Latest / THE DAILY BRIEF / Nigel Farage wins in Clacton - what now for questions about 5m gift

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Nigel Farage wins in Clacton - what now for questions about 5m gift · THE DAILY BRIEF

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: The people have spoken. Well, mumbled. 22,239. The verdict of
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Clacton is nothing to see here. Nigel Farage is still
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: its MP.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: I will not, sadly, be attending the count.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Parliament is still investigating the gift he received. Clacton seagulls
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: are still stealing the chips. So, after a month or
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: so of by-election shenanigans at a cost of around £ 250, 000,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: what exactly has changed? Mainly that a man with a
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: bin on his head won enough of the vote to
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: keep his deposit. That's a 2,500% swing to bin face.
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: Hashtag swing bin.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: Otherwise, everything's back to normal. And Nigel Farage is still
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: under scrutiny over the financial support he's had. He says
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: he's done nothing wrong. How did we get here? In
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: keeping with the spirit of the bin, let's recycle some news.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: In May 2024, Nigel Farage had said he'd no intention
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: of taking over as leader of reform and running as
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: an MP in the forthcoming general election.
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: There'll be some people very disappointed I'm not standing, but
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: I am campaigning.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: A week and a half later, he announced he wouldn't
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: disappoint those disappointed people after all.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: I've changed my mind. It's allowed, you know.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: It's not always a sign of weakness. It could potentially
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: be a sign of strength. 21,220 votes.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: In the midst of Labour's landslide general election win in 2024,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: Nigel Farage won Clackton-on-Sea with nearly half the vote. Now,
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: the controversial bit. Earlier that election year, before Mr Farage's
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: public change of mind, he received a gift of £ 5
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: million from billionaire backer Christopher Harbourn. Although he wasn't a
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: politician at the time, Nigel Farage was nevertheless president of
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: reform back then. Mr Farage didn't declare this gift when
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: he became an MP. He's argued... He didn't need to.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: It was a personal, unconditional gift. Others have argued he did,
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: proverbially flourishing the Commons Code of Conduct in his face.
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: Parliamentary rules say all financial interests in the 12 months
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: before becoming an MP should be registered. And personal gifts
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: don't usually count. But both the possible motive of the
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: giver and the use to which the gift is to
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: be put should be considered, the rules say. If in doubt,
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: register them anyway. With many considering that possible motive of
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: the giver, the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner started to look into it.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Nigel Farage did and continues to say it was a
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: private gift and he's done nothing wrong. But scrutiny of
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: the donation continued and there's confusion around Mr Farage's defence
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: of it. It led to a series of testy exchanges
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: with the media. Please, what has happened to this £ 5
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: million gift?
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: With all due respect, what's it got to do with you?
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: Having proper security is very expensive.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: How much of that money have you spent on security
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: so far?
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry, well, no, I'm not going to answer that.
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's any of your business, frankly. And if, however,
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: if the Standards Commissioner decides that it is, we'll talk
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: about it again.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: In July, the Sunday Times accused Mr Farage of receiving
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: undeclared benefits, including staff insecurity, from George Cotchop. a key
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: ally who, in 2017, was jailed for eight months in
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: the United States after admitting to wire fraud. Reform says
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: any support was purely personal. Mr Farage denies any wrongdoing.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: But he had an angry response for Sky News, whom
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: he accused of harassing his family. Was it a mistake
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: not to declare the gifts from George Cottrell, sir?
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: You tell your bosses you harass my family anymore and
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: I'll take you to serious consequences.
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: That's what your organisation has done this morning.
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: Go away.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Then, at noon on the 7th of July, this post.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: I will make a statement on my future in public
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: life at 2pm. What could it mean? Speculation fed the
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: rolling news machine for a couple of hours that none
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: of us will get back. But then it all became clear.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: Mr Farage, it seemed, had had enough.
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: I've thought about it hard and I've decided today, today
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: I will resign as a Member of Parliament for Clacton-on-Sea,
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: thereby forcing a by-election.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: But he hadn't had enough. He was going to run again.
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: No, I've decided that the people of Clapton should be
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: the judges of my actions. This will be a people
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: versus the establishment by-election. It's a chance to stick two
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: fingers up to the entire establishment, to frankly tell.
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: Them where to go.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: And that is why I will be putting my name forward...
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: to stand in this by-election. I will fight to win.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Mr Farage had addressed the nation, or as much of
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: the nation, as was watching Reform's feed from Milbank Tower,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: amplified by news broadcasters.
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: Thank you.
• 4:47
  Speaker 4: Nigel Farage there on a Reform UK broadcast. We've had
• 4:52
  Speaker 4: nothing to do with how that was transmitted. No questions
• 4:55
  Speaker 4: from the press because there was nobody there.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: But Newsnight's Nick Watt was there, one of a small
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: gaggle of reporters outside, waiting for Mr Farage to emerge
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: into the sunshine. There, he got his first sniff of
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: the reaction to his announcement. Nigel Farage, Kenny Badenox... Nigel Farage,
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: Kenny Badenox says this is a hissy fit.
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: Does she? Well, I think they've had more than their
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: fair share.
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: But you've done big gambles in the past. Isn't this
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: just a stunt?
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: Oh, it's a big gamble.
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: But it's a stunt, isn't it, Mr Farage? Some branded
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: the by-election a circus, a desperate stunt. The Conservatives, Labour
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: and the Liberal Democrats all said they wouldn't be standing candidates,
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: nor would the Green Party or Restore Britain. But Count
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: Binface would stand, and he appeared to receive an endorsement
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: from none other than outgoing Prime Minister... Sir Keir Starmer.
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: My advice to everyone is put your vote in the bin.
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: We saw a lot of the bin during the campaign.
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: What is your appeal going to be to the people
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: of Clacton?
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: I'm not Nigel Farage. It's a full manifesto. Newsnight's editor
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: was only too delighted to have him on the programme.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: I mean, these are serious times.
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: Why don't you bin off the bin on Newsnight now?
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: You want to talk to Camp Binface and then you
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: get me on Newsnight and you start trying to deconstruct
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: a character, I would say, what are we doing here?
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: When the day finally came, the people of Clacton trickled
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: into the voting stations while the media hung out nearby
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: like seagulls eyeing up the chips. The result... surprise no one.
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: It was the longest ballot in British electoral history. I'm
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: not talking about the duration, although it may have felt
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: like that at times. I mean, we've changed Prime Minister.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: since it was called after all. But the actual ballot
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: paper was almost a metre long, featuring 34 candidates. And
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: after all is said and done, we're back where we started.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: Parliament's investigation into Nigel Farage's undeclared gift goes on and on.
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: If he's found to have broken the rules, he could
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: be suspended. If he's suspended, there could be, you guessed it,
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: Another Clapton by-election. Like passengers caught in the cars of
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: its big wheel, round we go again. Only this time,
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: all the other parties will stand. So Count Binface had
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: better watch his back.