The former Tory cabinet member Sajid Javid has called on Nigel Farage to apologise for alleged racist comments as a schoolboy.
It came after a Guardian investigation found more than 30 of Farage’s contemporaries at Dulwich college have accused the Reform UK leader of racist and antisemitic bullying.
Farage has denied “directly” targeting anyone with racist or antisemitic abuse or having the “intent” to hurt anyone. This month, he dismissed the allegations as “complete made-up fantasies” based on political motivation.
In a wide-ranging interview with the Sunday Times magazine, Javid, who became the first home secretary from an minority ethnic background in 2018, said Farage’s remarks were “clearly the wrong thing to say”, even if they were banter to him.
“He could well be a totally different person today,” Javid said. “But to demonstrate you are a different person, it starts with an apology and he hasn’t done that yet. That’s what disturbs me.”
Javid spoke of his family’s story of integration after his parents moved to the UK from Pakistan. Born in Rochdale, he could not speak English when he started primary school, but went on to hold the offices of home secretary, health secretary and chancellor of the exchequer.
“If we talk about British Muslims, I think it is a success story of integration,” Javid said. “Today Britain has become, in my opinion, the most successful multiracial society on earth.”
In November, a Guardian investigation uncovered a series of fresh allegations of racism against Farage. Among the accusers was the award-winning Jewish film-maker Peter Ettedgui, who said Farage would say “Hitler was right” and “gas them”, and make hissing noises to simulate the sound of the gas chambers.
A month later, 26 school contemporaries wrote an open letter to Farage urging him to apologise and describing their “dismay and anger” at how he had dismissed the allegations.
The letter read: “What disturbs us is less what happened years ago, hurtful as it was, but rather your refusal to acknowledge your past behaviour or apologise for it.”
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