Farage accused of election overspending to secure Clacton seat

A former aide to Nigel Farage has claimed that his Reform UK party overspent on his Clacton election campaign. The ex-aide, Richard Everett, was more recently an independent councillor. However, he was elected under a Reform banner before leaving the party.

As reported in the Independent and the Guardian, Everett has now reported Farage to the police for falsifying his election expenses.

Farage says these are ‘inaccurate claims’ from a ‘disgruntled former councillor’

The allegations come amidst a scandal stemming from Farage’s former classmates’ accounts of his extreme schooltime racism. The far-right leader has attempted to dismiss the claims as “banter”, whilst deputy leader Richard Tice called them “made-up twaddle”.

However, Farage has appeared distinctly rattled that the allegations haven’t simply gone away. He launched into an angry tirade against the BBC on air last week. Now, the pressure on Farage is also being increased by the new allegations of election impropriety.

The leader’s Essex constituency of Clacton has an election spending limit of £20,660. Reform’s official declaration claimed that the party came in just £400 below this limit.

However, Everett has submitted documents to Scotland Yard allegedly proving that Reform failed to declare a raft of spending that would have tipped them far past this limit. This includes payments for utility bills, leaflets, banners, and the refurbishment of a bar in the campaign office itself.

Everett claimed that Farage himself was likely “blissfully unaware” of the overspending. Even so, and following their familiar playbook, a Reform spokesperson stated:

These inaccurate claims come from a disgruntled former councillor. The party denies breaking electoral law. We look forward to clearing our name.

‘Serious questions’

For their parts, both Labour and the Tories have shown outrage at Farage’s alleged overspending. Labour minister Jacqui Smith stated that there are:

rules on our electoral expenses in order to make sure that everybody standing in our elections has a fair chance, and therefore it’s a serious issue.

PLP chair Anna Turley said:

Nigel Farage needs to urgently answer serious questions about whether he broke the law and misled the public when standing for election to parliament. Our parliamentary democracy relies on people playing by the rules so all candidates have a fair hearing with the public.

Nigel Farage must come clean and put all the evidence on the table to prove he hasn’t undermined our democracy by breaking the rules. Failure to do so will raise even more questions about what he has to hide.

Likewise, Conservative chair Kevin Hollinrake stated:

We all have an obligation to play by the rules to ensure that our elections are free and fair.

As such, he also called on the Electoral Commission and the police to investigate Reform’s spending.

Fragile

Meanwhile, both Labour and the Lib Dems have also called for an investigation after last week’s revelation that Reform received an eye watering £9m donation from Thailand-based crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne. It’s by far the biggest personal donation ever made to a UK political party.

Taken together, the allegations of Farage’s racism and his party’s financial impropriety could seriously rock Reform if they’re made to stick. The far-right party is currently topping YouGov’s voting intention charts, although it has slipped from a high of 29% to 25% in recent weeks.

However, the party currently hold just 5 parliamentary seats, including Farage’s Clacton constituency. If they can be shown to have cheated their way onto at least one, it will seriously damage their fragile reputation as a political party.

Featured image via the Canary