‘No Tory deal’ Farage takes £9m donation from ex-Tory donor

Earlier this week, Nigel Farage got upset when the media reported he was planning to make a deal with the Tories before the next election. This is despite Reform UK being stuffed full of ex-Tory politicians. It’s also despite his party attracting donations from all the same billionaires as the Tories:

BREAKING: Reform UK has recorded the largest ever single donation from a living person in UK political history

Read more: https://t.co/3WsJCbcY6b

📺 Sky 501, Virgin 602, Freeview 233 and YouTube pic.twitter.com/fvON1YmN9r

— Sky News (@SkyNews) December 4, 2025

Gee, we wonder why donors who supported the Tories see Reform as a viable alternative?

“foreign money by any other name”

The donation in question comes from Christopher Harborne. As reported by Sky News, Harborne donated millions to the Brexit Party in 2019, as well as to the Conservatives between 2001 and 2022. While Harborne is British, he’s based in Thailand.

Sky News spoke to political donation expert professor Justin Fisher, who told them:

It exposes the fact that this is a person who is a British citizen but is able to influence British politics without being subject to the laws that any Reform government might bring in, any tax arrangements that a Reform might bring in.

This is foreign money by any other name.

The good professor also highlighted that the Tories changed the law in 2022 to allow British citizens living abroad to donate. While this was previously possible, there was a limit of 15 years; now a Brit could live abroad for 100 years and still exert financial influence over our politics.

I’ve no doubt this multi-millionaire, living in Thailand, donated out of deep concern for
Britain’s working-class.

Nothing says “anti-establishment” like record-breaking cheques from the ultra-rich. https://t.co/ZbKYCVHSD5

— Clive Lewis MP (@labourlewis) December 4, 2025

You know who’s really going to be horrified by this donation? That’s right – Reform’s deputy leader Richard Tice:

Reform UK have accepted £9m from foreign-based businessman Christopher Harborne.

Reform UK Deputy Leader @TiceRichard in 2018 on George Soros donating to UK organisations:

"He doesn't live here. He doesn't pay taxes here. What right has he got to interfere with our democracy?" pic.twitter.com/eamwLQD8sk

— Adam Schwarz (@AdamJSchwarz) December 4, 2025

Reform have taken other donations too:

So tell me again how Nigel Farage, who just took the largest ever political donation, from a Tory mega-donor, and another donation from the Viscountess wife of the non-dom owner of the Daily Mail, is planning to "take on the establishment"

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) December 4, 2025

Crypto

Adam Bienkov had additional criticisms to make – most of them relating to Harborne being a crypto investor:

Crypto investor Christopher Harborne, who has just donated £9 million to Reform, is also an aviation fuel entrepreneur.

In other news Reform, which has pledged to scrap all Net Zero plans, just declared a £36,000 donation from Heathrowhttps://t.co/eM5h00trFV

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) December 4, 2025

Crypto investor and former Tory donor Christopher Harborne has just given a record-breaking £9 million donation to Reform.

Nigel Farage has spent recent months publicly calling for deregulation of the crypto industry, telling an industry conference that "I am your champion" pic.twitter.com/VD3S2nyN8j

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) December 4, 2025

Nigel Farage used an LBC appearance to accuse the Bank of England of being “dinosaurs” for restricting the use of Stablecoins by crypto firms like Tether.

He didn't declare that Reform had just received £9 million from one of its biggest investorshttps://t.co/eM5h00trFV

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) December 4, 2025

If you’re confused as to what cryptocurrencies are, the only thing you need to understand is that they’re almost entirely unusable as currencies. The reason for this is because they’re too volatile, as their value can shoot up or down by tens of thousands of pounds in a single day. It’s also common for them to lose all their value entirely.

Crypto does have some actual uses, and they are:

• Online scams.
• Crime.

So that’s good.

Because lord knows we need more ways for the rich to scam us.

Meet the new boss

As we reported, Farage & co. got very upset when it was said that they’re planning to jump into bed with the Tories. Whether the two parties do an official deal or not, though, they’re all part of the same push to make life easier for foreign-registered billionaires.

Featured image via Reform UK