North Yorkshire Police lectured that Nigel Farage's views on Islam cause 'harm' in publicly funded hate crime talk
From the Newshound archive · first published 29 September 2026 · last updated 30 September 2026.
North Yorkshire Police officers were asked at a publicly funded hate crime conference in 2025 whether Farage ought effectively to be arrested for claiming that young Muslims reject British values. The session, led by Abbas Najib, former officer and chief executive of charity Better Communities Bradford, framed Farage's remarks as equivalent to a racially aggravated offence. Najib told officers Farage would be 'locked up before he left the studio' had he made comparable comments about Jewish people.
The talk also featured GB News footage of presenter Matt Goodwin displaying a YouGov poll showing that more than half of Britons regard Islam as incompatible with British values.
Officers were shown footage of a Muslim bus driver targeted with racial abuse and invited to 'draw your own conclusions' about whether Farage bore any responsibility for such conduct through his comments.
The controversy comes as a separate police watchdog investigation reportedly concludes that Met officers overlooked the firebomb suspect on CCTV following the April 2025 attack on Farage's home.