Hours before Nigel Farage was due to give his keynote speech at Reform UK’s annual conference in Birmingham, two of his senior people were gone. James Orr, the party’s head of policy, and Dan Jukes, a close aide to Farage, stepped down on Friday, September 4, after Channel 4 News broadcast an undercover investigation the previous evening.
The footage came from Verbatim, an investigative group founded by journalists from the Centre for Climate Reporting. Its reporters posed as wealthy American donors with British connections and spent about a year talking to senior Reform figures. According to IBTimes UK, the recordings showed discussions about having an overseas company pay for three opinion polls that Reform had commissioned, at a total cost of £32,500. They also covered a possible £500,000 donation from the supposed US financier, with part of the money routed through his supposed UK-based son. That son was in fact another undercover reporter.
Foreign donations of that kind are barred under UK electoral law, which is why the footage landed so hard.
Denials and a hoax claim
Reform said in a statement that Orr and Jukes had left their roles while an internal inquiry runs its course. Orr told a local news outlet that he would cooperate fully. Jukes said he had “stepped back from politics in order to clear my name.”
Farage came out swinging. He told LBC radio that Reform had “broken no laws” and was the victim of “entrapment.” A party spokesperson went further, calling the party “the target of a hoax perpetuated by foreign-funded, climate-change activists posing as would-be party donors.” Farage also said a couple of contractors had been removed for saying “things that shouldn’t have been said.”
Rival parties did not wait. Labour, among others, said it had reported Reform to the police, and the Liberal Democrats also called for an investigation. The Metropolitan Police said it was “aware” of the reports and was assessing the matter. The Electoral Commission said it was considering “all relevant information” and was in contact with the Met. It added that parties must report permissible donations above £11,180 and impermissible ones above £500, and that any attempt to dodge those controls is a matter for the police.
A bad summer for Reform
The scandal arrived on top of others. AFP reported that Parliament’s standards watchdog is looking into a 5 million pound ($6.7 million) donation to Farage from the crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne, which Farage says was for his security and arrived before he was elected. Deputy leader Richard Tice also faces allegations that he failed to declare gifts. Farage resigned his Clacton seat in July as the row over the Harborne money grew, then won the August by-election after mainstream parties stayed out of it, leaving joke candidate Count Binface as his main rival.
Reform led Labour in the polls for over a year until late July, then slipped behind as Andy Burnham took over as prime minister. An Opinium poll last month gave Farage a net approval rating of -28 against +11 for Burnham. Sam Power, a politics lecturer at the University of Bristol, summed up the season to AFP: “There’s no sugarcoating it. It’s been a really, really bad summer for Reform.”
Reform holds just eight of the 650 seats in the Commons, though it won 14 percent of the vote in the 2024 general election.
Sources
- Nigel Farage Rocked as Top Aides Resign Following Undercover Foreign Funding Exposé | IBTimes UK
- Nigel Farage’s Reform UK Rocked by New Foreign Donation Scandal at Birmingham Conference
