Nigel Farage took a swipe at Gary Lineker as he accused the football pundit of being “part of the BBC bias”.

The Reform UK leader also called for a debate over the future of the licence fee.

Mr Farage was asked about Lineker, who is quitting Match of the Day at the end of this season, condemning the BBC’s decision to remove a controversial Gaza documentary from iPlayer.

The programme was taken off after it emerged its child narrator was the son of a Hamas minister.

Mr Farage told an LBC phone-in: “He’s part of the BBC bias, has been for years, thank goodness he’s finally going.”

The Clacton MP was asked by a caller if the BBC licence fee should be suspended over the show.

He said: “You shouldn’t suspend the licence fee over one programme, however egregious that programme might be.

“But do we need a grown-up debate about what the BBC is actually for and whether we should be paying the licence fee and going to prison if we don’t pay it – yes we need to have that debate.

“I will say this, for all my criticisms of the BBC, and my goodness gracious me I’ve personally had to bear the brunt of a fair bit of it over the years, the one thing we must remember is the BBC is a very important part of our global brand.

“Therefore, things like the World Service actually genuinely do matter.

“So I would like to see a BBC that is out there in the world as a representative of this country, perhaps broadcasting from places where there is censorship of all kinds as historically it’s done.

“But for the rest of it, frankly whether it’s sport or entertainment or whatever it is, there’s no need for a BBC whatsoever.”

Lineker was one of 500 media professionals who signed an open letter to the BBC criticising the removal of the Gaza film.

The BBC has apologised for “serious flaws” in the making of Gaza: How To Survive A Warzone, and added it has no plans to broadcast the documentary again or return it to iPlayer.