At some point last year, Nigel Farage must have picked up a monkey’s paw and wished that all the attention would be on him at Reform’s 2026 conference.
The 2025 edition, after all, had been almost entirely overshadowed byAngela Rayner’s resignation over her tax affairs and the subsequent government reshuffle.
This time, there can be no doubt that all the attention at Birmingham’s NEC conference complex – and in the wider country – is on the party leader.
But that’s largely because of a devastatingly well-timed report from Channel 4 News and investigative journalism outfit Verbatim, which aired yesterday evening.
Many of the reporters who had travelled to Birmingham for the conference – including me – spent last night watching the half-hour programme in their hotel rooms.
The contents were damaging enough that Nigel Farage’s right-hand man of many years Dan Jukes and Reform’s well-regarded head of policy James Orr have stepped back from the party.
This morning, party chairman Lee Anderson told Sky News there is ‘no chance of them coming back’.
Both men were tied up in the sting, which involved Reform appearing to secretly collaborate with a supporter (actually an undercover reporter) on a series of polls and a seemingly illegal donation from a US businessman (actually an actor).
But there was a third top Reform figure who featured heavily in the report: Farage himself.
He’s seen on a secret camera thanking the actor and undercover reporter for their apparent generosity in offering a donation – after they made clear that it would ultimately be sourced from a non-UK citizen, which is against the law.
It’s clear what Farage wanted to dominate the headlines today. He signed a comically huge novelty agreement on the conference stage with French politician Jordan Bordella, promising action on stopping small boats.
Inevitably, though, the press conference that followed was dominated by questions about the allegations that emerged last night.
I watched on as Farage defended his actions in the footage, saying he had asked during the meeting if everything was ‘above board’ and received assurance that it was. (All others involved also deny wrongdoing.)
Then he cut it short – once upon a time he would take questions from every hand raised at these kinds of events, but today he took only five, saying Bordella had a flight to catch. And those were from preselected outlets.
Make no mistake, this is the most harmful crisis yet for Farage and Reform.
When asked about the £5 million from Christopher Harborne and his relationship with convicted fraudster George Cottrell, he was able to say it all happened before his return to frontline politics at the 2024 election.
Last night’s report related to events in the past few months, including some in the lead-up to this summer’s Clacton by-election – which Farage triggered voluntarily to show voters didn’t care about allegations over his behaviour.
The Reform voters has spoken to in the conference hall aren’t too fussed about the latest story, with many suggesting the media is just ‘out to get’ their favourite politician.
But out in the wider country, we may see others asking themselves two questions that could spell disaster for the party and its leader.
Is Farage, who was filmed sharing oysters while appearing to sanction an illegal donation, truly that anti-establishment?
And is Reform, which appears to have engaged in questionable behaviour to bag a political advantage, truly that different to the UK’s traditional parties?
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
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