Is Reform happy for its supporters to assault people?

Robert Jenrick (0:02)

This is a Global Production.

Emily Maitlis (0:05)

You cannot have it both ways. You cannot be the party that says, I've had death threats more than any other politician, any other leader in the UK, and then turns around and allows your own supporters to crack on and assault whoever they want around them.

Jon Sopel (0:24)

There are still a huge number of questions swirling about reformed finances.

Emily Maitlis (0:28)

Physical, visual, hard to deny confirmation that this has gone right to the top of the party.

Jon Sopel (0:35)

These are the benefits of a university education, folks. Yeah.

Robert Jenrick (0:44)

I bet she's studying.

Jon Sopel (0:47)

Tell us, love, is it sociology, is it? Yeah, I bet it is. That poor young girl, she looked like she was going to do herself an injury, didn't she?

Joe Mulhall (0:56)

Well, there's a saying I've got for that. You know what it is, don't you? Boring, boring, boring.

Jon Sopel (1:03)

That is Nigel Farage at the Reform Conference dealing with a heckler. Fine. The trouble is that reform activists in the hall were giving this woman a real going over, hitting her over the head, pulling her hair and pushing her to the ground.

And this is how Robert Jenrick reacted this weekend. There were some very disturbing video that came out of your conference about a woman being dragged out by her hair and being hit over the head.

Robert Jenrick (1:30)

Oh, boo-hoo. Look, I am not...

Jon Sopel (1:33)

Hang on. Come on.

Robert Jenrick (1:35)

If you try and wreck someone's speech at a party conference...

Jon Sopel (1:38)

Political history is full of hecklers.

Robert Jenrick (1:40)

Well, I'm not afraid of that.

Emily Maitlis (1:41)

A woman is getting lamped with a crutch, and the man who would be Reform's Chancellor says, boo-hoo.

Why are they so relaxed about their own supporters assaulting people? Welcome to The News Agents.

Jon Sopel (2:03)

It's Jon.

Emily Maitlis (2:04)

It's Maitlis.

Jon Sopel (2:05)

Obviously, the reason you're tuning in today is to find out more about Emily Maitlis' trip to Venice and dinner with George Clooney. That will come later in the podcast, but there are other issues we need to deal with first.

I was filling in on Sky yesterday. After the reform conference, where there is still a huge number of questions swirling about reform finances principally, but also about the way those hecklers were dealt with. I was really struck by what Robert Jenrick said because it seemed like more or less you are condoning an acceptable level of political violence. Oh, come on. If you heckle, you can expect to get a good kicking. That seemed to be a viewpoint that I found strange when reform have made such a big deal about the dangers of political violence and the risk that reform leading figures face.

Emily Maitlis (3:02)

Well, as we are talking, another video from ITV has just surfaced and this shows one of their reporters who was filming that incident of the protester having her essentially jaw pushed. He himself ends up getting punched. Just have a listen here to the sequence of events that he filmed.

The reporter is standing behind filming on his mobile phone, when one of the people, we can't really tell if it's part of the security team or another supporter of reform comes over and essentially socks him in the mouth. You cannot have it both ways.

You cannot decide to be the party that has to take a five million pound donation because you're so concerned about your own security. You cannot be the party that says I've had death threats more than any other politician, any other leader in the UK. You cannot be the party that invokes the horrific death murder of Anne Widicom, one of those reform spokeswomen, and then turns around and allows your own supporters to crack on and assault whoever they want around them and end up with the words boohoo. There is something that is just not right about trying to claim the moral high ground in this whole question of political violence, and then just turning around when it happens to people that you don't particularly agree with.

Jon Sopel (4:39)

And there's something else that happened over the weekend that I thought was really fascinating, and we're going to talk about that quite a bit later on. But it was about the protest that took place in Dover, when a group, a few hundred strong, all in black, wearing balaclavas and masks, catching everyone by surprise and laying siege to the port of Dover, and stopping people going on holiday and stopping the people of Dover from going about their business, all in the name of stop the boats.