Reform MP defends leader after ITV footage shows official warning Farage he is ‘protecting’ candidate over racist David Lammy comments

Robert Jenrick has sought to defend Reform UK against fresh allegations that it hosts extremists by claiming that Nigel Farage has “probably done more than almost anybody to stand against racism and the far right”.

The remarks came after Farage was berated by a Reform official for “protecting” a mayoral candidate who was accused of making racist remarks about the former Labour deputy prime minister David Lammy.

Farage’s intervention comes as Reform chair Zia Yusuf criticises ‘everybody’ in former Tory government that included Jenrick and Suella Braverman

Nigel Farage has denied that a Reform UK government would authorise lethal force against small boat crossings in the Channel, hours after one of his MPs said the Royal Marines should be permitted to fire on the boats.

Farage overruled Robert Jenrick, a Reform UK MP who defected from the Conservatives, who had told TalkTV that the party would deploy the marines to take boats back to France.

Reminders of banished Reform UK defector were all around the Conservative party conference in Birmingham

As Kemi Badenoch basked in the applause of the Tory faithful at the close of her pivotal speech at Conservative party conference last year, one member of her shadow cabinet looked less than enthused.

Robert Jenrick, bested by Badenoch in the leadership contest a year earlier, looked on, and – as one shadow cabinet member now recalls – had to be prodded by Lord Ashcroft to applaud. “If you’re plotting against someone, then you at least pretend to like them,” they say. “The thing about Robert is he’s not even a good machiavellian.”