to establish if there are any criminal offences".
The Channel 4 report also showed an individual, George Jones, who called a Pride flag a “degenerate flag”.
A reform spokesman has since confirmed that Mr Jones was a genuine party volunteer.
Mr Jones, a longtime party activist, repeatedly suggests members of the LGBT+ community are paedophiles and criticises police attending Pride.
The spokesperson said "you can’t sack a volunteer" but that Mr Jones was "no longer involved in the campaign", adding: "He’s gone."
Mr Farage has previously described Mr Jones's comments as "vulgar, drunk and wrong".
Mr Farage had already expressed frustration that his party had “ran out of time” to vet candidates properly after Grant StClair-Armstrong, standing for Reform, resigned following the emergence of social media comments in which he called on people to vote for the British National Party (BNP).
This came just a week after another Reform candidate, Ian Gribbin, apologised for an old internet post which said Britain should have "taken Hitler up on his offer of neutrality" instead of fighting the Nazis in the Second World War.
