Invoking Jimmy Savile to attack Nigel Farage over online safety is not just offensive – it exposes a deeper intolerance in political debate. Peter Kyle’s remarks cross a dangerous line, says Eliot Wilson

You would think that any mainstream politician would think twice before comparing an opponent to Jimmy Savile. The man police believe was not only a predatory sex offender on a horrifying scale but perhaps Britain’s worst sexual abuser is now the face of evil: guilty not just of appalling crimes (allegedly including necrophilia) but of abusing trust, exploiting his celebrity and eminence and of flaunting clues to his grotesque nature.

This is not like calling someone a “Nazi” or a “war criminal”. This is more personal: summoning up a universal hate figure and saying that your opponent is like him or on his side. Even in today’s febrile political atmosphere, that would, surely, be going too far.

Yet Peter Kyle, science, innovation and technology secretary, did just that. Last week, he was defending the Online Safety Act 2023, a statute many think misses its intended target and has unintentional but adverse consequences for free speech. Nigel Farage, leader of Reform UK, has been one of the most vocal of the act’s opponents. Speaking to Sky........

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