Labour deputy says Farage is a threat to democracy and calls for misinformation clampdown

Lucy Powell calls for tougher laws to tackle misinformation and says Reform UK has benefited from bots and troll farms

Reform UK is destabilising British democracy by spreading divisive material that is being amplified by bots and troll farms, Labour’s deputy leader has said.

Lucy Powell called for tighter laws on social media giants to tackle misinformation, arguing the online space was “open to wealthy individuals, and bad state actors”.

She also highlighted the multimillion-pound donations which have bolstered Reform’s election war chest and “fund their powerful online campaigns”.

Arguing Nigel Farage and his party posed a threat to democracy, she said the law should be strengthened to “tackle the scourge of dis- and misinformation which is ripping communities apart and undermining us all”.

She said Reform’s “exploitation of online algorithms on social media sites is well documented”, as was the way the party had benefited from “bots and troll farms to amplify support”.

A Reform spokesperson said Powell’s claims that its messages were spread by bots and troll farms was “completely untrue” and branded her a “conspiracy theorist desperately trying to distract from a failing Labour government”. “Rather than smearing voters and demanding more state censorship, Labour should be focused on fixing the messes they’ve created,” the spokesperson said.

Powell made her comments in an article for Babelfish, as well as an interview with the comedian Matt Forde. Her intervention comes as MPs are pushing for tighter regulation of misinformation in the forthcoming elections legislation, known as the representation of the people bill.