Is Reform a serious party or a home for 'degenerates'? | Jon Sopel

We know that the clips are bad, we've just played some of them. We know they're bad. How bad are they for reform? Can they get away with just saying, we're looking into these people and due process will remove them and we'll improve our vetting? Because we've heard we'd improve our vetting a few times, haven't we? You see, I think that the fundamental problem is this. You've heard Richard Tice, one of the gods of the Reform Party, chairman of the Reform Party, saying, look, this is just how people speak. And there are a few bad apples. Which is it? are we seeing what is the reform party or are we seeing a few bad apples because if you're saying look this is just a language that people use well then that is the reform party that we're seeing and i think that the reform party needs to decide whether that sort of language is totally unacceptable or has become common parlance now and we've just got to learn to accept it and that's who Reform is, and what you're seeing at the moment is a Reform Party that is being squeezed by Rupert Lowe's party further to the right, Restore, and the Reform Party sort of seeing that there's a bit of a squeeze going on, where you've got Kemi Badenoch, you know, saying this is our dividing line and trying to appeal win back disaffected Tory voters. And far to the right, you've got now Restore saying, well, if you don't like any of these people, we can kick them out and we'll boot them out the country because a lot of the messaging we heard was very restore and so you now see reform being the party that is being squeezed at the moment and i think that is new territory and you know look and this comes on top it's not the first scandal i mean if we start counting up what we've got we've got what the parliamentary investigation into whether nigel farage declared the five million pound loan we've got the under for undercover channel four uh kind of investigation of what went on and whether they were trying to break electoral law as a party by soliciting donations. We've now got, we've had these massive donations from two billionaires to Reform. We've now got the ITV. I mean, these things are piling up. Now, Nigel Farage can just try and argue, and I'm sure he will. It's an establishment plot. This is the mainstream parties trying out to get us. But some of these things, language being used, and I watched it last night, sort of thinking, this is taking us back to language that I thought died out in the 1980s and and on the one hand he he Richard Tice is right to say that some people speak like this but but we are allowed to say to those people I'm afraid I can't have anything to do with you if that's how you speak about black people or Asian people or women or your own daughter in a hypersexualized way or you know that we're adults we can draw lines draw some lines yeah I mean look the the you know that there was misogyny there was racism there was bigotry there was a high treason there was I mean you know and the idea of saying about the king yeah you know the king is the supreme governor of the Church of England yes and I and you know I know that the guy has since resigned from Reform who said that and he said that he was you know heavily medicated at the time well come on I mean the medication you know I'm I get drunk I don't become a different person I may become a more exaggerated person that I normally am. But I don't think you become a different person. And I just think that doesn't really wash. And so I think it's telling as well. I mean, Nigel Farage, to give him his due, has been a brilliant leader when it's come to facing the music and marching towards the gunfire. Well, today he was doorstep, wouldn't say anything. News conference cancelled. Zia Youssef been very quiet on everything. So I think that but for the statement that was issued to ITV, maybe they think And they know, and this must be the nightmare for them, that there is worse to come because there is, you know, we haven't seen all of it yet and there's still more to come out. And there's the whole question of their ascent to the, you know, all their position as was at the top of the polls consistently and that growing appeal that we've seen happen over the years, over recent years. But that also requires you as a party, if you want to get into power fully and properly in an election and have Nigel Farage as prime minister or whoever as prime minister. that requires you to have broader appeal doesn't it and you're not going to get broader appeal if you're relaxed about this infested parasitic Asian name drag people out of their homes and send them back to Pakistan nonsense that that has not got broad appeal in this country thankfully no it hasn't and i don't think it and i think that you know sort of that's where when Kemi Badenoch drew the line at the Tory party conference and said okay do you want to know the difference You know, I don't want my children who are kind of multiracial to be abused. I think they are English. And Kemi Badenoch praised her for it which is the right thing to do. Absolutely the right thing to do. So I think that there is, and I think that, look, it's absolutely right. And I'm sure there are reform supporters and maybe some even calling it who think it is grossly unfair the way the media is behaving towards reform. If you aspire to be a party of government, then it is only fair and right that you face the scrutiny of the media the press broadcasting because that is our job um you know you and i'm sure there are green party activists who feel really sore about some of the reporting that we did on the green party conference well i'm sorry you know if you're going to pass motions like that you're going to invite scrutiny and if you aspire to govern you're going to get scrutiny and not that long ago Labour was completely beset by by racism anti-semitism in this case but that's that's a form of racism but you know just a pure crisis that they had in their party and so you know Nigel Farage said in 2024 there were a few bad apples and they were going to be rooted out and there was going to be a vetting system and there was going to be and i thought what was the other thing that was revealing about what was said, what was shown on the television last night was this. You saw them when they were not dealing with voters saying, I can't say that in front of them because we'll be in the papers or we don't want to be in the TV as an Alan Partridge racist canvasser. And you think they know what they're doing. The mask slipped and you saw that the polite And that, you know, and that is dangerous for reform because reform needs to work out, is it a mainstream political party that kind of, broadly speaking, you know, has a tough line on immigration fine? Or is it a home for degenerates? Or is it a home for people who are bigots, racists, homophobes, misogynists? You know, that whole question of broadening their appeal and these kind of people being councillors and potentially MPs down the line. If you can't, we all know some people who talk like this. You know, we all hear stuff when we're out in the world. We know people who talk like this. We know people who will be anti-Semitic or racist or whatever. Not in my close circle, I don't, but we will know people who will be beyond the pale. But the point of a political party wanting to run the country is that you have to make it clear that they are beyond the pale to your party. And I don't think reform has done that yet. No, I don't think so. And I think it's really interesting the way the language has shifted. I spent four years as the BBC's Paris correspondent back in the day, around 2000. And I remember getting into a taxi or whatever, and the taxi driver would suddenly in French express some really racist views about Arabs, you know, because that was the sort of main source of racism, Muslims. And I was thinking, oh my God, you'd never hear that in England. You would just not hear that sort of language spoken. You do now. Spool forward to today and you do now. And it has suddenly become acceptable in certain sections of the public to say these things out loud about, you know, about Muslims, about Pakistanis, about whatever it happens to be. And you think, you know, is this really acceptable? And I'm, you know, I'm sure in the on the kind of edges of social media, it's fine and it's normal. And that is where the kind of action is on the likes for your post. But not on my local council. But I don't but I don't think that is mainstream Britain. I still don't think. And there is a there is a strong support for reform because people feel that the mainstream parties haven't done enough to meet their concerns, whether it be about immigration, whether it be about the health service, whether it be about what they're. Reform have brilliantly tapped into the legitimate concerns of the British people, and they've done that very well. But if they're going to be a mainstream political party asking for it to be the next government, then I think they've got to sort some of this stuff out. And you quoted the one bad, or a few bad apples thing that we're often hearing at moments like this, don't we? People forget the second half of that saying, which is spoils, what is it, spoils the whole barrel. And the question is, will these guys spoil the whole barrel for reform because if they want to survive they're going to have to make sure that they don't aren't they and also you know look reform have made a lot of noise you know and you could argue rightly about grooming gangs and protecting young women and you hear comments like that guy laughing in a pub and you think oh my god it's gross i mean it really is disturbing it is and dark and you know that should have no place in a modern political party surely name and shame them well they have and there's more to come on the Sunday as well so we'll see what else then maybe talk to you on the Monday I mean on the Sunday thing just as interestingly apparently they've got inside the headquarters so if you're seeing the professional of the party yeah if you're seeing in the press office and you know I mean we don't know what's going to come out see what happens then but you know that could be worse still