Reform UK foreign donations scandal: five legal issues police must examine

Reform UK has been referred to police by Labour and the Lib Dems after an undercover film exposed alleged attempts to accept illegal foreign donations.

Reform UK's funding scandal: what the law says and what police will investigate

Reform UK faces a potentially serious criminal exposure after an undercover film captured senior party aides apparently arranging payments from a donor they believed to be based in the United States — a person not legally permitted to give money to a British political party. The Guardian UK reports that Labour and the Liberal Democrats have already referred the party to the police, and sources suggest a full inquiry is a highly likely outcome.

There are five separate strands the authorities may pursue.

The £32,500 polling payment

Reform aides Dan Jukes and James Orr are alleged to have orchestrated payments totalling £32,500 for political polling from a donor their colleagues believed to be US-based and therefore an impermissible source. The money should also probably have been declared to the Electoral Commission as a benefit in kind. The donor was, in fact, an undercover reporter.

Farage's apparent knowledge

The film shows Nigel Farage congratulating the fake donors with the words "Boom — it worked." This suggests he was aware of the arrangement, a point investigators are expected to scrutinise closely.

The proposed £500,000 routed via a UK intermediary

A senior aide is recorded suggesting that a proposed £500,000 donation from the same impermissible US businessman could be channelled through a UK-based intermediary — a method that would, if used, potentially disguise the true source of the funds.

Foreign money via family members

The same aide indicated that similar arrangements may already have been used to funnel money from foreign sources to Reform through declared UK donors who were family members of the original contributors. The undercover reporter's notes include a recorded exchange in which Jukes appears to describe how "it's the father and it's the son" who donate — "one of the ways in which we do it."

Farage's tacit approval of the larger sum

When the £500,000 arrangement was explained to Farage, he is recorded responding "thank you both" — a response Labour argues amounts to tacit endorsement of a scheme to accept an illegal donation.

The law in question

All five strands potentially engage section 61 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, which covers offences concerning arrangements intended to evade restrictions on political donations. Labour's reading of section 61(1) covers any person who knowingly enters into, or acts in furtherance of, an arrangement likely to facilitate a donation from an impermissible source. The commissioning of the £30,000 polling and the attempt to solicit the larger £500,000 donation both fall within the scope of that provision.

A separate clause prohibits disguising the true source of a political donation through an intermediary, though legal experts regard it as a grey area whether liability rests primarily with the impermissible donor or with the receiving party.

What the Metropolitan Police have said

The Met said it would assess the matter and any further evidence. No announcement of a formal investigation was expected immediately, but sources close to the process told The Guardian UK that a full inquiry was highly probable.

Scotland Yard is already conducting two related inquiries. Detectives are investigating donations made by Fiona Cottrell, the mother of Farage aide George Cottrell; both have been interviewed under criminal caution. Lawyers for George Cottrell previously wrote to The Guardian UK stating that his mother's donations were "entirely her own decision" and that suggestions he donated impermissibly to Reform UK were "unfounded."

A second inquiry concerns two donations of £250,000 each made to Reform by Britain Means Business, a fundraising vehicle controlled by deputy leader Richard Tice, in the weeks before the 2024 general election. The Guardian UK previously revealed that Fiona Cottrell transferred £1m to Britain Means Business shortly before those donations were made, with roughly half the funds subsequently passed to the party.

The Electoral Commission's position

James Orr, the party's head of policy, described the Electoral Commission as "useless" in one recorded exchange, as he and Jukes debated how the foreign donor's polling payments could be arranged. The commission has since said the matter is now for the police, but it is expected to open its own investigation into potential failures to declare donations once any criminal process is complete — an inquiry that could result in substantial fines. The commission may also use the case to renew calls for tougher laws on donor funding.

Reform's defence

The party has suspended both Jukes and Orr, a step that appears designed to put distance between Farage and the affair. Reform's formal position is that it did not commission the polling funded by the US donor and therefore it was not a benefit in kind — a claim that recorded footage from Jukes and Orr makes difficult to sustain. On the £500,000 donation, the party argues the transfer never took place and would have been caught by its own due diligence procedures had it progressed further.

Names redacted from the published footage may emerge in subsequent reporting, potentially widening the scope of any police investigation.

Source: The Guardian UK