Cleverly distances himself from Hollinrake’s Reform UK jibe

Sir James Cleverly has distanced himself from frontbench colleague Kevin Hollinrake’s jibe at Reform UK in which the Conservative chairman appeared to compare Nigel Farage’s party to the Nazis.

A Tory split has opened up after Mr Hollinrake shared a link to a Wikipedia entry about a badge handed out to members of Adolf Hitler’s party in response to a social media post from Mr Farage showing a Reform logo.

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch defended the post as a “joke” while former home secretary Suella Braverman said it was “wrong, irresponsible and highly counter-productive”.

Asked about the comparison on Tuesday, shadow housing secretary Sir James said Mr Hollinrake had been “trying to make a point” and “that’s not necessarily the way I would have made it”.

“The point that I think he is making is that – I mean, the situation with Nathan Gill, the former Reform leader in Wales who’s now been imprisoned for corruption charges having been bribed by Russia to promote pro-Moscow propaganda, is something that is worth highlighting,” he told GB News.

“Kevin sought to do that in his own way. That’s a decision that he made, but I think it is right, not that we criticise people who vote Reform – these are people who we need to win over, and indeed often win back to voting Conservative – but I think it is absolutely legitimate to ask some very, very serious questions about the motivation of some of the elected people within Reform.

“And also, of course, it is legitimate to criticise the things that they’re saying about Ukraine, about Russia and about other things as well.”

Gill was jailed for 10-and-a-half years last week after being paid £40,000 to make pro-Russian statements in the European Parliament.

On Sunday evening, Reform leader Mr Farage posted an image of a black and gold Reform badge on X with the caption “coming soon”.

Mr Hollinrake responded with a link to the Wikipedia page about the Golden Party Badge – an award given out to the first 100,000 Nazi Party members in 1930s Germany.

Reform’s policy chief Zia Yusuf said: “This will be on leaflets and ad vans to the point of saturation, so every single one of their constituents knows: the Tories think that if you support Reform, you’re a Nazi.”

Tory MP for Fareham and Waterlooville Mrs Braverman said: “Let’s raise the level of debate: criticise the policies, even challenge the people or their actions.

“But comparing Reform and their supporters to Nazis is wrong, irresponsible and highly counter-productive.

“Kevin does not speak for me.”

But Mrs Badenoch brushed off the row, telling the PA news agency on Monday that Mr Hollinrake “made a joke” and “Reform spend a lot of time online abusing other politicians.”

Pointing to Gill’s sentence for bribery, she said: “I think they have much bigger problems.”