Reform UK is destabilising British democracy by spreading divisive material that is being amplified by bots and troll farms, Labour’s deputy leader has said.
Lucy Powell called for tighter laws on social media giants to tackle misinformation, arguing the online space was “open to wealthy individuals, and bad state actors”.
She also highlighted the multimillion-pound donations that have bolstered Reform’s election war chest and “fund their powerful online campaigns”.
Arguing Nigel Farage and his party posed a threat to democracy, she said the law should be strengthened to “tackle the scourge of dis- and misinformation which is ripping communities apart and undermining us all”.
She said Reform’s “exploitation of online algorithms on social media sites is well documented”, as was the way the party had benefited from “bots and troll farms to amplify support”.
A Reform spokesperson said Powell’s claims that its messages were spread by bots and troll farms was “completely untrue” and called her a “conspiracy theorist desperately trying to distract from a failing Labour government”.
“Rather than smearing voters and demanding more state censorship, Labour should be focused on fixing the messes they’ve created,” the spokesperson said.
Powell made her comments in an article for Babelfish, as well as an interview with the comedian Matt Forde. Her intervention comes as MPs are pushing for tighter regulation of misinformation in the forthcoming elections legislation, known as the representation of the people bill.
She also told the Guardian: “The spread of mis- and disinformation is a real and present danger to our democracy. This is not just about mega-donations from overseas crypto barons to Reform but also in the context of social media and the buying power this provides. We should look to strengthen the elections bill as much as possible to tighten up the rules.”
The government’s new elections bill will bring in votes at 16, a ban on donations in cryptocurrency, and cap on overseas donations, but campaigners believe it does not go far enough to tackle misinformation or the outsize influence of a handful of donors.
Some civil society groups are hopeful that Andy Burnham, the Greater Manchester mayor who is set to challenge Keir Starmer for the leadership if he wins the Makerfield byelection, would look more favourably on reducing online misinformation.
Some believe he is also sympathetic to the idea of bringing in a cap on donations overall to prevent billionaires dominating political funding, but his spokesperson declined to comment on that.
Asked about the issue of false information online, Liz Kendall, the technology secretary, said the government was considering doing more to halt misinformation at times of public crisis such as riots or unrest.
She said she was “very concerned” about the role of social media platforms in times of unrest, adding: “I definitely think particularly during moments of crisis and disorder and when public safety is important, we need to look at what more we can do.”
Kendall pointed to a report last year from parliament’s science, innovation and technology committee, which called for Ofcom to implement “crisis response protocols” that would hold platforms responsible for misinformation. The media regulator has consulted on the issue, with more details expected to be announced this month.
However, Powell is calling for more decisive action, saying the lack of regulation online is a “fundamental threat to our democracy” and it was common to encounter viral misinformation repeated by voters on the doorstep.
Speaking on Forde’s podcast, she said: “I’ve got children, my eldest is 22 and I’ve got a 16-year-old and a 13-year-old, and I know what they see and what they believe and what they get fed. It’s frightening and that’s true for some adults.
“It’s not just a young person’s problem. The echo chambers, the rabbit holes that people can go down and you get that on the doorstep, suddenly there can be something that comes up on the doorstep quite a lot and you’re like, where the hell’s that come from? It’s not in the mainstream media at all. And it’s gone absolutely viral on social media.”
She added: “We need to do more to regulate the algorithms and what drives contention and controversy and the business models of big, big tech as well. And we need to look at where politics and how politics is funded from abroad and from wealthy individuals and things like that and the power that that can bring you in the kind of social media age.”
On Reform’s use of social media, Powell wrote in a separate article that Farage was “importing all the worst populist tactics which have undermined democracy elsewhere to Britain”.
She added that Farage was “mired in controversy about his support for and use of cryptocurrencies” after taking a £5m gift from a Thailand-based billionaire.
The undeclared gift, given in the months before Farage became an MP, is now under investigation by the standards commissioner. Farage has said it was for his security costs, and later that it was a reward for campaigning for Brexit.
She added: “We should go further … to regulate social media and tackle the scourge of dis- and misinformation which is ripping communities apart and undermining us all.
“In the fast-paced world we live in, with new technology emerging at breakneck pace, the integrity of our electoral system is a watching brief.”
Azzurra Moores, associate director at Demos, said: “Mis- and disinformation on an unprecedented scale are adding to the current democratic emergency of collapsing trust and social cohesion.
“In the most recent Scottish election, one in three voters reported seeing a deepfake during the campaign period. This is not a problem for tomorrow, it is a challenge that demands action today.
“The government can and should act now. The proposed representation of the people bill could tackle election misinformation head-on by closing loopholes in electoral law, strengthening the Electoral Commission’s powers to scrutinise harmful activity on platforms, and introducing safeguards for AI chatbots – a rapidly growing area of concern that remains largely unregulated.”
