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A prominent Brexit Party supporter and former MEP has been slammed for 'arguing racism is the fault of black people.'

Theresa May's chief of staff, Gavin Barwel, took aim at Roger Helmer, a former Tory and Ukip MEP over a tweet suggesting he understands racial prejudice.

Helmer was a Tory MEP from 1999 for more than a decade, before defecting to Ukip in 2012.

He quit Ukip in April, lining up in support for Nigel Farage's Brexit Party.

He published the tweet last night, commenting on a row between Labour MP David Lammy and Conservative writer Tim Montgomerie.

(Image: Surrey Advertiser)

Mr Helmer wrote: "Racial prejudice is wrong, and I condemn it.

"But David Lammy’s ranting illustrates why prejudice against black people persists."

In response, Mr Barwell tweeted: "In which @RogerHelmerMEP argues that it is the fault of *black people* that racism persists"

Mr Lammy tweeted: "Morning Roger, hope you are not justifying racism against black people because you don't like that I have the guts and the platform to tell it as it is.

"That would be as ridiculous as assuming all white, middle-class, retired men are xenophobic and backward based on your tweets."

It is, of course, not the first of Mr Helmer’s outbursts which has been met with a broadly negative response.

In 2015 he published a blog post telling renewable energy workers their jobs are “damaging the economy” and they should work in “real, value-added industries” instead of “wasteful projects that are little more than gesture politics.”

(Image: Surrey Advertiser)

A week earlier, he tweeted a suggestion that the temperature dropping during a solar eclipse disproved climate change.

In 2012, while he was a Conservative MEP, he suggested some rape victims are partly to blame for their assault.

Contrasting date-rape to “classic stranger rape” on his blog, Mr Helmer said a woman who “voluntarily undresses and gets into bed … surely shares a part of the responsibility, if only for establishing expectations”.

“Most right-thinking people would expect a much lighter sentence. Rape is always wrong, but not always equally culpable.”

In 2016 he said beating "dumb" seal cubs over the head was "humane" and that they deserved to die because they were "guilty" of eating too many fish.

In 2014, he suggested the NHS should fund ‘gay cure’ therapy, telling the Daily Mail: “"One person is unhappy with their physical sex and wants to change it and we say, ‘OK you can do it’.

"You have a homosexual who says, ‘I’m homosexual, actually I’d rather be straight, is there a way of fixing it?’

"We say to the person who wants to change from a man to a woman or vice versa, ‘Please do that on the NHS’.

"We say to this guy, ‘That’s wicked, you’re not allowed to think about it’."

The same year he said it was OK for people to find homosexuality “distasteful if not viscerally repugnant.”

He defended his prejudice, comparing it to liking different types of tea.

He said: “Different people have different tastes, you may tell me you don’t like Earl Grey tea.

“That may be a minority view but you are entitled not to like it if you don’t like it.”

He has suggested gay marriage would lead to incest and polygamy.

When Cardinal Keith O’Brien said gay marriage was a “grotesque subversion of a universally accepted human right,” Helmer said “I wish I’d thought of that phrase.”

(Image: Getty Images)

In 2009, he dismissed the existence of homophobia, saying it was “merely a propaganda device” used to “denigrate and stigmatise those holding conventional opinions.”

During the 2011 London riots, he suggested the army should “shoot looters and arsonists on sight.”

And in 2013 he claimed 15-year-old girls could consent to sex with pop stars.

He said: “Suppose a 15-year-old girl is at a club with a pop star, and he says ‘how about it, dear’? and she says ‘yes please, I was hoping you’d ask’.

“In most people’s book, that constitutes consent. Legally, she cannot consent, but in real terms, she can.”

He announced his resignation from the European Parliament in 2017, citing age and health as reasons - but amid allegations of misuse of public funds.

The EU recovered £101,364 of his transition allowance for former MEPs over claims he had broken the rules governing payments to party workers.