🔗 Share this article

The UK's attorney general, one of the most senior Jewish ministers, has demanded the Reform UK leader to issue an apology to former schoolmates who allege he targeted with racist abuse them during their years in education.

Hermer remarked that Farage had "obviously deeply hurt" many people, according to their accounts of his actions as a youth. He added that the politician's "constantly changing" explanations had been difficult to believe.

“During his answers to valid inquiries, not once has Farage genuinely condemned antisemitism,” Hermer told a publication.

Fresh Claims Come to Light

A published report last month outlined the accounts of more than a dozen ex-pupils of Farage from a private college.

One, Peter Ettedgui, described that a teenage Farage "would approach me and say: ‘Hitler was right’ or ‘gas them’, sometimes adding a long hiss to imitate the sound of the Nazi gas chambers”.

Another pupil from an ethnic minority claimed that when he was roughly nine years old, he was subjected to similar treatment by a older Farage.

“He came over to a pupil with two similarly tall mates and spoke to anyone looking ‘other’,” the individual said. “That involved me on three separate times; questioning me where I was from, and pointing away, saying: ‘That's how you get back,’ to any place you replied you were from.”

Since then, others have stepped forward; approximately twenty people have now claimed they were either targets of or saw highly inappropriate past behaviour by Farage.

The behaviour they outlined span the period when Farage was aged a teenager.

Evolving Explanations

The Reform leader has rejected that anything he did was "blatantly" racist or antisemitic, and has asserted the former classmates were misremembering.

Critics have noted that Farage has failed to condemn antisemitism and other forms of racism outright in his denials.

They also point to his reluctance to discipline a fellow Reform MP, Sarah Pochin, after she made remarks about the number of ethnic minorities she saw in adverts. She later apologised for the comments.

“Nigel Farage’s shifting account about his behaviour to his peers [is] not credible, to say the least,” Hermer commented.

He went on to say: “Suggesting that two dozen individuals have somehow recalled incorrectly the same things about his offensive behaviour simply isn’t credible."

Demand for Accountability

“If he wishes to be seen as a serious contender for high office, he has to address the fears of the Jewish community, and apologise to the numerous individuals he has obviously deeply hurt by his behaviour,” Hermer said.

“Prejudice in all its forms is abhorrent to the standards of this country and we should not let it to ever become legitimised in society.”

In a other comments, Rachel Reeves said Farage should “speak out” if he wanted to look like a true statesman.

“It speaks volumes how little he has to say, and the precisely drafted words that both you and I would recognise as being written in a specific manner to communicate, but also dodge the issue,” she noted.

Formal Denials and Subsequent Comments

In lawyers' communications prior to the release of the investigation, Farage’s representatives claimed that “the implication that Mr Farage ever engaged in, condoned, or led such conduct is categorically denied”.

Farage later altered his position in an interview, stating: “Did I say things as a youth that you could see as being playground talk, you could interpret in a today's standards today in a certain manner? Possibly.”

He added that he had “not ever purposely really tried to go and harm anybody”. Farage subsequently put out a new statement: “I can tell you definitely that I did not say the things that have been published when I was 13, nearly 50 years ago.”