Get all your news in one place.
100's of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Comment
Owen Jones

As Reform celebrates £72m in donations, tell me this: are you ready to see two rich men buy our democracy?

Nigel Farage after his closing speech at Reform UK’s annual conference in Birmingham, 5 September 2026.
Nigel Farage after his closing speech at Reform UK’s annual conference in Birmingham, 5 September 2026. Photograph: Tolga Akmen/EPA

As £72m in donations makes its way to Reform UK’s bank accounts, consider what Nigel Farage said on the eve of Britain’s vote to leave the European Union a decade ago. “This referendum is the people versus the establishment,” he declared. “It is the vested interest, it’s the rich, it’s the big business.”

Just two years ago, Farage assailed “an unholy alliance of big business, big banks and big government”. He is also the same man who, when he debated with the then Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, in 2014, claimed to “represent the mercantile, trading, entrepreneurial end of society”, while his opponent “represents big banks, big government and big business”.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100's of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.