Ex UK equalities watchdog head ‘confused’ by Nigel Farage response to racism claims

By Christopher McKeon and Jordan Reynolds, Press Association

The former head of the UK equalities watchdog has said she is “confused” by Nigel Farage’s response to allegations of racism during his teenage years.

The Reform UK leader has faced allegations that he engaged in racist and antisemitic behaviour while he was a pupil at Dulwich College, a top private school in south London.

Speaking to Sky News’ Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips, former Equality and Human Rights Commission chairwoman Baroness Kishwer Falkner said she was “confused and disturbed” by the allegations.

Describing the claims as “ghastly on paper”, Baroness Falkner said: “The one thing that slightly confuses me about him, and I hear his contextualisation of it all. Why can’t he just offer an unreserved apology for any distress caused?

“I just don’t get it. It seems to me that that would be the most genuine thing to say if he’s genuinely not a racist.”

Mr Farage has faced repeated questions over the allegations, which include claims that he told a Jewish pupil “Hitler was right” and “gas them”, and told a black pupil: “That’s the way back to Africa.”

The Clacton MP has denied the allegations, variously saying they were “categorically” untrue and at other times saying he “would never, ever do it in a hurtful or insulting way”.

In a press conference last week, he continued to deny he ever made racist remarks in a “malicious or nasty way” while accusing broadcasters reporting on the claims of “double standards”.

And he read out a letter from another former pupil saying Mr Farage was “neither aggressive nor racist”.

Reading from the letter, he said: “While there was plenty of macho tongue-in-cheek schoolboy banter, it was humour, and yes, sometimes it was offensive … but never with malice.

“I never heard him racially abuse anyone.”