Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has told the BBC that Reform UK’s pledge to repeal the Equalities Act is “shocking”.
The vow was reiterated by Suella Braverman when she was handed the party’s education and skills brief on Tuesday.
In an interview in Downing Street, Sir Keir told BBC Breakfast’s Naga Munchetty the laws were “core” to British values and had given “decades of protection”, ensuring women and people of all races were “treated equally”.
The prime minister said: “We know the battles that were fought, many of them by the Labour party to get proper equality.”
Labour’s Equalities Act, passed in 2010, contains legal protections against discrimination on the basis of gender, sexuality, race, religion or disability.
But Braverman, a former Conservative home secretary who defected to Reform UK last week, said the country was being “ripped apart by diversity, equality and inclusion”, “tokenism” and “victimhood”.
She said Reform would scrap the law, as well as the role of equalities minister, if it won power at the next election but did not outline what could replace the protections.
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has previously said the changes would involve “getting rid of the pernicious, divisive notion of protected characteristics”, while still protecting people in the workplace.
When asked about those views, the prime minister said he believed the protections are about “basic values, one of which is should women be treated equally with men”.
“I think it actually rips up something that goes to who we are as a country because I believe passionately that to be tolerant, compassionate and diverse is what it is to be British and this year’s that up.”
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The prime minister was also asked about recent allegations of a “Boy’s Club” at the heart of Downing Street, with some senior Labour women pointing at his former chief advisor Morgan McSweeney.
Pressed on Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy’s accusations that some Labour briefings have been “dripping with misogyny”, Sir Keir said: “In terms of misogyny she’s absolutely right, it’s right across politics, it has been for decades.”
He added: “We have to tackle it and it is shocking and it’s our responsibility not just to be shocked but to step up and do something about it.
“I feel that very strongly, both within my party, beyond the party because this isn’t linked just to one party, it’s in all political parties but we have to talk about it, we have to discuss together how we are going to change it.”
