Zia Yusuf and Victoria Derbyshire clashed during their BBC interview as he told viewers about the party’s plans to scrap the Equality Act. It follows Reform’s Suella Braverman, stating she wanted to eradicate the “pernicious, divisive notion of protected characteristics” in the Act. Yusuf was defending the notion on BBC Newsnight, leaving Derbyshire stuttering over her words. She said: “You’re going to scrap the Equality Act, but you’re still going to protect, for example, pregnant women from being sacked because they’re pregnant?” “That’s exactly what we would do,” the Reform supporter replied.
Derbyshire then asked what Reform would do for the disabled population, adding: “This act means if you have a disability, you’ve got an equal right to a job, equal access to public transport, or practical stuff that most people don’t even think about – doorframes have to be a certain size so people in a wheelchair can literally get in and out of a building. Do you not want to protect those people?”
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“Yes, you can expect those things to be protected,” he explained on the evening news programme.
“Right, so which of the protected characteristics do you not want to protect anymore, because I’m not clear,” Derbyshire expanded during the clash.
Yusuf said: “We’ve got to look at why there are huge problems in this country, they are left behind white working class boys…”
“No, the question was specific,” Derbyshire snapped back. “Which do you not want to protect?”
“You’ve got to look at how all these things work together,” Yusuf retorted. “You can’t reduce a serious conversation like this to two minutes.”
As the interview got more heated, Derbyshire said: “I’m not reducing anything. I’m literally going to go through the list and ask what a Reform government would protect.”
BBC Newsnight can be watched on BBC iPlayer.