Jenrick: Labour playing politics with Farage’s life
Jenrick: Labour playing politics with Farage’s life
Amy GibbonsTue, July 14, 2026 at 9:47 AM UTC
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Robert Jenrick said ministers should have acted sooner - Anadolu/Getty Images
Reform UK has accused the Labour Government of “playing politics” with Nigel Farage’s life.
Robert Jenrick, the party’s Treasury spokesman, claimed that ministers chose not to give Mr Farage the security he needed before Ann Widdecombe’s death last week because they disagreed with his politics.
Mr Farage was offered a meeting with the government security authorities on Monday to discuss his safety after the alleged killing of Miss Widdecombe, the former Tory minister who later joined Reform.
However, Mr Jenrick claimed that ministers should have acted sooner and accused Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, of a “dereliction of duty”.
On Tuesday, he told the BBC’s Today programme: “The point I’m making is that the Government chose not to give Nigel the security that he needed. They now have, as a result of Ann Widdecombe’s appalling murder, offered him a meeting. The Home Secretary could have offered that meeting a year ago, two years ago, she chose not to.
“That, I’m afraid, is playing politics with the safety of politicians, and I suspect that’s because they don’t like the views the Reform politicians take forward because we are not mainstream politicians. We are politicians who are fighting the establishment every single day, and we’re not backing down.”
Miss Widdecombe was found dead at her home in Dartmoor, Devon, on Thursday, July 9. Police believe she was killed 24 hours earlier, at around midday on Wednesday, July 8.
Police initially claimed there was nothing to suggest the crime had been politically motivated or linked to terrorism in a series of statements on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
However, the head of counter-terror policing announced on Monday that it had taken over the investigation following the discovery of “new information or evidence”.
A 28-year-old man who was initially arrested for murder on Saturday was rearrested on suspicion of terrorism offences.
At the weekend, Mr Farage claimed that the alleged murder may have been premeditated, with Reform sources accusing the police of “gaslighting” the public over the suspect’s motive.
Nigel Farage claimed at the weekend that the alleged murder may have been premeditated - Belinda Jiao
In a statement to MPs on Monday, Ms Mahmood said she was “happy to offer a meeting” for Mr Farage with the chairman of Ravec, the Home Office committee in charge of security for public figures. She also said she would be reviewing security guidance for former MPs.
However, on Tuesday, Mr Jenrick said: “It shouldn’t have taken the death of Ann Widdecombe for Nigel Farage to be given a meeting with the relevant Home Office committee. That really is a dereliction of duty, and it’s ultimately the Home Secretary who makes the decision.”
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Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leader, welcomed Ms Mahmood’s pledge to review security threats to politicians, but insisted that these were unrelated to the use of fiery language in Parliament.
She told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “In the case of both Jo Cox and Sir David Amess and now with Ann Widdecombe it has been terrorism-related. And I think that it makes a lot of people wonder about going into public life, into political life, with these threats.
“But I think that we should look at it in the context of Ian Gall, the 1984 bombing of Conservative Party Conference, Sir Anthony Berry died… We have had MPs threatened and losing their lives before. I wouldn’t want the public to think we were spending more time worrying about our own security than everybody else’s security.
“I’m glad that the Home Secretary is reviewing arrangements, it is something that I think about.”
Mrs Badenoch said that while she could understand people’s fears about going into politics, she had “always felt safe” and insisted the circumstances of Miss Widdecombe’s alleged murder were very rare.
Mrs Badenoch said she needed to be able to speak ‘very forthrightly’ as part of her job - Jonathan Brady/PA
Rather than threats against politicians increasing, she argued, MPs and the public were instead becoming more alive to the threats that they faced.
The Tory leader was then challenged over her description of Bridget Phillipson, the Education Secretary, as a “spiteful class warrior” and her remark that there were “400 knives stuck in [Sir Keir Starmer’s] back” after he was ousted by Labour MPs.
Mrs Badenoch responded: “I stand by everything that I said. I don’t think that we should conflate criticism in the House of Commons with terrorism, I don’t think we should conflate the two. My job is to hold people to account. Calling people spiteful does not put people in danger and this is the thing that worries me, whenever we have a serious tragedy, people making it about themselves and things that I don’t like.
Saying that she needed to be able to speak “very forthrightly” at PMQs, Mrs Badenoch continued: “That’s what Ann Widdecombe always did, she never held back…
“We need to be able to do our jobs. I think people should always do that respectfully. But I don’t think calling someone spiteful or using metaphors is where the line is being crossed.”
Richard Tice, Mr Farage’s deputy, said that he expected there would be a “major reassessment” of Mr Farage’s security.
Asked whether he was worried about the wider ramifications of Miss Widdecombe’s alleged murder, Mr Tice told TalkTV: “Candidly, yes. I mean we’ll learn more when we hear from counter-terrorism, whether it’s specific to Reform, we don’t yet know. I’m sure we will at some point.
“Whether it’s specific to well-known MPs and former MPs from different parties, we don’t know, we’ll learn soon. But it’s a very bad place for politicians and ex-politicians to be in.”
Source: “AOL Breaking”
