What the recordings show

Chris Parry, a retired rear admiral selected to fight the Hampshire and the Solent mayoral election for Reform UK, said last year that David Lammy, the former foreign secretary, should "go home to the Caribbean". He also suggested that at least eight other politicians from minority ethnic backgrounds do not have a primary loyalty towards the UK.

In the undercover footage, Nigel Farage said Parry "must apologise to Lammy" and "must do it and move on". Ed Sumner, Reform's head of communications, replied: "You're protecting him".

Farage delivered that line to laughter, telling Sumner to get Parry to accept the apology deal, according to the undercover investigation.

A candidate who stayed on

The recorded exchange sat uneasily beside what Sumner had said when the row first erupted last December. Filmed at the time, he told another press officer that Parry was "clearly a racist" and added: "He needs to go, I'm getting rid of him".

Yet Parry's departure did not happen on that timetable:

• •Three weeks after the December controversy broke, Parry was still the candidate.
• •Farage told a press conference in that period that Parry could stay if he apologised.
• •Parry's suspension came only on 26 March, after the Guardian reported that he had described members of a Jewish neighbourhood watch group as "cosplayers" and likened them to "Islamists on horseback".

Labour's response

Bridget Phillipson, the Labour party chair, described the revelations as shocking and deeply disturbing and said they reached the top of Reform. She demanded Farage account for allegedly standing beside a candidate who made racist remarks about David Lammy.

"Nigel Farage needs to wake up and realise the buck stops with him," Phillipson said.

Reform's defence and other fallout

Reform UK rejected the programme's methods, accusing ITV and Hardcash Productions of using "extreme methods of deception". The party said the undercover journalist had used altered identification documents and false credentials, and had also sought sensitive security information, travel arrangements and financial information outside the scope of the investigation. It added that Farage and other members are being targeted by individuals who wish them harm, causing a documented security issue during the filming.

On racism itself, Reform stated: "There is no room for racism in Reform UK. We always respect due process of investigations".

Parry referred comment to a statement to ITV in which he said: "I would urge people to go back to the original contexts and tweets to see what was said and why." He said the remarks related to reparations and failures by police and government, and that he always exercises his right to criticise anyone in power or the public eye whom he judges to be acting against the interests of the British people.

The Parry recordings are only part of the fallout from the ITV undercover documentary:

• •Several Reform councillors stood down after segments aired on Wednesday showing them making graphic threats of extreme violence and expressing racist, misogynistic views.
• •Sarah Pochin, Reform MP for Runcorn and Helsby and one of the party's two female MPs, complained other party officials "are so fucking chauvinistic".
• •Pochin was recorded saying "they just exclude you if you're a woman. It's really tough being a girl with all of this alpha male shit going on".
• •She did not provide a statement when approached by ITV.

The full ITV documentary, Undercover: A Year in Reform, airs on Sunday.