A Conservative leadership hopeful Tom Tugendhat has hit out at Elon Musk and Nigel Farage in his first major speech since announcing his bid to lead the Tories.
Musk, who owns the social media platform X, has criticised PM Keir Starmer repeatedly over his response to the far-right riots in recent weeks, and even claimed “civil war is inevitable” in the UK.
Tugendhat, a former security minister, responded to those remarks on Tuesday afternoon, saying: “Frankly I found those comments delusional and simply false.
“The question as to how we operate on social media is a difficult one.”
He added: “I refuse to be on TikTok because the algorithm is set by a foreign dictatorship. Others make different choices.”
He did not say politicians should quit X though, after a handful of Labour MPs left.
Tugendhat also ruled out making a deal with populist party Reform UK if he became Tory leader, and said he would not allow the party’s leader Farage into the Conservatives.
He claimed that Farage has been “deeply irresponsible and dangerous” over the riots in trying to amplify “false information”.
The Reform leader had suggested the police were withholding information from the public over the Southport stabbings.
Tugendhat slammed Farage for criticising the breakdown of law and order, “but not the riots themselves”.
Tugendhat also discussed the conspiracy theory that there is “two-tier” policing in the UK, which claims the authorities treat some protesters more kindly than others.
Musk has even called the PM “Two tier Kier” over this claim, which Starmer – and the police – have vehemently denied.
Tugendhat, now the shadow security minister, said he did not believe there was a two-tier approach, but claimed there is sometimes “inconsistency”.
He said: “A two-tier approach suggests there is an active choice to treat communities differently. I don’t believe that that is the case.”
He claimed “inconsistency” leads to “lack of predictability”.
He added: “As security minister, I constantly had to encourage the police to make arrests on the day as crimes were being committed rather than waiting until after the protest had finished.”
Tugendhat will be competing alongside James Cleverly, Priti Patel, Robert Jenrick, Kemi Badenoch and Mel Stride to lead the Tory Party.