Labour MP David Lammy has divided the internet by defending remarks which appeared to compare hardline Brexiteer conservatives to Nazis and advocates of South African apartheid.

Appearing on The Andrew Marr Show, Lammy was played a video of remarks he made last month at a People’s Vote march for a second referendum. At the time, he said:

I’m just looking over there at Winston Churchill.

On the 30 September 1938 he stood in parliament and said we would not appease Hitler. I’m looking across to Neslon Mandela, who would not give in to apartheid. 

We say, we will not give into the ERG. Will not appease.

Lammy was asked whether the remarks were an “unacceptable comparison”, to which he replied:

I would say that it wasn’t strong enough. 

We must not appease. We're in a situation now, and let me just be clear, I'm an ethnic minority. We have, in the ERG, in Jacob Rees-Mogg, someone who is happy to put on to his web pages the horrible, racist AfD party, a party that's Islamophobic and on the far right.

I'm sorry, but very, very seriously, of course we should not appease that, of course we should not appease that.

Brexiteer Rees-Mogg was condemned for quoting the leader of the far-right German party, the AfD. Last year the party called for “Islam-free schools”.

When Marr suggested that Lammy’s comments compared senior Tories like Boris Johnson to Nazis, he said:

Ask Boris Johnson why he's hanging out with Steve Bannon.

On Twitter, people were divided about the comments. Many threw their support behind Lammy.

Whereas others condemned his comments.

H/T: Independent

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