Nigel Farage Reform advert comments branded 'poisonous' by target Anas Sarwar

28 May 2025, 05:46

By Alan Zycinski

@AlanJZycinski

Scottish Labour's leader has accused Nigel Farage of making "poisonous" comments about him in a row over a Reform UK advert.

LBC revealed last week how more than £7000 had been spent promoting the social media video ahead of a Scottish Parliament by-election claiming Anas Sarwar wanted to "prioritise the Pakistani community".

He told us the advert was "outrageous, somehow questioning my loyalty and identity" and later branded it "blatantly racist".

However Reform UK claimed the party was "simply advertising Sarwar's own words" and said that "if he doesn't like them, he shouldn't use them".

And leader Nigel Farage doubled down on that defence today in his first keynote speech since the local elections.

In a response to a question from LBC's Political Editor Natasha Clark, where the advert was played, he said: "There's a bit of a row going on in Scotland.

"Everyone's having a go at us, Labour, the SNP."

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"So maybe we're getting something right. I think what I'm able to do is to show you what Mr. Sarwar actually said and how we've responded to it. Can we do that, guys?

"So it was Anas Sarwar that introduced sectarianism into Scottish politics, making it perfectly clear his priority was to a certain section of the community.

"All we've done is to put out the exact words spoken by him without any comment. We've said nothing, just that we will represent the people of that constituency and the fact that they, having chosen to get down the sectarian route, choose to direct accusations back as us says to me, Natasha, that we are winning."

And the Scottish Labour leader has since responded again, telling LBC: "I've seen these poisonous comments from Nigel Farage. I have fought against sectarianism all my adult life.

"Let me tell you about Nigel Farage. While I was working in Scotland's NHS in one of the most deprived communities in our country, he was on the Brussels gravy train.

"While I'm campaigning to save our NHS, he wants to privatise our NHS. This is a man that doesn't understand Scotland, doesn't care about Scotland and that's why Scotland will utterly reject him."