The Labour Party has a four point lead in the polls ahead of its party conference due to take place later this week.
In a boost to Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who has presided over a turnaround in the party’s performance since he became leader, Labour are on 27%, while Reform are on 23%. Meanwhile, the Tories are on 21% and the Green Party on 13%.
Labour (-1), Reform UK (-2) and the Lib Dems (-1) all see a small drop since last month.
The polling was carried out by Ipsos between 10th – 15th September and comes ahead of the budget later next month.
Reform has continued to face a decline in the polls after Farage’s numerous scandals, including over his failure to adequatley declare a £5million donation from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne and is currently facing a standards committee probe into the matter.
Nigel Farage has spent years presenting himself as the voice of the people. But the people reading his own local newspaper appear to have a rather different view.
The Colchester Gazette, which covers local news across Essex, including the seaside town of Clacton, and its sister title, the Clacton Gazette, recently asked readers whether Farage should quit as an MP.
The local news outlet wasn’t exactly coy about the result.
And the figures made for uncomfortable reading for the Reform UK leader.
More than eight in 10 of the 1,001 people who responded, 818, or 82 percent, said Farage should step down as an MP following investigations into Reform UK’s finances.
Just 177 people, or 18 percent, said he should not, while six were unsure.
The poll also asked whether readers thought Farage would become the next prime minister.
Of the 714 people who answered, 85 percent said no. Just 14 percent thought he would, while nine were unsure.
The Gazette also set out the allegations behind the latest controversy engulfing Reform.
A Channel 4 News investigation by Verbatim Investigations reported that senior Reform UK figures had discussed ways of obtaining support from an American donor that would not be permitted under UK electoral law.
The investigation alleged that a US company paid for three Reform-commissioned polls costing £32,500, while discussions also took place about a proposed £500,000 donation that would have been made via a UK-based son.
Channel 4 reported that the larger payment was never made. Reform denies wrongdoing and has launched an internal investigation.
But perhaps the most entertaining part of the Gazette article for Farage’s critics was the accompanying reader reaction.
One reader argued that investigations into expenses, misappropriation of funds and bribery should apply to politicians regardless of party.
“It just happens that Reform Ltd, its CEO and employees tend to bend the rules more than the other parties and to a much larger extreme, so it makes more exciting reading,” they wrote.
“All parties make mistakes, but Reform Ltd, just can’t help themselves and just don’t learn – they jump from scandal to scandal and it’s always someone else’s fault.”
And then came the social media pile-on.
“When you’ve lost the Clacton and Frinton Gazette…” posted campaign group Leeds for Europe.
One commenter joked: “Can he be an MP while being in jail?”
Another wrote: “The clue here is in the word ‘readers’, which rules out most Reform acolytes.”
“He’s done it once, so he’s had the practice!” said another, referring to Farage’s earlier resignation as the local MP.
“How would anyone notice?” someone else said in reference to the MP’s notorious absence from his constituency.
Hungary’s former prime minister wasted little time making his intentions clear. At the annual Kötcse gathering of Fidesz politicians and allies, he delivered what was described as a “fiery speech,” declaring the “grace period for the neo-communists is over,” and that his party was ready to fight. He accused Péter Magyar’s government of overseeing the “recolonisation” of Hungary and claimed Brussels, rather than Hungarian national interests, was driving the country’s direction.
Orbán may have lost power, but he has no intention of disappearing from politics.
And his comeback matters well beyond Hungary.
Voters decisively rejected him at April’s parliamentary election, ending his 16-year tenure and handing Magyar’s Tisza party a two-thirds majority. But the political networks, ideas and relationships cultivated during those years did not disappear with him.
Reform could face a similar situation. Even if it loses an election, that wouldn’t necessarily mean the end of its political influence. Like UKIP before it, Reform could succeed in pulling the mainstream parties towards its positions on issues such as immigration, net zero and taxation, achieving some of its political goals without holding a parliamentary majority.
It also has assets that can survive an electoral setback: a high-profile leadership, extensive media exposure, substantial financial backing and an established institutional presence. With elected representatives across local councils, the London Assembly, the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Senedd, Reform is already building a political infrastructure that extends beyond any single election. Its reported £72 million in combined donations from billionaires Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo could further help it maintain that infrastructure and its campaigning networks.
In other words, electoral defeat would not necessarily amount to political disappearance. Orbán’s experience shows how a movement can retain influence through networks, ideas, institutions and sympathetic media even after losing power. That is an important part of understanding what Reform’s long-term impact could look like.
Orbánism has travelled
For years, Orbán presented Hungary as a blueprint for what he called an “illiberal” state, built around national sovereignty, traditional family values and hostility towards perceived foreign interference.
His government was criticised by opponents at home and abroad for taking Hungary in an authoritarian direction, but its influence was never confined to Hungary.
Orbán cultivated relationships with politicians, intellectuals, think tanks and media organisations across Europe and the US, and government-backed Hungarian institutions became part of an international conservative network, providing platforms, funding and opportunities for political collaboration.
Hungary became a reference point for politicians seeking to challenge liberal institutions, strengthen national sovereignty and oppose what they portrayed as the influence of Brussels and international organisations.
That network now stretches across Europe, and into Britain’s populist right.
The Reform-Orbán connection
A DeSmog investigation published in April mapped links between Reform figures and Orbán-linked organisations. It found that senior Reform figures had appeared on Orbán-backed platforms and that organisations associated with Reform figures had received funding from institutions connected to the Hungarian government.
One prominent link is James Orr, Reform’s head of policy until his recent resignation following an undercover investigation into Reform’s handling of foreign donations.
Orr is a trustee of the Roger Scruton Legacy Foundation, whose UK board includes figures such as Michael Gove. The foundation has been identified as a recipient of Hungarian-linked funding, with investigations reporting substantial funding from the Orbán-linked Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC).
Orr is also UK chairman of the Edmund Burke Foundation, which organises National Conservatism conferences, which are also sponsored and coordinated by the Brussels arm of the MCC.
NatCon has provided a meeting place for politicians and intellectuals sympathetic to Orbán’s brand of national conservatism.
At its 2024 conference in Brussels, Orbán was the headline political figure, while Orr and Nigel Farage were also on the programme. Suella Braverman, who defected to Farage’s party in January, also spoke at the event. As has Matthew Goodwin, GB News presenter who stood as Reform UK’s candidate for the Gorton and Denton parliamentary by-election. In an interview with Hungary Today earlier this year, Goodwin praised the Orbán model, saying that “Britain can learn from countries like Hungary.”
These connections matter because Orbán’s influence has never depended solely on formal political alliances. Conferences, think tanks, intellectual networks and cultural organisations have helped create a common political narrative and goal across borders.
Patriots for Europe – the far-right gains ground
The pattern is visible across Europe.
Orbán has openly cultivated relations with Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland (AfD). In February 2025, shortly before Germany’s federal election, he met AfD co-leader Alice Weidel and declared that Berlin had been a “city of walls” and that it was time to tear down another one.
The AfD subsequently achieved a landmark result in Saxony-Anhalt’s state election on September 6, winning around 44% of the vote.
In the Czech Republic, billionaire populist Andrej Babiš’s ANO won just under 35% of the vote in the 2025 parliamentary election, taking 80 of the 200 seats. Babiš, who was prime minister from 2017 to 2021, is a founding member of Patriots for Europe, the right-wing populist European Parliament group established by Orbán in 2024.
Following Orban’s election loss in April, the Patriots declared renewed vigour.
“The Patriots Group is more united than before and determined to intensify its efforts, committing to continue and strengthen the political struggle for sovereignty, prosperity, and freedom for all European nations,” they said in a statement.
The group also includes Austria’s Freedom Party (FPÖ), France’s National Rally, Portugal’s Chega and other nationalist parties. With 84 of the European Parliament’s 720 seats, it is the chamber’s third-largest political group. Its chairman is Jordan Bardella, National Rally president, Marine Le Pen’s party that has developed particularly close political ties with Orbán, sharing positions on immigration, national sovereignty and opposition to the EU establishment.
Portugal has also seen the rapid rise of the far-right sovereigntist party, Chega. In the 2025 snap election, the party won 60 seats and 22.8% of the vote, becoming the second-largest party and the largest opposition force. Chega joined Orbán’s European alliance in 2024.
Sweden offers another example of how far-right influence can outlive an electoral setback. After a desperately tight race, voters rejected the prospect of the far-right in government. The Sweden Democrats’ share of the vote fell for the first time since it began as an openly neo-Nazi party in the late 1980s, slipping from second to third place behind the conservative Moderates. It may have lost ground, but the party remains a potent political force, spending years exerting considerable influence over Sweden’s centre-right government from outside the cabinet.
Across Europe, ideas once associated with the political fringe have entered mainstream political debate, particularly around migration, crime, national sovereignty and cultural identity.
Hungary is trying to dismantle the Orbán model
Yet there is, thankfully, counter forces to Orbán’s comeback, providing a glimmer of hope.
While he is attempting to mobilise supporters against Hungary’s new government, his successor, Péter Magyar, is moving in the opposite direction.
His government has promised to reverse parts of Orbán’s legacy and has already begun dismantling parts of the political and institutional infrastructure built during Orbán’s tenure, including replacing Orbán-era appointees and pursuing anti-corruption measures. This week, the government submitted legislation to roll back Orbán-era anti-LGBTQ+ rules and intends to reverse the effective ban on same-sex adoption introduced under the previous government.
And something else to make progressives smile – Orbán’s comeback should not be mistaken for a resurgence in domestic popularity. A Europion poll conducted on September 7 – 8 put Fidesz on just 26 percent, compared with 56 percent for Péter Magyar’s Tisza party. Tisza retains an absolute majority in Budapest, where it has 56 percent support, county-seat cities with 51 percent, voters under 40 with 52 percent and, most notably, university graduates with 62 percent.
The model survives
For Britain, the Orbán story is particularly relevant because his relationship with the British populist right is hardly new.
Since then, the political networks surrounding Orbán and Britain’s populist right have become increasingly interconnected through National Conservatism, MCC-linked organisations, conferences and think tanks.
This is what can be missed when Orbán is treated simply as a Hungarian phenomenon.
His most consequential export may not be a particular policy, but a political model – sovereignty placed above international institutions, liberal elites portrayed as enemies of the people, migration and cultural change framed as existential threats, traditional family values turned into political weapons, and independent institutions presented as obstacles to popular will.
Orbán may be out of power in Hungary. The political ecosystem he helped build is not. It reaches from Budapest to Brussels and Berlin, and, through networks linking the European and British populist right, into Britain too.
Orbán might be physically back but in terms of influence, he never really went away.
Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is author of Right-Wing Watch
BBC Question Time presenter Fiona Bruce roasted Reform MP Danny Kruger on the programme for his party’s hypocrisy and confected outrage over laws applying retrospectively.
Reform have been facing questions over donations the party has accepted from two crypto billionaires, Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo, who both gave £36 million each last week.
Questions have been raised over whether the donations are legal and if they would have to be returned.
Even before the current donations to Reform, the government was already looking at tightening the rules following the Rycroft Review into foreign financial influence. The government then said it would introduce a £100,000 annual cap on donations from overseas electors.
And the rules go further than simply stopping somebody living abroad from writing an enormous cheque. They would also continue to restrict some people who return to Britain, until they have been resident here for a full calendar year.
Crucially, the government intends the new limit to apply retrospectively to donations made since 25 March this year. Donations caught by the new rules and above the limit could therefore eventually have to be returned.
Reform have tried to claim that laws which apply retrospectively are undemocratic and unconstitutional and Kruger tried to make the same point on Question Time.
Bruce asked the East Wiltshire MP: “Do you think laws should never be applied retrospectively?”
When he replied that this is a “very important principle,” Bruce asked: “Then why does Reform want to retrospectively change the law by rescinding indefinite leave to remain to people that already have it?”
Reform MP Danny Kruger drew much laughter and ridicule after claiming that the two crypto billionaires who donated an eye watering £72 million to Nigel Farage’s party expected ‘nothing in return’.
Last week, crypto billionaires Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo donated £36 million each to the party in the space of just 24 hours.
Questions have been raised over whether the donations are legal and if they would have to be returned as well as over what Delo and Harborne are expecting in return from the party.
Even before the current donations to Reform, the government was already looking at tightening the rules following the Rycroft Review into foreign financial influence. The government then said it would introduce a £100,000 annual cap on donations from overseas electors, a move that could apply retrospectively.
Critics have pointed out that Reform has already given the crypto billionaires what they want, including a pledge to cut their taxes, lighter regulation of their industry, and to limit competition.
Kruger insisted on Question Time that the two donors would get nothing in return for their donation, which prompted much laughter from the audience.
He said: “I think that it’s an admirable thing that these two men – who will get nothing for it, no peerage, no policy. They’re not getting anything for it. There’s absolutely nothing in it for them.”
Reform continues to make the headlines for all the wrong reasons after its party leader in Wales announced he was stepping down following his arrest on suspicion of assault.
Dan Thomas, who became Reform UK Wales leader in February this year, was arrested on suspicion of assault and controlling or coercive behaviour. He was released without charge.
Thomas said in a statement: ““It has been the honour of my life to have been the leader of Reform Wales and see this party go from zero to 34 elected members and become the largest opposition group in Welsh history.
“With deep regret, I am now standing down from this position due to personal reasons.
“Over the weekend, I was reported to the police and was released without charge.
“I stress that I have done nothing wrong, but I do not want the coming headlines to be a distraction from the fantastic work our Senedd team is doing in holding this government to account.”
Gwent Police said: “On Sunday 13 September a 45-year-old man, from the Aberbargoed area, was arrested on suspicion of assault and engaging in controlling/coercive behaviour.
Reform continues to be exposed for having links with far-right thugs and groups, after an investigation revealed that a Facebook group involved in the recent far right anti migration protests which saw balaclava clad men block roads and cause disruption, was set up by a Reform activist.
Earlier this month, hundreds of men wearing all black and balaclavas took part in two anti-migrant protests in Dover and Portsmouth. In Dover they blocked the town’s two main roads for several hours and in Portsmouth they blocked migrant coaches.
Ministers condemned the “thuggish and intimidating behaviour” of far-right activists who blocked roads, and who were coordinated by Danny Thomas, a close associate of anti-migrant and anti-Muslim activist Tommy Robinson.
While Reform leader Nigel Farage issued condemnation of the far-right protesters, saying it was ‘disgusting’ and that nobody, ‘whether they’re on the left or right, should be wearing balaclavas’, it seems not everyone in Reform shares his sentiments with some keen to support Thomas’ far-right thugs.
HOPE not hate has discovered that the North East Patriot Platform and Tyneside Patriots Facebook pages, part of the Patriot Platform network that launched the intimidating masked vigilante actions in Dover and Portsmouth last week, have been set up by Mark Thorn, a Reform activist from Gateshead.
The anti-extremist group added: “Thorn describes himself as the “Reform UK Representative/Campaigner” for Gateshead Central & Whickham Constituency on his social media accounts, which contain a mix of pro-Reform and pro-Patriot Platform content, and appears to believe that the party’s criticisms of the movement are not sincere.
“Responding to criticism of Farage’s response from another member, Thorn argued that Farage public stance was guided by political necessity and might not match his “secretly and privately personal opinions”:
In the same Facebook group, five Reform councillors indicated that they were keen to support Patriot Platform’s activities. They included Cllr Trevor Shonk of Kent County Council, Cllrs Sandra Pickering and James Wright of Gateshead Council and Cllrs Paul Goldingay and Jamie Campbell of Solihull Council.
Reform UK has been plaugued by yet another crisis at its flagship local authority after three more councillors quit.
The three councillors quit Durham Council for a number of reasons, bringing Reform’s majority on the local authority down from 65 to 51.
Durham council was supposed to be one of Reform’s flagship local authorities, showing how the party would govern if elected in national office and yet far from being a success, it has been plagued by bitter infighting and defections.
One of the councillors who has quit, Lyndsey Fox, said: “I’ve been thinking of resigning for some time, and the reason is because I reported a very serious safeguarding issue on July 14, and we’re now two months on and I’ve heard nothing.”
Reform’s record in local government has been defined by bitter infighting, broken promises and incompetence.
Self-proclaimed ‘man of the people’ Nigel Farage has said that he will seek to stop trade unions giving money to the Labour Party.
Scandal hit Farage has said that he is willing to take drastic measures if the goverment forces Reform to hand back £72 million it has received from two crypto billionaires.
Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo donated £36m each to the party in the space of just 24 hours at the weekend. Questions have been raised over whether the donations are legal and if they would have to be returned.
Even before the current donations to Reform, the government was already looking at tightening the rules following the Rycroft Review into foreign financial influence. The government then said it would introduce a £100,000 annual cap on donations from overseas electors.
And the rules go further than simply stopping somebody living abroad from writing an enormous cheque. They would also continue to restrict some people who return to Britain, until they have been resident here for a full calendar year.
Crucially, the government intends the new limit to apply retrospectively to donations made since 25 March this year. Donations caught by the new rules and above the limit could therefore eventually have to be returned.
A panicked Farage, who claims to represent working people, has threatened to stop unions giving cash to the Labour Party in retaliation.
Writing in the Telegraph, Farage said he would look to retaliate by ending the unions’ historic funding of the Labour Party if he becomes prime minister.
He said: “The Unite union alone has given the Labour party over £50m over the course of the last few years. They’ve got the Employment Rights Act, not to mention big pay rises for bus drivers. If anybody is giving money to do political bidding, it’s the trade unions.
“So I would just warn the Labour party here and now: If you try and ban our donors, we in government would certainly ban funding from the trade unions. I don’t want to go down that route. But it’s something we would be prepared to do.”
Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds hit back telling HuffPost that trade union donations are different to those from billionaires.
He said: “When we talk about union donations, that is not one entity. That is tens of thousands of ordinary people choosing to make that donation, and it’s banded up and given from the union. But it’s very easy to opt out of that.
It’s going from bad to worse for Nigel Farage, after a new poll found that his popularity has fallen to its lowest level ever.
The poll, carried out by YouGov, found that 69% of Britons now have an unfavourable opinion of Nigel Farage, the highest recorded by the pollster in the decade it has been tracking Farage’s popularity.
Barely a quarter of voters (24%) have a favourable view of the Reform chief, giving him a net favourability rating of minus 45.
By contrast, 46% of people have a favourable view of Labour leader and prime minister Andy Burnham. It comes after Burnham promised bold and radical measures on the cost of living crisis.
Farage meanwhile has lurched from one scandal to the next, and faces a Standards Committee probe into his failure to declare a personal £5 million “gift” he received from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne shortly before becoming an MP in 2024.
While Reform may be very gleeful right now over the £72million in donations they have secured from two crypto billionaires, it turns out that they could face an investigation from the elections watchdog over the cash given to them.
HuffPost UK reports that Labour MP Phil Brickell has asked the Electoral Commission to clarify whether Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne’s donations are permissible. Harborne and Delo donated £36m each to the party in the space of just 24 hours at the weekend. Questions have been raised over whether the donations are legal and if they would have to be returned.
Even before the current donations to Reform, the government was already looking at tightening the rules following the Rycroft Review into foreign financial influence. The government then said it would introduce a £100,000 annual cap on donations from overseas electors.
Delo has moved back to the UK from Hong Kong, while Harborne is now registered to vote in Hampshire, although it is unclear whether he still lives in Thailand.
Now it turns out that the Electoral Commission could investigate Reform over the donations too after Labour MP Phil Brickell wrote to them.
The HuffPost reports: “Brickell, who is chair of the all-party parliamentary group on anti-corruption, said: “The British public deserve complete confidence that all political donations are lawful, transparent and come with no strings attached.”
In a letter to Electoral Commission chief executive Dr Vijay Rangarajan, seen by HuffPost UK, Brickell says “it appears very likely that both donors were still registered overseas on – and for some time after – March 25, 2026”.
He added: “I would therefore be very grateful for swift clarification from the Electoral Commission on whether you see grounds for opening an investigation into the permissibility of the two £36m donations.”
“The first reaction is horror,” is how the left-liberal Der Spiegel described the shocking victory of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in the recent local elections.
The newspaper pointed to the historical significance of a party that does not draw a clear dividing line from Nazi Germany winning an election by such a large margin more than 80 years after the Nazi dictatorship.
Would Der Spiegel be able to make such a critical assessment if the AfD were in government and had the power to change the law?
The far-right party has long targeted Germany’s established media by undermining its credibility, threatening its funding and becoming a social media superpower to bypass traditional journalists entirely.
“We want to finally pull the plug on this woke, anti-German and manipulative influence,” said Ulrich Siegmund, the party’s parliamentary group co-leader in Saxony-Anhalt, when promising to “terminate” the public broadcasting agreement.
And it’s not just in Germany. Across Europe, right-wing governments have shown how political power can be used to reshape the rules governing the media, weaken independent journalism and make life increasingly difficult for outlets that scrutinise those in power.
And we are already seeing the warning signs here in Britain.
Just last week, Reform UK blocked a Left Foot Forward journalist from attending its party conference, claiming it was “overcapacity” for media applications, despite the party selling additional late-registration media passes for £100.
Other journalists who have investigated Reform were also refused passes, including Michael Crick, Peter Geoghegan, whose conference pass was rejected less than an hour after he published a story revealing how Isabel Oakeshott, the right wing journalist, had privately called Reform mega donor Christopher Harborne “untrustworthy.” The Guardian’s Anna Isaac, who broke the story about Nigel Farage accepting an undeclared £5m gift from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne, was also refused a pass.
This is the party that routinely presents itself as a defender of free speech while portraying the media as part of an Establishment conspiracy against it.
When attacks become law
Russia provides the bleakest example of what happens when such parties have the power to change the rules governing the media.
Following Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the government introduced laws criminalising what it deemed “knowingly spreading false information” or “discrediting” the military.
The legislation effectively destroyed what remained of Russia’s independent media. Outlets were forced to close or flee the country, while Novaya Gazeta suspended its coverage of the war because of fears the new laws would be used against its journalists.
As Professor Marko Milanovic of the University of Reading wrote: “The freedoms of speech and protest have been dying a long, slow death in Vladimir Putin’s Russia.”
Hungary offers another example.
Viktor Orbán used his parliamentary majority to rewrite the constitution and introduce sweeping media laws. His government took control of public broadcasting while changing the legal and regulatory environment in ways that helped government-friendly oligarchs acquire private media.
Reporters Without Borders estimates that the Orbán government came to control around 80% of Hungary’s media outlets. The pattern is clear: first, discredit journalists as biased or hostile, then change the laws and institutions governing the media, and finally, use those powers to reshape what the public is allowed to see and hear.
Italy under Giorgia Meloni has also seen concerns over press freedom, including the use of defamation cases against journalists and public figures. Italy has fallen from 41st to 49th in the World Press Freedom Index since Meloni’s party came to power. When the European Commission flagged this in a rule of law report, Meloni accused left-leaning Italian media of twisting its findings. Last summer, the Italian prime minister was caught telling Donald Trump at the White House: “I never want to speak to my press.”
And as for Trump, since returning to office, he has used lawsuits, threats against broadcasters, restrictions on journalists’ access and the power of government agencies to put pressure on media organisations.
Last month, Walt Disney sued the Federal Communications Commission, accusing the Trump administration of launching a “retaliatory campaign” against its ABC television networks over their broadcasts. Trump has repeatedly called for the FCC to revoke ABC’s licences.
Reporters Without Borders has warned that Trump’s administration is not merely attacking journalism rhetorically but reducing the physical and institutional space in which journalists can operate.
“It’s a very basic tactic but a fundamental hit to press freedom,” said Clayton Weimers, executive director of Reporters Without Borders USA. “Just as he wants to control the narrative in print and on the airwaves using government pressure or lawsuits against media outlets, he’s also trying to control the narrative by restricting the press’s access to spaces where crucial decisions are made, avoiding transparency and accountability,”
A politician complaining about an unfavourable coverage is one thing, but when a government changes the law, controls regulators, threatens licences or turns the courts and state institutions against media organisations, the stakes are entirely different.
And what about Reform and its dubious ‘Free Speech Bill’?
Ahead of the 2024 general election, Reform pledged that a Reform-led government would begin reforming what it described as the “out-of-touch,” “wasteful” and “institutionally biased” BBC within 100 days of the next Parliament.
Its manifesto, rebranded as “our contract with you” rather than a manifesto, promised to scrap the TV licence, which it branded “taxation without representation”. “In a world of on-demand TV,” it declared, “people should be free to choose.”
The party also called for a Free Speech Bill, supposedly designed to protect “personal freedom and democracy,” while promising to legislate against what it described as “left-wing bias and politically correct ideology.” It pledged to put an end to “cancel culture,” “left wing hate mobs” and “political bias in public institutions.”
The contradiction is difficult to miss. Reform presents itself as the defender of free speech while simultaneously proposing to use legislation to combat viewpoints and ideas it considers too left-wing.
In his party conference speech last week, Nigel Farage pledged to eliminate “obstacles” to his plans, declaring he would use a “national emergency” if he wins power. He also threatened to overhaul the House of Lords and how judges are appointed if they stood in the way.
Identifying the judiciary as another potential “obstacle,” Farage promised to remove the judges’ ability to rely on conventions such as the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR).
“Parliament makes the law, judges interpret the law. We will do whatever it takes, and perhaps have to consider how judicial appointments work in the future,” he said.
The ‘national emergency’ tactic is familiar in Trump’s America, where emergency powers have been used to justify sweeping changes to government and the law. Critics have warned that normalising the language of permanent crisis risks weakening democratic norms and giving governments greater scope to exercise extraordinary powers, including over the media.
“In any emergency-power regime, it’s crucial that the ‘emergency’ trigger be carefully defined and cautiously applied, lest the state of emergency become the new normal,” said David Pozen, a Columbia University law professor. “Yet that seems to be exactly what Trump wants – to govern in perpetual crisis model.”
And warnings about what a Reform government could mean for the free press and the laws governing are are also mounting.
In August, Labour’s Bridget Phillipson accused Reform deputy leader Richard Tice of a “chilling attempt to silence a free press” after he sent a legal threat to the Guardian over its reporting on his financial affairs.
The National Union of Journalists has also condemned Reform’s restrictions on journalists, urging all political parties to “demonstrate their commitment to media freedom and uphold the public’s right to be informed.”
Even Kemi Badenoch warned that the party’s behaviour could offer a glimpse of how it might govern.
“I think you could … [see] what kind of government they would be – authoritarian and using state power actually to pursue opponents is what they’ve effectively been threatening.
“We believe in free speech. We believe in a free press. And yes, of course, that might be painful for us as politicians, but public scrutiny is part of the gig. If Nigel Farage can’t handle difficult questions about his dodgy £5m then he shouldn’t be a politician.”
Farage’s complaints about the media are hardly convincing when so much of the right-wing press has spent years giving him and Reform a sympathetic platform.
But the victim narrative remains politically useful. Reform can cast itself as an outsider battling a hostile Establishment while simultaneously behaving like a political organisation that wants to control which journalists get access to it.
The crucial issue, however, is not whether Reform dislikes Left Foot Forward, the Guardian or any other publication.
It’s what happens if a party that regards critical journalism as an attack acquires the power to change the laws governing journalism itself.
Russia, Hungary and Trump’s America show why that question matters.
Free speech is not simply the right of politicians to say what they want.
It’s also the right of journalists to scrutinise those politicians, and the ability to do so without governments changing the law to punish them for it.
That is the real test of whether a government believes in a free press. And one Reform should be prepared to answer.
Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is author of Right-Wing Watch
Reform UK’s X account has put out a photo of Tory-turned-Reform UK MP Suella Braverman with a JCB digger during a visit to the construction equipment company’s HQ in Staffordshire.
J.C Bamford Excavators Limited donated £200,000 to Reform UK in November last year, as well as £200,000 to the Conservatives.
The chair of JCB, Anthony Bamford, and his brother Mark have been subject to a long-running investigation by HMRC due to their attempts to aggressively minimise their payment of tax in the UK by holding their money in offshore tax havens and companies.
The social media post featured a photo of Braverman with a JCB digger and JCB workers, with the caption: “One message stood out to Suella Braverman while visiting apprentices at the JCB World HQ today.
“Britain is overdue a Skills Revolution, with more apprenticeships for young British people.”
One X user wrote: “Here are Reform actively promoting one of their donors and advertising their product.”
Nigel Farage, Richard Tice, Lee Anderson, Robert Jenrick, Zia Yusuf, Sarah Pochin have also all used their social media platforms to promote the JCB Pothole Pro machine.
This is despite the mayoral position she was running for not being responsible for upkeep of the roads.
Last month, Andrew Harrison, the Reform leader of Leicestershire County Council, and his highways cabinet member Andrew Hamilton-Gray, announced that the council had signed up to trial the Pothole Pro.
This is despite an assessment by highways officers in Leicestershire in 2025 concluding the vehicle was “too big” to deploy efficiently and was “not economical”.
The Labour Party has extended its lead over Reform UK in the latest poll of Westminster voting intention, as Andy Burnham continues to reverse the party’s fortunes.
In the latest poll, carried out by Survation, Labour are on 28%, up one point, while Reform are on 23%, down one point.
The Tories meanwhile are on 21%, while the Liberal Democrats are on 10%.
It comes as Nigel Farage struggles to reach the polling highs Reform had seen last year when the party was in the lead and averaging around 30%.
After being hit by a number of scandals including his failure to declare a £5million gift received from crypto-billionaire Christopher Harborne, Farage has struggled.
Reform has continued to tumble in the polls since Burnham became Labour leader, as he focuses on addressing the cost of living and taking the fight to Reform.
A Reform council leader has been accused of “deliberately” encouraging vigilantism among anti-migrant activists with his plans to publish a list of Houses of Multiple Occupancy (HMOs) in the area.
George Finch, who is leader of both Warwickshire County Council and Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council, announced at a council meeting last night that he plans to publish a list of HMOs across Nuneaton and Bedworth borough.
Finch has said that he wants to create an HMO register for “transparency” reasons.
He said: “The public have asked for transparency, they don’t know who lives in these HMOs and it is right that we tell them the facts.”
The 20-year-old councillor added: “We don’t know who these people are who commit atrocious crimes.”
The Reform council leader’s decision comes after an asylum seeker living in an HMO in Nuneaton was found guilty of and jailed for raping a 12-year-old girl last year.
Green Party councillor Keith Kondakor said that HMOs in Nuneaton and Bedworth house asylum seekers, vulnerable women, disabled children, as well as professionals who live in housing that happens to be classified as an HMO.
The Reform-run council pledged to introduce an Article 4 direction, which would make it more difficult to set up HMOs in the borough. In the meantime, Finch has said he wants to make a list of HMOs publicly available.
Kondakor told Left Foot Forward: “There’ll be a list of maybe 200 addresses produced, all of which will then be at risk of vigilante attacks and misinformation.”
Kondakor said that after the rape conviction, the police had to drive around HMOs making sure anti-migrant protesters weren’t gathering outside.
“It was a major distraction of police time and all the people in the accommodation felt unsafe,” he said.
The Green councillor called Finch’s plan to publish a list of the HMOs “worrying” and “absolutely reckless”, adding “it won’t do our town any good at all”.
Asked if Finch is encouraging people to go to the addresses, Kondakor said he thinks he is.
“I think he’s doing it deliberately,” he said.
“He wants other people to do the dirty work. It’s like when we had the protest and things, he always keeps that bit of distance from anything illegal, but actually, he’s putting the petrol on the fire effectively. He does it all the time,” Kondakor added.
Labour councillor Brady Hughes called Finch’s plan “dangerous,” branding it a “populist policy to appeal to Reform voters and incite hatred”.
“It’s going to create vigilantism,” she added.
Hughes said: “They’re [Reform] deliberately trying to link these with asylum seekers, of which there are not many in this town, and my fear it is just going to create more division.”
Finch has said the list of HMOs will be published as soon as next week.
Hughes said that Reform “can’t do it, not without a risk assessment by council officers, not without input from police”.
She added: “I think it is quite worrying that they’re trying to force officers’ hands into publishing the list.”
The Labour councillor said Finch keeps bringing up the case of the rape of the 12-year-old, “He’s got to stop using that because he keeps bringing it up and he forgets who the victim is in all of this”.
Hughes added: “It’s wrong and he’s not a nice person to be quite frank.”
Labour and Green Party councillors in Nuneaton and Bedworth support tightening up HMO licensing and looking at bringing in an Article 4 directive, but strongly oppose publishing any addresses.
Hughes said that two Conservative councillors who attended the meeting were in favour of Finch’s plan.
Reform UK continues to become the home of failed Tory politicians, after yet another former Conservative MP defected to Nigel Farage’s party.
Despite just four months ago Zia Yusuf vowing that no more Tories would be joining the party, Jane Stevenson who was elected the Tory MP Wolverhampton North East in 2019, but lost her seat to Labour at the 2024 general election, has now defected to Reform.
She told the BBC that she wanted to pursue “more radical solutions to our country’s problems”.
“I especially like Reform’s work from Danny Kruger on reducing and reorganising Whitehall/quangos and bringing back ministerial power and accountability,” she said.
So much for Reform being anti-establishment, the party is now the refuge of failed Tories.
Reform MP Robert Jenrick has now said that the Reform member who attacked a woman with a crutch at Reform conference last week “should be given a medal”.
In an interview with LBC on Monday, Jenrick justified the Reform supporter attacking the woman and said he had “zero sympathy” for her.
Speaking to TalkTV’s Peter Cardwell yesterday afternoon, a viewer asked Jenrick to apologise to the young female Climate Resistance protester who was hit over the head with a crutch by a pensioner at the conference.
The viewer also asked if the pensioner had had his Reform membership suspended.
Jenrick said: “I’m not going to apologise.”
He said it was “an occupational hazard if you’re a professional protester who goes into conferences, tries to disrupt the speech of the leader”.
Jenrick added: “Remember this is a leader whose life has been threatened in recent times. This was a speech that had been delayed because counter-terrorism police…”
The protesters did not threaten violence against Farage or attempt to attack him. However, the police has confirmed it is now investigating incidents in which five protesters were attacked by Reform conference attendees.
West Midlands Police has also said that counter terrorism police had no involvement in Reform conference and did not tell Reform to delay Farage’s speech due to a threat.
Cardwell said: “Did that person deserve to get walloped over the face with a crutch? Is that reasonable?”.
Jenrick responded: “Peter, Peter come on. A professional protester is moaning that an old age pensioner knocked her with a crutch. I mean come on. Honestly I just think it’s completely and utterly ridiculous.”
The TalkTV presenter added: “It wasn’t just that. They had their hair pulled. Have you not a smidgeon of sympathy Robert… none whatsoever?”.
Jenrick said: “I don’t have any sympathy for her, no. In fact I’m sorry for the OAP who’s had his picture plastered all over the papers, he should be given a medal for what he’s done.”
The Metropolitan Police have announced that they have launched an investigation into allegations that Reform UK broke the law on political donations after an undercover Channel 4 report.
It comes after footage was released by undercover reporters showing senior members of Farage’s team appearing to plot to avoid electoral laws on foreign donations in an undercover investigation broadcast by Channel 4 News.
A senior aide to Farage, Dan Jukes, was filmed suggesting a way to get around electoral law to secure a foreign donation of £500,000 for Reform UK.
Electoral law in the UK states that to be a permissible donor to a UK political party you must be a UK registered voter, or a company registered in the UK.
In a statement, the Metropolitan Police said they had “assessed the information provided and determined that there are potential offences requiring investigation”.
A Met spokesperson said it had received “a number of reports relating to donations and polling involving a political party”, after the film by Channel 4 News and Verbatim Investigations was shown on Thursday evening.
In its statement, the force said: “All allegations under investigation relate to potential offences under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000.”
“Detectives continue to liaise closely with the Electoral Commission and Crown Prosecution Service as enquiries progress.”
A Reform spokesman said: “Reform UK denies any wrongdoing and will fully co-operate with the investigation.
“We won’t be commenting further while a live investigation is under way.”
The West Midlands Police is continuing its investigation into assaults on five people at Reform conference last weekend.
Video footage has been circulating on social media of protesters being assaulted on Friday at Reform’s conference.
The protesters were part of Climate Resistance, and disrupted Nigel Farage’s keynote speech on Friday afternoon.
In response, Reform conference attendees are seen attacking the hecklers.
In one video, an older man with a walking stick is seen hitting a female protester over the head, while another grabs her mouth and people push her.
Reacting to the assaults, Reform MP Robert Jenrick said he had “zero sympathy” for the protesters who were attacked.
He also justified the violence carried out by members of the audience, saying: “What do you expect them to do?”.
Farage laughed at the disruption and said: “We’ve got a screamer. Oh dear.”
The Reform leader also said to the conference hall: “That poor young girl, she looked like she was going to do herself an injury”, before adding, “boring, boring, boring”.
The police have been urging the protesters who were attacked to come forward.
In a statement, the West Midlands police force said: “To date, none of the victims involved have come forward. We continue to encourage them to do so.”
The statement added: “A number of suspects have been identified as the investigation progresses.”
LFF spoke with a Climate Resistance activist who attended Reform conference at the weekend, who said she was unsure if one of the women who was assaulted would report the incident to the police.
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