'Linking Reform UK to fascists? That is utter garbage': Deputy party leader Ben Habib responds to far-right claim

Mr Habib, Reform’s deputy leader, was reacting to remarks made by the leader of the SDLP Colum Eastwood on Friday.

Mr Habib is an Anglo-Pakistani businessman who has become one of the UK’s most prominent critics of the NI Protocol.

He stood in the election in Wellingborough and Rushden (in the English east-midlands), winning 21.5% of the vote and coming third behind Labour and the Tories.

Overall Reform (which is twinned with the TUV) picked up just five seats, despite being the third most voted-for party (Labour took 34% of the vote, Tories 24%, and Reform 14%).

Asked about the surge in votes for Reform, Colum Eastwood had told the News Letter on Friday that it was a result of “the Tory Party totally collapsing and being all over the place and not knowing what they were for – and indulging the right wing and the worst elements of politics”.

He continued: “And that’s why we end up in these situations with sort of neo-fascist parties doing well.”

Pressed on whether he was saying Reform is a “neo-fascist party”, Mr Eastwood replied: “I’m saying they indulge in the rhetoric that is very similar to neo-fascist politics.”

Responding, Mr Habib told the News Letter this is “utter garbage”.

"He says what he says in order to discredit Reform UK, because he has no answers to the pro-British policies we adopt.

"I challenge Colum to read our contract with the people and to identify within it precisely what it is that is 'neo-fascist'. We do not have any policies remotely similar to fascism.

"We stand for the working and middle classes, private enterprise, small-and-medium-sized enterprises, for the territorial integrity of the UK, for borders to be enforced, for immigration to be slashed, for illegal migration to be stopped. None of this is 'neo-fascist'.

"We also, for what it's worth, stand for freedom of speech – something which people like Coulm Eastwood have difficulty with; it's precisely because he is not prepared to debate openly and freely that he wishes to close down debate by accusing us of being 'neo-fascist'. He wishes to discredit us before the debate even begins.

"It's actually people like Colum Eastwood that are heading towards the creation of a dictatorship in this country. He should mind his words, and be careful in how he describes other political parties.

"He's sowing the seeds of division. And he should know better than that.”