Nigel Farage has been accused of breaking Commons rules by not declaring a £5m gift from a crypto billionaire.
This week, the Guardian revealed that Farage had been given £5m from by British cryptocurrency investor Christopher Harborne, who is based in Thailand and has since donated millions to Reform UK.
The money was handed to Farage in early 2024, just weeks before he announced his U-turn decision to stand as an MP in that year’s general election.
In an interview with the Telegraph, the Reform UK leader said had been given the money to pay for personal protection “so that I would be safe and secure for the rest of my life”.
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He also revealed to the newspaper that his home had been targeted last year in a firebomb attack.
Both Labour and the Conservatives have now accused the Clacton MP of breaking Commons rules by not declaring the £5m gift in the register of interests.
The Commons code of conduct states that new MPs “must register all their current financial interests, and any registrable benefits (other than earnings) received in the 12 months before their election within one month of their election”.
Labour Party chair Anna Turley said Farage “appears to have broken the rules again by failing to declare this cash from his billionaire backer”.
Conservative party chair Kevin Hollinrake said that as a new MP, he should have declared the gift, adding: “Why does Reform think the rules don’t apply to them?
“This stinks and Reform should come clean now.”
He announced in a post on X that the Tories had referred Farage to the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner.
Farage’s team have claimed there was no requirement to declare the money because it was a personal gift.
Meanwhile, some have raised questions about the timing of the financial gift and whether this may have played in a part in not just Farage’s decision to stand as an MP but also Reform’s subsequent pro-crypto stance.
And others have compared the attention around the story to the media storms that have been taken place in the past when it came to the likes of Keir Starmer not declaring gifts like glasses.