Attorney General Lord Hermer has urged Nigel Farage to apologise for allegedly making antisemitic and racist remarks while a pupil at Dulwich College, arguing that the
Reform UK leader’s shifting account of his school-era behaviour lacks credibility.
Lord Hermer, one of two Jewish members of Sir Keir Starmer’s cabinet, said he found Farage’s “constantly changing story about his behaviour to his Jewish classmates [to be] unconvincing, to say the least”. His comments follow a series of allegations published by The Guardian, based on interviews with 20 of Farage’s former school contemporaries.
Among them was Jewish film producer Peter Ettedgui, who recalled remarks he said Farage would make between the ages of 13 and 18. “[Farage] would sidle up to me and growl: ‘Hitler was right’ or ‘gas them’, sometimes adding a long hiss to simulate the sound of the gas showers,” Ettedgui told the newspaper. He later clarified that Farage had been 13 at the time.
Farage has denied making any comments that were “directly” racist or antisemitic and accused his former classmates of being untruthful.
Speaking again to The Guardian this week, Hermer dismissed that defence. “Arguing that 20 people have somehow all misremembered the same things about his nasty behaviour simply isn’t credible,” he said. He criticised Farage for failing to condemn antisemitism “throughout his defensive responses to legitimate questions”.
“If he wants to be seen as a legitimate candidate for prime minister, he urgently needs to address the concerns of the Jewish community, and apologise to the many people he has clearly deeply hurt by his behaviour,” he added. “Racism in all its forms is anathema to the values of this country and we cannot allow it to ever become legitimised in public life.”
The controversy surfaced again in Parliament last week, when Starmer raised the matter during Prime Minister’s Questions. “The more we see of Reform, the more we see of their true colours … He says he never engaged with racism with ‘intent’, what does that mean?” the prime minister said. “I have no doubt that if a young Jewish student was hissed at to mimic the sound of a gas chamber, they would find it upsetting. He may want to forget that, they won’t … he should seek those people out and go and apologise to them.”
Farage has rejected the accusations as politically motivated. “I did not say the things that have been published in the Guardian aged 13, nearly 50 years ago,” he said, arguing that the claims have emerged only now because Reform UK is polling strongly. “We know that the Guardian wants to smear anybody who talks about the immigration issue,” he added, insisting he has spent his career countering extremism and far-right politics.
In an opinion article for the Jewish Chronicle following the Heaton Park shul terror attack in October, Farage wrote that antisemitism had “moved onto the streets and infected the institutions of our country”. Photo by Lauren Hurley / No 10 Downing Street, Wikimedia commons.