SCOTLAND’S Reform leader Malcolm Offord has been forced to apologise and deny he is homophobic after it emerged he made a joke about George Michael while giving a speech in 2018.

In a Burns Night speech to the London Scottish Rugby Club, which he then chaired, he is understood to have mocked Wham singer’s grieving boyfriend, Fadi Fawaz.

Speaking to the Daily Record newspaper, a man who had witnessed the display described it as “a crude, bad taste and insulting spectacle,” adding: “It was so shocking I’ve not forgotten it.”

Mr Offord spent much of last week attempting to explain away one Reform candidate’s past endorsement of fascist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon and another’s declaration that former first minister Humza Yousaf was “not British” and a “grandstanding Islamist moron.”

Now, challenged on his own comments, the former Tory minister said he “instantly regretted” them, insisting: “This was a clumsy mistake that I immediately acknowledged and acted upon. 

“I am not homophobic. I am someone who accepts accountability, owns my actions, and makes amends where needed.”

First Minister John Swinney branded Mr Offord’s comments “typical of the prejudice spouted by Reform,” adding: “Malcolm Offord and his ilk are unfit for office.”

Scottish Labour equalities spokesman Paul O’Kane said: “Whether it is homophobia or racism, there is clearly no low to which they will not sink.

“Lord Offord attempted to pass off some of the reprehensible remarks made previously by his party’s candidates in Scotland as being okay because they are ‘not politicians.’

“But he has served as a minister in the House of Lords for years under Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, so what is his excuse?”