Farage's failure to reject Trump claim on paracetamol 'puts women at risk'

Nigel Farage is "endangering women's health" by failing to condemn Donald Trump's claims that pregnant women using paracetamol causes autism, the education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, has said.

- Jessica Elgot

Phillipson said she had used the painkiller throughout her second pregnancy, adding that Reform's connections with medical conspiracy theories including anti-vaccine rhetoric made them a danger to public health.

The deputy leadership candidate, who is also the minister for women and equalities, said she wanted to use the platform to make a stronger moral argument against Reform UK, saying Labour needed to "get on the front foot challenging them".

She said Farage's unwillingness to repudiate the US president's comments was the wrong move. "I couldn't have got through my second pregnancy without taking paracetamol," she said. "To scaremonger in that way, and to scare women and put lives at risk, is really dangerous."

Phillipson suggested there had been some frustration that Labour had not come out fighting fast enough against some of Reform's controversial announcements over the summer and said that would change.

"We do have to be firmer in our approach," she said. "And as deputy leader, that's what I'll do, because I believe the approach we need to take is where the British people are.

I don't think Reform speak for the vast majority of the British people, who abhor prejudice, intolerance and racism.