Reform leader Nigel Farage has postponed a significant announcement scheduled for this morning in Essex. This decision follows an ITV investigation aired last night, which reportedly showed party councillors and election candidates making graphic threats of extreme violence and expressing racist and misogynistic views.
Three councillors have already resigned from Reform, which stated it is investigating the initial revelations from the ITV undercover operation. More revelations are anticipated from the year-long undercover filming of senior Reform politicians and officials.
Among those filmed was Alan Feeney, a Reform councillor and former deputy mayor of Solihull, who reportedly called Asian homeowners “parasites” and stated that “no more than 1% of [the] British population can be non-white”. Feeney has announced his departure from Reform “for personal reasons”. Other candidates were recorded making comments of extreme violence and sharing misogynistic and racist views, including a Bromley councillor who allegedly called for King Charles to be killed.
Separately, Dame Julia Unwin, chairwoman of the Charity Commission, is expected to deliver remarks today in central London condemning the “thuggery and intimidation” faced by Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) volunteers. The charity regulator is expected to state that charities must only act within their purpose, such as the RNLI rescuing people at sea, and to warn against a “normalisation of violence” against workers.