David Lammy backtracks after Nigel Farage ‘Hitler Youth’ comments

'I don't know what songs he sang in school'

Lammy made the comments in what is likely a refence to allegations from 2013 that the Reform UK leader sang Nazi songs as a teenager.

The allegations claimed that, during the 1970s and 1980s, Farage as a schoolboy marched through a village with others "shouting Hitler Youth songs."

Farage has always denied the allegations.

The Deputy PM made the comments after Prime Minister Keir Starmer called Reform UK's migrant policy "racist" and "immoral".

Speaking to BBC's Politics Live show after the speech Lammy was asked if he believed Nigel Farage was a racist.

Lammy said Starmer has been calling out policies "that would line people up who have a right to be in this country, who might be Indian, who might be Nigerian, and send them home".

He added: "It's not British. It doesn't respect our values.

"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 judgements about someone who once flirted with Hitler Youth when he was younger."

By the evening, Lammy reappeared on BBC News to "clarify" what he had meant by his earlier remarks.

The Deputy PM told the BBC: "He [Farage] has denied it and so I accept that he has denied it and I would like to clarify that position because in the end the prime minister is keen for us to focus on the policies not the individuals."

He added: "I wasn't at school with Nigel Farage. I don't know what songs he sang at school.

"I'm happy to clarify. I did say it's for the public to make up their mind and I did also emphasise that let us play the ball, not the man."

A source at Reform UK has since told the BBC that Lammy's comments are "disgusting and libellous. Beneath contempt."

In the wake of rising Reform popularity, senior Labour figures have been attempting to call out Reform policy as "racist" without labelling the party's supporters the same way.

The PM has vowed to fight racist rhetoric "with everything we have".