Black people can't be English, insists Reform councillor

Nigel Farage appeared to agree with deputy prime minister David Lammy in the Commons today as he lambasted Reform MP Sarah Pochin for claiming it drove her mad to see black and Asian people on TV adverts.

As Lammy, deputising for the absent Keir Starmer at prime minister’s questions, said the language “belongs in the dark ages”, Farage, who has criticised Pochin for her comments, appeared to nod in agreement, despite her sitting just three seats away.

So what is he going to do about a Reform councillor and former mayoral candidate who this weekend appeared to claim that black people couldn’t be English?

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In Facebook posts in response to the horrific knife attacks on a train in Cambridgeshire at the weekend, Alexander Jones, a Reform member of Doncaster Council who stood for the city’s mayoralty this year, said the suspect was “not English, but black and of Caribbean descent”. The accused, Anthony Williams, who has appeared in court charged with 11 counts of attempted murder, was born in Britain. Jones said the incident was “prompting again discussion about mass immigration on public safety”.

When one commenter noted that Williams was British, Jones doubled down, writing: “Being English transcends mere citizenship; it encompasses a rich tapestry of lineage, culture, and traditions back to 927AD when tribes of Angles, Saxons and Jutes formed together and created the country of England. So british [sic] maybe, but not English.”

What for Farage to do? The Reform leader’s usual get-out card when a Reform representative does a racism is to claim he has neither met nor heard of the person. But this isn’t really possible in the case of Jones, whose mayoral bid he helped launch. At the time the Reform leader said: “Alexander understands the challenges faced by local people having lived here all his life. He is young, energetic and exactly what’s needed to get Doncaster back on track.” In a separate interview he said that Reform would bring “entrepreneurial flair and spirit” to the Yorkshire city.

After being contacted by Byline Times about his posts, Jones returned to Facebook to write “On Sunday morning I posted my immediate thoughts on the aftermath of Saturday nights [sic] horrific attacks, in hindsight what I wrote was open to interpretations I did not attend and I apologise for any offence caused and I have deleted the post”, adding a ‘shaking hands’ emoji. Will that be enough to save him?