Angry scenes and protests at Senedd as Reform call for ban on Muslim face coverings

Sioned Williams, deputy first minister, said the debate was a "shameful" end to a "sad day" that began with the commemoration of the Aberfan disaster.

Looking at the Reform members, she accused them of "conflating the intimidating behaviour of thugs and those whose protest can descend into disorder and violence, often in demonstrations directed against migrants or Muslims, with the very people who are targeted by that intimidating behaviour".

"I do not accept that a face covering worn by an individual for religious reasons means they don't share British or Welsh values," she said.

"Nor should we suggest that someone belongs any less, because their religious practice differs from that of others."

Williams added: "The Jewish people of 1930s Germany were subject to the Nuremberg Laws, which stated they were no longer German, laws which led to their persecution and extermination by the state that stripped them of the Germaness.

"Who decides that a woman who [has] a face covering is less British or less Welsh?"

The comments led to angry protests and finger-pointing from the Reform benches. A point of order was raised by a member of the party asking the presiding officer if the comments were appropriate.

The presiding officer Huw Irranca-Davies said he was "always happy" to review the record of proceedings, but did not make a ruling. Williams said she was making a "statement of fact".

Carrie Harper, Plaid MS for Fflint Wrecsam, told Reform: "How on earth can you claim to stand up for women when you are trying to dictate what Muslim women can and cannot wear?"

Plaid MS Kiera Marshall, for Caerdydd Penarth, said a Muslim woman in her constituency was subject to a "physical, violent attack in broad daylight".

"The attacker shouted at her about removing her headscarf and continued to do exactly this while physically assaulting her," she said.

"This is just one example of an increasingly common occurrence when Muslim women are being targeted.

"This is exactly what the rhetoric that Reform is peddling is doing."

Labour's Huw Thomas said he had not heard Reform condemn "the masked mobs who stormed RNLI stations across of South Coast, last month".

A lifeboat station in Portsmouth went out of service in September, following anti-migrant protests.

Following the debate, Dr Abdul Azim Ahmed of the Muslim Council of Wales said: "This debate demonstrated the disturbingly authoritarian attitudes members of Reform UK hold, coupled with dangerously ultra nationalist attitudes about culture and belonging."