Rayner stands by ‘scum’ comments

Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner has stood by her comments that Conservatives are a ‘bunch of scum’.

At a fringe event during Labour’s conference yesterday, she was recorded saying: “We cannot get any worse than a bunch of scum, homophobic, racist, misogynistic, absolute vile … banana republic, vile, nasty, Etonian … piece of scum,” she said at the event, before adding that she had “held back a little”.

In a series of Tweets posted today, Rayner repeated her accusations that Boris Johnson had made “racist, homophobic and sexist” comments, and included images of headlines reporting his refusal to apologise for past remarks regarding made Muslim women and gay men.

She said: “If he withdraws his comments and apologises, I’ll be very happy to apologise to him.”

She added: “Boris Johnson also called the children of single mothers ‘ignorant and illegitimate’.

“According to Boris Johnson, when I was a young single mum I should have been pushed into ‘destitution on a Victorian scale’.

“So you can apologise for those comments as well prime minister.”

A No 10 spokesman said: “It is a matter for her how she chooses her comments.”

She told the BBC on Sunday: “I will apologise when Boris apologises for saying the comments he has made, I will retract that he is scum.”

In light of the row, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said it was “not the language I would have used” but did not condemn his deputy.

Conservative Party Chair Oliver Dowden criticised the remarks, arguing that politicians “need to make politics better not drag it into the gutter” adding, that “at a time when the country is trying to pull together to recover from Covid, the last thing we need is the deputy leader of the Labour Party calling people ‘scum’ and yelling insults.”