Adam Price calls for Jimmy Carr Cardiff performance to be cancelled after Holocaust joke

Jimmy Carr (left), Adam Price (right) Credit: PA

Plaid Cymru leader, Adam Price has called for a performance in Cardiff by Jimmy Carr planned for next week to be cancelled. 

But the First Minister said that, while he deplored “unacceptable” views, it wasn’t as simple as suggested to cancel such events. 

The comedian has been heavily criticised for making a joke about the Holocaust and Roma, Sinti and traveller communities in a Netflix special.

At First Minister's Questions in the Senedd, Adam Price urged the First Minister to intervene to prevent the show. 

Jimmy Carr Credit: PA

He said: “While the spectre of fascism is stalking Europe again the comedian Jimmy Carr is still refusing to apologise for implying that the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Gypsies at the hands of the Nazis was somehow something to be celebrated.  

“Next Monday he is performing in our capital city at St. David’s Hall. Welsh Gypsies are asking the venue to cancel the performance in solidarity with them.

"St. David’s Hall is owned and managed by Cardiff Council and subsidised by the Arts Council of Wales which the Welsh Government funds.  

“As First Minister and indeed as leader of the Labour Party in Wales will you ask the Labour leadership of Cardiff Council to agree to the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities' entirely reasonable demand that no publicly funded venue should be a platform for an unrepentant purveyor of racist tropes, and if they refuse to do so will you ask the Arts Council to urgently review the terms of its funding?”

First Minister, Mark Drakeford Credit: PA

In response, the First Minister said that “the views attributed to the individual are absolutely unacceptable, and will be condemned by anybody in this chamber. 

“We spoke only last week about our concerns for gypsy traveller communities, and we discussed those at some length in the policing board for Wales that my colleague Jane Hutt and I attended. 

“If it were as simple as issuing an edict and putting things right, then of course we would be able to do that, but I know from what I've heard from Cardiff Council, it simply isn't as easy as that."

ITV News has contacted Jimmy Carr's agent for comment.