Reform UK leader and Member of Parliament Nigel Farage has warned that Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer represents the “biggest threat to free speech” in the history of the United Kingdom.
Prime Minister Starmer, a self-described socialist who swept to a massive majority last month despite only securing a little over a third of the votes, poses a grave danger to remaining liberties in Britain as he seeks to expand government censorship, Brexit boss Nigel Farage lamented.
Speaking to Fox News on Sunday, the Brexit leader said: “Nobody should use any social media platform to genuinely spread hate or incitement to violence, and that free speech rule I think all of us would support and agree with.
“But what we are allowed to do on social media, or should be allowed to do, is to speculate, is to ask questions, is to try and put facts out, to put facts out that wake up the rest of the community.
“And when you’re engaged in something like that, you can never, ever guarantee that what you say is 100 per cent true… Now Starmer, by cracking down on that, poses, I think, the biggest threat to free speech we’ve seen in our history.”
Following the riots, which were sparked by a mass stabbing attack at a children’s ‘Taylor Swift’ dance party in Southport that left three young girls dead and several others injured allegedly at the hands of a second-generation African migrant, the new left-wing government has arrested multiple people for posts made on social media.
Reports have also emerged that Starmer’s administration will seek to amend the impending Online Safety Act, which gives the UK broadcasting regulator sweeping powers to punish social media companies that fail to police hate speech, to reinstate a scrapped clause to mandate social media firms censor “legal but harmful” content in a supposed bid to limit so-called “disinformation”.
Asked if he personally feared arrest, given attempts to blame him for the riots after he raised questions about the Southport attacker’s identity, Mr Farage said: “Yeah, exactly. And this is why I think this is incredibly dangerous.
“All I did was to say ‘please tell us the truth’. Funnily enough, if they had told us the truth, the rioting would not have been anything like as bad as it was, and the authorities need to wake up to an online world.
“So yes, I am currently coming under serious assault, and many of the campaigners on the left are publicly saying that I should be arrested simply for asking to know the truth about the murderer. So yeah, I’m worried.”
In addition to pushing for more censorship, the left-wing Labour government is also seeking to require schools in England provide lessons to children on how to avoid “misinformation” and “fake news.”
While the Reform UK parliamentarian said that he believes in teaching children critical thinking skills, Farage warned that such measures in education could hinder discussions around contentious political topics.
“If the parameters that are set are to say to every kid, if you read a post that questions net zero and global warming, it will be extreme content, and a lie, if you read a post that even dares to question levels of immigration, legal or illegal into Britain, that that’s extremist, then you start to set a narrative for a future generation that is fundamentally undemocratic,” he said.
“So I am very worried that the instincts of a Left-wing Labour Party are to use this crisis to take away our liberties and our free speech, and this is going to have to be fought.”