Sir Keir Starmer speaking yesterday (Image: Getty)
Nigel Farage and his supporters are not racist, the Prime Minister has said, despite insisting that the Reform party’s immigration policy is. The comments come after Sir Keir Starmer and his colleagues stepped up their attacks on Mr Farage’s party, repeatedly branding Reform‘s policy to remove the right to remain from some migrants legally living in Britain as “racist” and “immoral”.
The PM also declined to say US president Donald Trump‘s claims that London wants to “go to Sharia Law” were “racist”, but described them as “nonsense”. Speaking with Sky’s Beth Rigby, as part of a series of interviews following the embattled PM’s keynote speech at this year’s Labour Party conference, Sir Keir said he did not believe Mr Farage was racist. He said: “No, nor do I think Reform voters are racist.
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“They’re concerned about things like our borders, they’re frustrated about the pace of change.
“I’m not for a moment suggesting that they are racist.”
He insisted he had been talking about a “particular policy”, claiming Reform’s plans would see migrants who live in the UK lawfully deported, saying “that to me would tear our country apart”.
The Labour leader, who described Mr Farage as a “formidable politician”, declined to say whether he believed his opponent was courting racists with the policy, but said minorities in the UK felt a “shiver down their throat”.
On Tuesday evening, David Lammy, the Deputy Prime Minister, appeared to row back on claims he made to the BBC that the Reform leader had “flirted with Hitler Youth”.
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage (Image: Getty)
In an interview with Nick Ferrari on LBC, Sir Keir rejected Mr Farage’s claim that his painting of Reform policies as racist “will incite and encourage the radical left” and threaten the safety of Reform members.
Asked if he had put his political opponent at risk, the PM said: “No, that’s not the case.”
In his interview with Sky, Sir Keir also refused to answer three times whether President Trump’s Sharia Law comments had been racist.
He said: “I’m not going to start down the road of discussing whether things said by others are racist or not.”
He added: “I have been really clear that the idea that in London we’re introducing Sharia law is rubbish.”
Asked by ITV’s Robert Peston about polling from Ipsos, which suggests he is the least popular prime minister in history, Sir Keir insisted he was committed to leading Labour into the next election.
The final day of Labour’s conference on Wednesday will see speeches from Environment Secretary Emma Reynolds and Energy Secretary Ed Miliband.
Following the conference, former House of Commons leader Lucy Powell will face off against Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson in a deputy Labour leadership hustings.
The statement appeared to reference allegations that emerged in 2013 that Mr Farage sang Nazi songs as a schoolboy.
Mr Farage denied the allegations at the time, which stemmed from a 1981 letter reportedly written by his teacher claiming the schoolboy and others marched through a village “shouting Hitler Youth songs”.
Mr Lammy said: “I’m not going to play the man. I’m playing the ball, as our leader did.
“I will leave it for the public to come to their own judgments about someone who once flirted with Hitler Youth when he was younger.”
In a later interview with BBC News, Mr Lammy said the Reform leader had denied the allegations, saying: “I accept that he has denied it.”
He added: “I wasn’t at school with Nigel Farage. I don’t know what songs he sang at school.”
Keir Starmer in humiliating climbdown as he insists: ‘Farage is not racist’
Keir Starmer has been forced to clarify his position on Nigel Farage after repeatedly describing a Reform UK immigration policy as “racist” and “immoral”, while insisting that he does not believe the Reform leader or the party’s voters are themselves racist.
The prime minister’s clarification came after days of increasingly heated exchanges between Labour and Reform UK, during which Starmer placed immigration and Nigel Farage at the centre of his Labour Party conference message.
Speaking to Sky News political editor Beth Rigby after his conference speech, Starmer was asked directly whether he believed Farage was racist.
“No, nor do I think Reform voters are racist,” Starmer replied.
He went on to say that many Reform voters were concerned about Britain’s borders and frustrated by the pace of change, adding that he was “not for a moment” suggesting that they were racist.
The clarification followed Starmer’s earlier comments about Reform’s immigration policy.
The prime minister had argued that a proposal to remove the right to remain from some migrants who are legally settled in Britain crossed a line. He described the policy as racist and immoral, while drawing a distinction between removing people who have no legal right to remain and changing the status of people who have lived and worked in Britain lawfully for years.
Starmer’s argument was that the policy should be judged separately from the motives of every person who supports Reform.
That distinction became increasingly important as the political row intensified.
During his Labour conference speech, Starmer said concerns about immigration and secure borders were legitimate political issues. He acknowledged that voters could be frustrated by the asylum system and wanted stronger controls over Britain’s borders.
But he also argued that there was a “moral line” between expressing concerns about immigration and targeting people because of their race or background.
“Controlling migration is a reasonable goal,” Starmer said. He then condemned violence, racist abuse and suggestions that people could not be British because of their skin colour.
The prime minister’s speech was therefore not a blanket accusation against Reform voters.
Indeed, Starmer explicitly attempted to separate the concerns of ordinary voters from the policies and rhetoric of the party leadership.
He said many people were worried about borders and frustrated by the pace of change. That was the same argument he later repeated when asked directly about Farage.
The political difficulty arose because Starmer had also used exceptionally strong language when discussing Reform.
At the conference, he described the political struggle against Farage as a “fight for the soul of our country” and accused the Reform leader of not liking or believing in Britain.
He asked whether Farage genuinely wanted to serve Britain’s “beautiful, tolerant, diverse country” or whether he wanted to “stir the pot of division”.
Those remarks provided the backdrop to the subsequent argument over whether Starmer’s attacks on Reform had become too personal.
Farage responded by accusing the prime minister of using inflammatory language against Reform and warning that such rhetoric could encourage hostility towards the party.
The Reform leader argued that Starmer’s description of the immigration policy as racist effectively placed a label on the party and those supporting it.
Starmer rejected that interpretation.
In his interview with Sky News, he described Farage as a “formidable politician” and made clear that his criticism was aimed at a particular policy rather than the character of every Reform supporter.
He argued that the proposal concerning legally settled migrants would damage social cohesion because people who had lived in Britain for years, worked in the NHS and education system, run businesses and built families could potentially be affected.
The Independent reported that Starmer said minorities in Britain felt a “shiver down their throat” over the proposal, while maintaining that he was not describing Farage or Reform voters as racist.
The distinction is politically significant.
A political party can propose a policy that an opponent considers discriminatory without every supporter of that policy necessarily sharing the same motives or beliefs.
Starmer’s clarification appears designed to preserve that distinction.
It also reflects a broader challenge for Labour.
Reform has been attracting voters who are not necessarily motivated primarily by questions of race or identity. Some have concerns about immigration levels, asylum processing, housing, public services, taxation or dissatisfaction with established parties.
Starmer’s comments acknowledge that reality.
He said Reform voters could be concerned about borders and frustrated with the pace of change — concerns he argued were legitimate.
The prime minister has therefore attempted to draw a political line between those concerns and policies that he believes go too far.
That position was also visible in his conference speech.
Starmer said the British public was “not unreasonable” and described voters as pragmatic, compassionate and tolerant. He acknowledged that people wanted safer streets, more money in their pockets, opportunities for their children and an NHS capable of meeting their needs.
He also explicitly said that people wanted secure borders and described that demand as reasonable.
This was an important part of his attempt to reposition Labour on immigration.
Rather than dismissing concerns about migration, Starmer sought to argue that Labour could address them while rejecting what he regarded as unacceptable proposals.
He pledged to tackle smuggling gangs, crack down on illegal working, remove people without a right to remain and strengthen Britain’s borders.
At the same time, he said Britain should continue offering asylum to people genuinely fleeing persecution.
The approach places Labour between two political pressures.
On one side, the party wants to reassure voters who believe immigration has been too high or border controls have been ineffective.
On the other, Labour wants to prevent Reform from defining the political debate entirely on its own terms.
That helps explain the importance of Starmer’s insistence that Reform voters are not racist.
If Labour were perceived as dismissing everyone who supports Reform, it could make it harder for the government to persuade those voters that Labour understands their concerns.
Starmer’s formulation allows him to criticize Reform’s proposals while recognizing that many of its supporters may have more conventional concerns about government performance.
The controversy has also exposed differences within Labour.
Some Labour politicians have supported Starmer’s characterization of Reform’s immigration policy. Others have concentrated on the question of whether the party should use such strong language when discussing an increasingly significant political opponent.
The debate became even more complicated after Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy was criticized for remarks concerning allegations about Farage’s schooldays.
Lammy subsequently appeared to clarify that Farage had denied the allegations, adding another layer to the broader dispute over whether Labour’s attacks were becoming excessively personal.
Against this backdrop, Starmer’s decision to state explicitly that Farage is not racist can be seen as an attempt to refocus the argument on policy.
The prime minister’s position is now relatively clear: he believes a particular Reform immigration proposal is racist and immoral, but he does not believe that Nigel Farage himself or Reform voters are necessarily racist.
Whether that distinction satisfies critics is another question.
Farage has continued to argue that Starmer’s language is politically damaging and that criticism of his party’s policies should not be transformed into accusations about the people who support them.
Labour, meanwhile, maintains that it is legitimate to use strong language when it believes a policy would have discriminatory consequences.
The argument ultimately comes down to how political parties discuss contentious immigration proposals.
For Starmer, the central issue is whether legally settled migrants should face changes to their status because of a tougher immigration regime.
For Farage and Reform, the argument is about Britain’s right to determine who can remain in the country and how the immigration system should operate.
Those are substantive policy questions that can be examined independently of assumptions about the motives of individual voters.
The phrase “humiliating climbdown” in the headline reflects one interpretation of Starmer’s clarification. The prime minister himself has not described the statement as a retreat. Instead, he has presented it as a clarification of a distinction he says he has been making consistently: criticism of a policy is not the same as accusing every person who supports a party of racism.
That distinction is supported by his own conference remarks, in which he repeatedly acknowledged legitimate concerns about immigration while attacking specific proposals and forms of racist abuse.
The episode therefore illustrates the increasingly difficult political territory surrounding immigration in Britain.
Starmer wants to demonstrate that Labour will secure the country’s borders while maintaining an asylum system for people fleeing persecution. Reform wants substantially tougher restrictions and has made immigration central to its political identity.
Both sides are seeking to appeal to voters who believe the current system needs major change.
Starmer’s statement that “Farage is not racist” does not end that political dispute.
Instead, it establishes a narrower position: the Labour leader believes Reform has proposed a policy he considers racist, while rejecting the idea that this automatically makes Farage or his supporters racist.
As the competition between Labour and Reform develops, that distinction is likely to remain important.
The debate will ultimately be shaped less by labels and more by the substance of each party’s immigration proposals, their practical consequences and how voters assess the competing arguments.