Reform faces criticism after councillors filmed making racist comments

Warning: This report contains racist and offensive language.

Reform UK has said "there is no room for racism" in its party after ITV News broadcast undercover filming, gathered over a year, of some of its councillors and candidates using racist, violent and sexist language.

In the film, Undercover: A Year in Reform, a Reform councillor and deputy mayor of Solihull is recorded calling Asian homeowners "parasites".

It comes after Reform leader Nigel Farage vowed to root out "bad apples" from his party.

A Reform spokesman said: "Where members, activists and councillors have clearly behaved inappropriately, investigations have commenced" and that in some cases there had been suspensions.

The spokesman added that the party had improved its procedures but some individuals who did not share their values would occasionally make it through vetting.

ITV's filming involved eight figures in Reform – the BBC does not know how many it spoke to in total.

Reform says the people filmed by ITV are all under investigation, and have already either resigned or been suspended.

ITV News says it had reporters undercover with Reform UK candidates and councillors across England and Wales running up to the elections in May and four by-election campaigns this year and last.

These reporters joined a Reform councillor, Alan Feeney, in Solihull, in the West Midlands, where he was campaigning to retain his seat on the council, having defected from the Conservative Party in 2025.

He told undercover reporters the area has been "infested" with Asian families, and called them "absolute parasites".

Later in the film, he is recorded saying: "I'd be saying no more than 1% of British population can be non-white."

On a different day, Feeney, Solihull's deputy mayor, is joined by two other Reform candidates, Jamie Campbell and Chris Whelan, who discuss speculation of a mosque being built in the local area.

"There's got to be a way of stopping them - like, go and buy some pork chops; we'll bury it in the ground," Campbell is heard saying in the film.

Whelan says "we'll take pictures of it", prompting Feeney to add: "I was gonna say, 'Unfortunately, this is a pig cemetery, mate'."

Discussing a female Reform candidate from Birmingham, Feeney is heard saying, "I didn't know where to look," before Whelan adds: "I'd have been sniffing that seat as soon as she got up."

The BBC has tried to contact Feeney for a response.ITV has reportedthat on Monday evening he had "mutually agreed" to resign from Reform UK, citing "personal reasons" and would be continuing as an independent councillor.

ITV reported that Whelan, who did not respond to the broadcaster's request for comment, would now be an independent councillor. The BBC has contacted him and Campbell for a response.

Farage has repeatedly said he wants to get rid of those he has called "bad apples".

Two years ago he said he didn't want Reform to be "a sectarian or racially based party in any way at all".

"I'm going to be absolutely ruthless about it," he said.

Elsewhere in the film, Dean Miller, a councillor in the south London borough of Bromley, is shown campaigning for Reform in the Makerfield by-election.

"We've been ethnically cleansed out of London because you never used to get any blacks over in Bromley," he tells an ITV undercover reporter. "And now, you know, Bromley's like massive Nigerian communities there."

Miller says he is "not racist", before later adding: "The Muslim thing, that is going to be that thing that takes over everything and then everyone just has one religion. Because, apparently, King Charles is a [expletive] Muslim... I think that's [expletive] traitorous."

ITV reported that Miller would now sit as an independent councillor having resigned from Reform and had told them in a statement that he was heavily medicated due to a chronic pain condition when he made the comments.

The BBC has contacted him for comment.

In a statement released after ITV's film was broadcast, Reform said the party "had improved and prioritised its vetting procedures, but from time to time, a handful of individuals who do not share our values will initially make it through vetting".

Labour described the investigation as "truly sickening" adding: "Nigel Farage can't shrug these latest revelations off as being a few bad apples."

The Conservatives said: "Nigel Farage promised to make Reform ready for government. These sorry individuals are proof he has failed."

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey said: "This is chilling. I feel for anyone watching this tonight who is frightened to see such racism and hatred festering in their community."

A Green Party spokesman said: "Vilifying migrants and Muslims is Reform's main focus, and these racist comments reflect party policy."

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