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An activist working for Reform UK’s leader Nigel Farage told voters that migrants should be used for army “target practice” and labelled Prime Minister Rishi Sunak a “fucking Paki”.
Andrew Parker, a canvasser for Farage in Clacton, Essex, where the Reform leader is standing for election on July 4, was filmed by an undercover Channel 4 reporter telling constituents that army recruits should shoot migrants arriving in the UK on small boats.
“You’ve got Deal, haven’t you? The place near Dover. Army recruitment. Get the young recruits there, yeah, with guns on the fucking beach, target practice,” he said. “Fucking just shoot them.”
Parker later remarked about Sunak: “I’ve always been a Tory voter but what annoys me is that fucking Paki we’ve got in. What good is he? He’s just wet. Fucking useless.”
The remarks are the latest in a series of racist and violent comments made by some Reform parliamentary candidates and activists, and come as the party focuses on its hardline immigration policy.
Reform replaced several candidates prior to the registration deadline on June 7 over inflammatory remarks, but has since only suspended two after it emerged they were previously members of the far-right British National Party.
The undercover Channel 4 reporter joined canvassers in Clacton and chatted in a pub with members of the Reform UK campaign team.
Rob Bates, a senior party campaigner, told activists that Reform had spent double the campaign spending limit in Clacton.
Farage said he was “dismayed” by the remarks made by individuals in the Channel 4 film, adding they would no longer be involved in Reform’s campaign.
“The appalling sentiments expressed by some in these exchanges bear no relation to my own views, those of the vast majority of our supporters or Reform UK policy,” he added.
Parker said in a statement to Channel 4: “I have never discussed immigration with either Nigel Farage or the Reform party and that any comments made by me during those recordings are my own personal views.”
Bates said he had made a joke about breaching spending limits in Clacton and was not involved in Reform’s finances.
Reform said: “We are well within the legal limits and, like all parties, our returns will be delivered promptly after the close of the polls.”
Farage told the Financial Times on Tuesday that a vetting company had failed to screen Reform’s candidates and blamed previous management for a roster that included individuals who had praised Hitler’s leadership and were BNP members.
“Those candidates were there months before,” Farage said. “I inherited that.”
Although Farage is a director and majority shareholder of Reform, he has previously maintained he was not involved in the day-to-day running of the party before he returned as leader four weeks ago.