Labour leader Chris Hipkins admits ex-staffer running account lampooning Luxon with homophobic and other objectionable memes

Labour leader Chris Hipkins has admitted the person running an account posting homophobic and other objectionable memes of Prime Minister Christopher Luxon is a former Labour Party staffer.

Hipkins said Labour was not involved with the Instagram account and it was not formally affiliated to Labour, but he knew who the person running it was.

After further questions, he admitted the person running the account formerly worked for the Labour Party.

The memes include an edit of the television series Black Mirror in which a fictional British Prime Minister has sex with a pig.

The Instagram account posted a clip of this scene with Luxon’s head superimposed on the head of the British Prime Minister.

The account also used obscenities to refer to members of the Government.

Another more recent video is an edited clip of Luxon from his time working at Unilever. The clip, which talks about men’s hygiene, is captioned “Luxon thinks about a lot of men in a shower”.

The Instagram account, luxury_marmite_sandwich_, is followed by multiple Labour MPs who sometimes share the memes it posts. The Herald has not seen MPs share the objectionable memes.

“I do know who that person is,” Hipkins said.

An image from the account. Photo / Instagram

When pressed, he admitted that they had worked for the Labour Party in Parliament in the past.

When asked about the pig video, Hipkins agreed it was objectionable.

“It’s not the sort of stuff that I would condone,” he said.

An investigation by Stuff noted that at least one of the posts appears to use footage from the Labour Party’s official account.

The footage in question shows a toaster in what appears to be a kitchenette at Parliament. The Instagram account, according to the Stuff analysis, has repurposed the same footage.

Hipkins said Labour was not to his knowledge “feeding any current material to that person”.

After his caucus meeting on Tuesday, Hipkins said he had reminded his MPs not to share material with “external parties”.

Hipkins also said his office had reminded the person behind the account that they “shouldn’t be using any material that they had during their time employed by us in any content they are producing now”.