"It hurts and it makes me angry… [Nigel Farage] has some questions to answer"
PM Rishi Sunak condemns racist term used about him by Reform UK campaigner, adding "this is too important not to call out clearly for what it is"
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— BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) June 28, 2024
Rishi Sunak has told how he was left “hurt and angry” after a Reform UK activist was filmed calling him a “fucking P***”.
The prime minister said his two daughters should not have to hear racist insults being hurled at their father.
An undercover reporter for Channel 4 News secretly filmed Reform supporter Andrew Parker saying: “I’ve always been a Tory voter, but what annoys me is that fucking P*** we’ve got in. What good is he? You tell me, you know. He’s just wet. Fucking useless.”
Reacting today, a clearly-emotional Sunak said: “When 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 for what it is.”
Channel 4 have also denied claims that Parker is an actor who was paid to be in the video.
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage stoked the conspiracy with a post on X.
Andrew Parker was the man that made the astonishing racist comments that have given us so much negative coverage.
We now learn that he is an actor by profession.
His own website says he is ‘well spoken’ but from the moment he arrived in Clacton he was doing what he calls…
— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) June 28, 2024
But a Channel 4 spokesperson 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.”
Parker himself told the Press Association that he apologised for what he had said.
“Of course I’m sorry,” he said. “They were off-the-cuff things that everyone says.”