Reform UK leader is bouncing back and there’s nothing his opponents can do, writes Jonathan Walker
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage looks set to have the last laugh (Image: Getty)
They thought it was all over. But Nigel Farage is having the last laugh, because events over the past few days have shown he is still very much a contender for No 10.
It’s true that in recent months, the Reform UK leader has been rocked by a series of funding-related allegations. There was the £5million gift from Thai-based crypto tycoon Christopher Harborne. The gift itself was entirely legal and in no way against any parliamentary rules, but Mr Farage’s enemies claim he should have registered it, meaning details would appear on the House of Commons website.
Then there was the undercover sting by Channel 4, in which senior Reform figures – who have since been suspended – were filmed apparently discussing ways to accept a £500,000 donation from a wealthy American, even though it would have been against the law. The donation was never made. But it all provided ammunition for Mr Farage’s enemies.
And there is some evidence that the mud constantly thrown at Mr Farage has dented Reform UK’s popularity, although this should not be exaggerated. Opinion polls suggest about 25% of voters still back Reform.
But now, Mr Farage is fighting back. Reform is receiving two massive donations, giving it a war chest to ensure British politics really does become a fair fight.
Because while all the focus has been on Reform, the other parties have been receiving huge sums of money from donors for decades.
Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne are giving Reform £36million each, making a total of £72million.
Mr Farage said the money would be used “for one purpose only: to make certain we are ready to form a government at the next election”.
He said Reform would fund “the best research and policy department British politics has ever seen” and recruit “the best minds in every area”.
And deputy leader Richard Tice said: “What these two donations are trying to do is to actually level the playing field.
“We’re relatively new, we haven’t had the vast donations over the last five to 10 years that Labour and the Tories have had, so we need to employ campaign managers up and down the country, we need to employ brilliant policy people, the best minds, in order to ensure that we have the best policies.”
In 2024, for example, the Conservatives received £15million from a body called The Phoenix Partnership, owned by businessman Frank Hester.
A hedge fund called Quadrature Capital handed £4million to Labour in the same year.
Ecotricity, owned by energy entrepreneur Dale Vince, gave Labour £3.6million.
And union UNISON gave Labour £2.7million while USDAW gave £2.2million, the GMB gave £1.9million, and Unite gave £1.8million.
All of that is just in one year. And those are only some of the biggest donations – there are many more.
This has traditionally been considered perfectly normal. And there’s nothing wrong with it. The only real alternative would be for parties to get more money from taxpayers.
As Mr Tice says, political parties need buildings and staff. They need to carry out research and develop policies. And they need representatives across the country to organise campaigns and print leaflets.
The traditional parties have this infrastructure. They need it, and they have to pay for it somehow.
But Reform is in exactly the same boat. It needs infrastructure, too, if British voters are to have the option of choosing a Reform government on polling day.
These two donations, mammoth though they appear, will give Mr Farage and his party a fighting chance at the next election – on something close to equal terms with the other parties.
Nigel Farage has emerged from one of the most turbulent periods of his political career with something his critics may not have expected: an extraordinary financial boost for Reform UK and a renewed argument over his party’s place at the centre of British politics.
For weeks, Reform had been under intense pressure.
The party faced questions over alleged attempts by some officials to circumvent rules on foreign donations, while Farage himself was drawn into controversy surrounding a £5 million personal gift from businessman Christopher Harborne. Senior Reform figures subsequently faced scrutiny, and the party’s annual conference was overshadowed by allegations concerning its internal operations and finances.
Then came the money.
In September, cryptocurrency billionaires Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne each announced a £36 million donation to Reform UK. The combined £72 million became the largest donation ever made to a British political party, according to reporting by ITV and other outlets.
Farage described himself as “honoured and humbled” by the donations.
The political significance was immediate.
From political crisis to a £72 million war chest
The timing transformed the conversation around Reform.
Instead of spending the aftermath of the controversy defending the party’s finances, Farage was suddenly talking about building an organisation capable of competing at the next general election.
He told the Daily Telegraph that the money would be used for one central objective: making Reform ready to form a government at the next election. He said the party intended to build a major research and policy operation and recruit people with expertise across government departments.
Reform has also said that the two donors want nothing in exchange for their contributions.
The party has specifically said that neither donor will receive a peerage, knighthood or government contract if Reform enters government.
That assurance has not ended the controversy.
Instead, it has opened an even bigger debate about whether Britain’s political system should allow individual donors to contribute sums of this magnitude.
For Farage, however, the immediate consequence is obvious: Reform suddenly has financial resources on a scale it has never previously possessed.
The backlash did not disappear
The idea that Farage’s opponents have simply been defeated would be an overstatement.
The £72 million donations have actually created a new political vulnerability.
The government has proposed tougher restrictions on political donations, including measures targeting donations from overseas electors and direct cryptocurrency contributions. Ministers have indicated that some changes could operate retrospectively, potentially placing the legality of Reform’s recent fundraising under renewed scrutiny.
Angela Rayner said the government’s objective was to prevent foreign interference and stop wealthy individuals from gaining disproportionate influence over British democracy.
She also said the reforms would be backdated to the publication of the Philip Rycroft review on 25 March 2026.
That has produced an obvious political clash.
Reform argues that its donations complied with the law as it existed when they were made.
Government ministers argue that the law needs strengthening precisely because existing arrangements can allow extremely large donations from people whose connections to Britain may be contested.
The dispute is therefore no longer simply about Farage.
It is becoming a fundamental argument about political finance.
Why the £72 million matters so much
The scale of the donations is difficult to ignore.
Each £36 million contribution is larger than the total amount many political parties are able to raise over an entire election cycle.
Combined, the £72 million is equivalent to roughly three-quarters of the amount spent by all parties during the 2024 general election, according to ITV’s reporting.
That gives Reform the ability to do something it has historically struggled to achieve: build a permanent political machine rather than operate largely through volunteer networks and a comparatively small central organisation.
And that is precisely what Farage now appears determined to do.
The Guardian reported on 19 September that Reform was advertising more than 60 professional positions and that Farage was considering a major expansion involving roughly 400 campaign staff. The plans have already produced internal disagreement, with some activists concerned that professionalisation could weaken the party’s grassroots identity.
That is an important development.
Money can pay for offices, researchers, polling, digital operations, candidates and campaign staff.
It cannot automatically resolve internal disagreements.
The party still has serious political problems
The image of Farage “laughing at his enemies” also needs to be treated cautiously.
Public opinion remains challenging for him.
YouGov’s September 2026 favourability figures found that 69% of Britons held an unfavourable opinion of Farage, while only 24% viewed him favourably. YouGov said the 69% figure was the highest unfavourable rating recorded by its tracker during the previous decade.
That means the financial transformation of Reform should not automatically be interpreted as a transformation in public opinion.
Indeed, YouGov’s earlier September research found that only 19% of Britons thought Farage looked like a prime minister in waiting, down seven points from June.
The figures demonstrate why the current moment is complicated.
Farage has substantially strengthened Reform’s financial position while continuing to face significant levels of public distrust and unfavourability.
Both facts can be true simultaneously.
The donation row has united Farage’s critics around one issue
Across Westminster, the £72 million has generated calls for tighter limits on political donations.
Labour MPs have argued that wealthy individuals should not be able to provide parties with sums capable of dramatically altering their campaign resources.
Trade unions have also become involved in the debate, although union leaders have resisted proposals that would treat their funding in exactly the same way as donations from individual billionaires. The Guardian reported that union leaders described their funding as fundamentally different from donations by wealthy individuals.
Other campaign groups have taken a broader position, calling for a general cap on political donations.
The government has consequently found itself under pressure from several directions.
If ministers restrict large individual donations, opponents can accuse them of targeting Reform.
If they fail to act, critics can argue that the political system leaves too much influence in the hands of extremely wealthy donors.
Farage has seized upon that dilemma.
Farage turns the attack back on Labour
The Reform leader has also attempted to shift the argument towards Labour’s own finances.
He has warned that if Reform’s donations are restricted or forced to be returned, he would challenge the treatment of Labour’s trade-union funding.
That argument has become a central part of Reform’s political response.
The party’s position is essentially that politicians should not be able to create a system in which one type of political funding is treated as legitimate while another is treated as inherently suspect.
Labour and the trade unions dispute that comparison, arguing that union political funding operates under established rules and is fundamentally different from massive contributions by individual wealthy donors.
The argument is now moving into Parliament.
The remarkable turnaround
There is nevertheless a striking contrast between where Farage’s party appeared to stand during the summer and where it stands now.
The undercover investigation into Reform’s finances created serious questions for the party. Reform denied wrongdoing and said it would cooperate with investigations. Some aides subsequently stepped down amid the controversy.
Then the £72 million arrived.
Instead of being financially weakened by the controversy, Reform found itself with the largest single fundraising haul in modern British political history.
That does not settle the allegations surrounding the party.
Nor does it guarantee political success.
But it fundamentally changes the resources available to Farage.
His stated ambition is now to use the money to professionalise Reform, develop policy and prepare candidates and campaign teams for the next election.
A new battle is beginning
The irony is that the donations may have solved one problem for Farage while creating another.
Reform now has money.
But the same money has produced an intense political argument over whether Britain’s existing rules are adequate.
The government is seeking tighter controls. Opposition politicians are debating whether the proposals go too far or not far enough. Trade unions are defending their own role in political finance. Watchdog groups are demanding stronger safeguards.
And Reform is preparing for a much more professionalised future.
So the claim that Farage’s opponents thought they had “destroyed” him is best understood as political rhetoric rather than an established fact.
What can be established is that the controversies of the summer did not prevent Reform from receiving £72 million from two donors in September.
Nor did they stop Farage from using the moment to announce an ambitious expansion of his party’s political operation.
The next question is no longer simply whether Farage can survive another political storm.
It is what Reform will actually build with the extraordinary resources now at its disposal — and whether Britain’s political system changes before the party gets the opportunity to deploy them fully.
For Farage, the latest chapter is certainly very different from the one his critics expected.
The controversy has not disappeared.
The investigations have not disappeared.
The arguments over political donations have not disappeared.
But neither has Nigel Farage.
And with Reform sitting on an unprecedented £72 million fundraising haul, the political battle surrounding him has entered a new and potentially much more consequential phase.