The deputy leader of Reform UK has hit back after being branded “pathetic” by an MP over comments he made about the female commanding officer of an RAF base.

Louise Jones – the Labour MP for North East Derbyshire – condemned Richard Tice for comments he posted on X about Group Captain Louise Henton following a security breach at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire.

The Boston and Skegness MP posted: “Kept safe & secure by an HR manager……well done folks” with a link to the officer’s biography.

In response to Jones’s comments in Parliament on Tuesday, Tice said the “woke weakness from Lib Dem and Labours MPs is a national embarrassment”.

Jones, who served in Afghanistan with the Army, said: “Certain pathetic little people took this incident and decided to come out of the woodwork and criticise people for doing their job whilst being female.

“I know as a woman serving in the armed forces, every opportunity that has been given to women, we have earned, through serving on operations, proving time and time again, we are worthy to be there.

“I was very conscious when I was serving that I had to be perfect, because any fault or flaw that I showed would not be held just against me, but against all the women that I was serving with.”

Responding, Tice told the BBC: “What is pathetic is allowing a HR manager to be responsible for security at one of our most important UK bases.

“The woke weakness from Lib Dem and Labours MPs is a national embarrassment.”

Members of the Palestine Action group broke into the RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire and spray-painted two military planes red.

Footage posted online by the group on Friday showed two people inside the airbase in darkness, with one riding on a scooter up to an Airbus Voyager and spraying paint into its jet engine.

South East counter-terrorism police later confirmed its specialist officers were investigating the incident alongside Thames Valley Police and the Ministry of Defence (MoD).

Group Captain Louise Henton joined the RAF in 2001, and took command of RAF Brize Norton in July 2024.

The MoD would not officially comment on the row but a source told the BBC: “The RAF has utmost confidence in the leadership at RAF Brize Norton.

“The current station commander brings expertise and talent to the role that are hugely relevant, she is an excellent example of non-aircrew delivering leadership at the highest level, as also shown by Sir Rich Knighton who is an Engineer and head of the RAF.”

Group Captain Henton’s biography on the RAF’s website states that she “has served at RAF Stations in the UK, and completed worldwide deployments and detachments”.

It reads: “Louise has completed command and staff appointments in personnel, media, recruitment, programmes and plans, and human resources.

“Promoted to Group Captain in [August 2022], she was recently responsible for delivery of the modernisation of career management practises and protocol.”

The Liberal Democrat MP for Tewkesbury, Cameron Thomas – who served under Group Captain Henton – also joined the condemnation of Tice.

He said in the Commons: “It was a disgusting attack on a senior officer and my previous squadron commander, who had dedicated her career, to the armed forces service and to bettering the lives, the lived experience of our personnel.”