A “BLATANTLY racist” political advert put out by Reform UK about Anas Sarwar has now been seen around a million times on Facebook as their by-election candidate continued to defend it during an STV hustings.
The advert – which Reform have spent between £20,000 and £25,000 on – falsely claims Scottish Labour leader Sarwar would “prioritise the Pakistani community” and includes selected clips from a video spread by far and alt-right agitators on social media in a bid to claim that Europe was under threat from “multiculturalism” and mass immigration, specifically of Muslims.
The total spend on the advert only last week was listed as between £10,000 and £15,000, and this now appears to have risen several thousand pounds according to statistics.
Ross Lambie – who is hoping to claim the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse Scottish Parliament seat for Reform this week – was grilled during an STV hustings by host Colin Mackay and SNP candidate Katy Loudon about the advert.
He doubled down on defending it insisting the party had not misquoted Sarwar despite telling the BBC last week the claim that Sarwar will “prioritise” the Pakistani community was “a quote from us”.
He criticised the BBC, suggesting the broadcaster had got facts wrong, and said he “looked forward to their apology”, adding that his party had “nothing to apologise for”.
“We’ve done that, we’ve given our view on it.”
Asked if he owed Sarwar an apology for misquoting him, Lambie then said: “We never misquoted him at all. The title of it was our opinion of it, it was not in quotations.”
He was then asked if he believed his party had anything to apologise for to which he said "absolutely not".
When it was put to Lambie by both Loudon and Mackay that he had previously said they were not Sarwar’s words, Lambie went on: “We didn’t portray them as his words. The BBC were incorrect about the quotations, and we look forward to their apology.”
Loudon then asked him to clarify whether they were not Sarwar’s words and instead Reform UK’s opinion to which Lambie replied: “Yes, correct.”
Last week, Sarwar called Farage a “pathetic, poisonous little man who wants to use divisive rhetoric to spread fear and division for his own political gain”.
The Labour MSP further challenged the Reform UK MP to a debate at “any time, any place”, adding: “He can challenge me on my views, I'll challenge him on his, and I am confident that the people of Scotland will reject him.”
He said the Clacton MP did not know about, or care for, the people in the area, saying Farage "thinks Hamilton is some kind of show on the West End of London".
Reform UK are not expected to be able to win the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election, but some pollsters have projected that they could push Labour into third place, which would send shockwaves through Scottish politics.
The debate on STV was only attended by two candidates – Lambie and Loudon – despite four others contesting the seat on Thursday having been invited to go on the programme.
Scottish Labour’s candidate Davy Russell floundered in an accompanying interview after failing to answer a question 11 times.
Russell previously said he would not be attending the debate because he would rather be "knocking on doors" – despite the fact that the event is scheduled for 10.40pm.
In the individual interview he had with Mackay, he then struggled to answer when asked about the failings of the current Labour Government.
Mackay asked Russell a total of 11 times whether the UK Government was right to scrap the Winter Fuel Payment.
The Scottish Labour candidate did not answer and instead insisted that he wasn't involved in the decision and that he was running for a Holyrood election rather than Westminster.
