Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy has walked back claims that Nigel Farage “flirted with Hitler Youth.”
Lammy’s remarks appeared to reference allegations from 2013 that Farage sang Nazi-affiliated songs as a teenager.
The Reform UK leader refuted the allegations at the time, which centered on claims that, as a schoolboy in the late 1970s and early 1980s, he and others marched through a village “shouting Hitler Youth songs.”
A Reform source told BBC News: “It’s disgusting and libellous. Beneath contempt.”
On Sunday, Sir Keir Starmer described Reform UK’s policy of scrapping indefinite leave to remain as “racist” and “immoral.”
Since then, senior Labour figures have sought to distinguish between labeling a Reform UK policy “racist” and applying the same label to the party’s supporters.
In his conference speech, the Prime Minister intensified his criticism of Farage and Reform, asserting they lacked patriotism and were primarily interested in fomenting division.
He also pledged to combat racist rhetoric “with everything we have.”
Speaking after the speech on the BBC’s Politics Live, Lammy was questioned on whether he considered Farage to be a racist.
He stated that the Prime Minister had been denouncing policies “that would line people up who have a right to be in this country, who might be Indian, who might be Nigerian, and send them home.”
He added: “It’s not British. It doesn’t respect our values.”
“I’m not going to play the man. I’m playing the ball, as our leader did.”
“I will leave it for the public to come to their own judgements about someone who once flirted with Hitler Youth when he was younger.”
Shortly after making the comments, Lammy stated that he was “happy to clarify” them, in an interview with the BBC News Channel.
“He [Farage] has denied it and so I accept that he has denied it and I would like to clarify that position because in the end the prime minister is keen for us to focus on the policies not the individuals.”
The Deputy Prime Minister added: “I wasn’t at school with Nigel Farage. I don’t know what songs he sang at school.”
“I’m happy to clarify. I did say it’s for the public to make up their mind and I did also emphasise that let us play the ball, not the man.”
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