Nigel Farage slammed Keir Starmer as the “biggest threat to free speech” in British history.
The Reform UK leader lashed out at the PM over his online response to unrest which has rumbled across England and Northern Ireland in the wake of the killing of three young girls in Southport.
The Prime Minister has called out large social media firms for their role in allowing inciteful content to be spread on their platforms – and is weighing up imposing obligations on said firms to crack down on “legal but harmful” material.
But the Clacton MP, speaking to the US’s Fox News, said: “Nobody should use any social media platform to genuinely spread hate or incitement to violence, and that free speech rule I think all of us would support and agree with.
“But what we are allowed to do on social media, or should be allowed to do, is to speculate, is to ask questions, is to try and put facts out, to put facts out that wake up the rest of the community.
“When you’re engaged in something like that, you can never, ever guarantee that what you say is 100 per cent true.
“Now, Starmer, by cracking down on that, poses, I think, the biggest threat to free speech we’ve seen in our history.
“If the parameters that are set are to say to every kid, if you read a post that questions net zero and global warming, it will be extreme content, and a lie, if you read a post that even dares to question levels of immigration, legal or illegal into Britain, that that’s extremist, then you start to set a narrative for a future generation that is fundamentally undemocratic.
Nigel Farage slammed Starmer as the “biggest threat to free speech” in British historyPA“I am very worried that the instincts of a left-wing Labour Party are to use this crisis to take away our liberties and our free speech, and this is going to have to be fought.”
With that in mind, do you think Keir Starmer is a threat to free speech? Have your say.