Count Binface’s Candidacy Mocks Farage’s ‘Egotistical’ By-Election Stunt | Fraser Nelson

They should not have the power to inflict this hassle on their constituents.They should be serving them, not using them as props for a great egotistical political drama.But given that the system is happening, I think this is quite an appropriate response, mockery.

But let's start by talking about another major figure in British politics, the Reform UK leader, Nigel Farage.He's tried to explain why why he wants a by -election, and he's now tried to explain why the by -election with Count Binface as his main opponent isn't ridiculous.But Charlotte, I guess the question is, is it ridiculous?And if it is ridiculous, does that actually matter that Farage versus a man dressed as a bin Is there a danger that could harm Farage somewhere along the way?

I sort of feel like that's one of those questions that's kind of answered itself in the asking.Is it ridiculous that Farage versus a man dressed like a bin?Yes, it is.Can I go now?

No.

It is ridiculous.It is extremely odd that we are going to spend the summer watching Nigel Farage square up against this guy with a bin on his head.I was trying to think on the tube on the way in here whether there is any way that Farage can sort of jujitsu his way into making this, you know, versus the establishment, something like that.I think the idea that they're all laughing at you would be quite a dangerous and powerful one for the people of Clackton, for people in general, you know.The idea that everyone in Westminster is having a big laugh at people's expense, I think is a very powerful one.Which they probably are.

I don't know.

Are people in Westminster finding the situation funny?

Yes, they are.But is that at voters' expense?

That's an interesting question.

So who is it who's taking the mick out of the voters?Is it Calvin Feith in the establishment who have rode behind him, or is it Nigel Farage?And I can really see it tipping over in the pro -Farage direction, if he's clever.And I don't know whether he will be clever enough.He's certainly on the back foot at the moment.

There's also the question of whether we'll just get bored of it collectively, because it's not actually an active by -election, it's silly.And therefore,we've had the thing of Binface versus Farage, Rachel Reeves has made a joke, all of that's happened.We can't keep trailing around Claxton for six weeks pretending this by -election is meaningful, can we?

No, and Nigel Farage is unbelievably good at gathering media attention.You saw it in his giving this announcement of the by -election, you know, he tweeted out, what was it, at 2pm I'll be making a statement about my political future or my future in public life and everyone was sort of fizzing with excitement for a few hours and for a long time it was just him ranting on about how hard done by he was while all the cameras of the British media were focused on him, you know, everyone's got it live on their news channel, so he's skilful.The British media was out to get him.The British media was out to get him as they sort of platform this grand rant about how unfair it all is.The question, I think if the other parties had stood, this would have been huge for Farage.No one would have talked about anything but Farage, particularly because we are about to enter a period of no parliament sitting, we are in between governments, no one's really doing anything.

But he has really been rather stymied here.So yeah, I think it's all going to quieten down for him and he'll just be there kind of trudging around delivering leaflets.

I guess the question for us is, does this harm him in a way?I mean, how ridiculous do you judge it to be?It's a great question from Charlotte, I've not heard it articulated that way.

is laughing at whom is a really fascinating way of actually describing this this issue collector yeah well of course it's ridiculous i mean count benface is there as a uniquely british character who serves a rather serious purpose he is there to the mock, the sheer pomposity of all of this.I mean, when he was there for the Makerfield by -election, that was there to kind of mock the process.Now, a British system where any MP can have a hissy fit and then mock whoever is, force his constituents into a by -election, that, of course, is ridiculous as well.And Campbell faces making this basic democratic point.And do you think

I mean, Kate and I have been trying to wrestle with this, what's a good number for him or a bad number for Farage?Because Farage got 46 % last time, his base is going to be very energised because they won't want him to look ridiculous, you'd imagine.So say he gets 50, if Count Binface gets the protest vote, gets 25, 20, 15, does that matter at all or is this just all going to be forgotten in a moment, do you think?

Well, to be honest, it's the juxtaposition.I mean, Nigel Farage wanted a juxtaposition of him versus the reviled establishment.He wanted to misrepresent a by -election as a kind of referendum on whether he's entitled to take five million quid from Thailand without declaring it.He wanted to conflate these two issues.He hasn't been able to do that.And he now stands held up to ridicule by Count Boonface.

So this is a rather elegant democratic point, if you ask me. I think MPs should not have the power to hold these by -elections.I was saying this when Zac Goldsmith called one over Heathrow, when Nadine Dorries called one over her.not being admitted into the House of Lords when David Davis called one over civil liberties.They should not have the power to inflict this hassle on their constituents.They should be serving them, not using them as props for a great egotistical political drama.But given that the system is happening, I think this is quite an appropriate response, mockery.

questions for Reform UK about their sort of conversations they've had with the Governor of the Bank of England?

Yeah, I almost want to say that doesn't matter hugely.Richard Tice, of course, set up that meeting with the Governor of the Bank of England so that they could discuss cryptocurrencies and one of their investors, I suppose you call him, is heavily invested in cryptocurrencies.I'm not sure Robert Jemmrick matters hugely to Reform, no offence meant to him.I think this is a party that literallyor dies on the back of one man and that is why you see them all rallying behind him.You know, it's easy to imagine if this was another party of a similar size, say Lib Dems, Greens, something like that, although they're similar in different ways, they could just decapitate the leader, get on with their lives, but this really is a one -man state.

So yeah.

There's another way of looking at it, Fraser, which is the Trump prism, which is when people use lawfare against Trump, when the establishment in America or the state in America tried to do Trump on standards, on regulations, on infractions of either rules or the law, in many ways that empowered an electorate to vote him in again.And I guess the question, which I think is fascinating in this, is that How many people will be energised because they feel this is the establishment going after Frye?So there'll be more and more stories about financial impropriety.Whether they turn out to be true or not is not my point.There'll just be lots more stories.We're going to see a summer of stories about reform and problems with people paying money towards them, strikes me.

Now that could either be very damaging to the party or it could be the Trump version which is it just empowers them to say this is everyone out to get us.

Well, this is exactly Nigel Farage's playbook.And when he was over, actually, in America recently, Trump made the same point that they're trying to use the same tactics on you, Nigel, as they did on me.But in America, their tradition of sort of politicised investigations is very different to what's going on here.The Parliamentary Standards Commission is completely apolitical.And it's quite simple.Nigel Farage took a five million quid gift, but he didn't even tell others in reform about, let alone his constituents and let alone Parliament, they are all required to do.

Now, this isn't a kind of hounding, although he's trying to frame it as one.And the investigations into his other dealings, there's a very important story today about how he's been lobbying the Bank of England on very specific points about cryptocurrency.Now, why would Farage do that?given that he doesn't have a policy in energy?He doesn't have a policy on education.Why should he be lobbying, actively lobbying on behalf of the crypto barons?

Now, is that connected to the fact that Reform gets most of his money from crypto kings?Is that related to the fact that he got five million quid from a crypto king in Thailand?Now, this isn't a political setup question.This is a really legitimate question about the relationship between power money.Now it does take you right to say that perhaps the press interest in this may go on to make reform supporters thinking okay we're gonna dig down, we're going to back Nigel Thoreau out to get him.It's not newspapers' job to increase or decrease support for Reform UK.

It's newspapers' job to find the truth and to put information into the public realm.So the newspapers don't have a political agenda.Now if this may well end up helping Farage, I've got no idea whether it does or whether it doesn't makes not one blind bit of difference to the journalist's duty to investigate.

The UK has the largest second chamber on the planet.

peers now, if it's not resignation honours then it's pretty similar to them.They do have to deal with the reality as it exists and I think that's a sensible and pragmatic thing to be doing.Is this going to cause a political problem for the Labour Party in the future?Probably not.I'm not well preparedthis is top of anyone's agenda.

Yes it is.You think people don't care?I think if you push people on it...I think people would A. say a lot of people don't like the House of Lords, you know, anti -democratic, da di da.A lot of people don't like it when politicians U -turn on things.So I think if you were to turn up with a clipboard and ask a series of questions, people would say they're not happy.

Do I think anybody's vote will be swayed by this?Do I think anybody would raise it in a focus group?I'd be utterly, utterly astonished.

But Fraser, does it go to that kind of question about undermining manifestos?Because this was something that Labour did campaign on, and Charlotte's probably right.it's not going to be the top of most people's lists.But it was something that they made fairly central to their argument about redoing politics, changing it, doing it in a different way.And now Keir Starmer is appointing 19 more people into the House of Lords.

Yes, well, restoring trust in politics, that's how Keir Starmer framed it when he spoke about Hazel Lord's reform.But like most other governments before him, he hasn't succeeded in getting it through.He's done phase one, I think it was like 15 hereditary peers, completing Blair's unfinished business.But most people really don't care about this.I mean, when you talk about manifesto promises, one of those promises was to make Britain the fastest growing country in the G7.Now, that makes a difference to people.

If that was true, people without being a cost of living crisis would be on their way out of the economic mess.And that is an important promise, as is the promise on jobs unmet, the promise on living standards, I mean, and the promise on building new houses.These were hard promises.And we've yet to see if Andy Burnham is going to try to wriggle out of them saying, well, they were Keir Starmer's promises.They weren't mine.They are the ones that matter.

I think the House of Lords is a bizarre diversion from these far more important pledges.

Charlie, you know Westminster really well.That's a very fair point you made.just from someone I'm an outsider to Westminster the ideaof appointing your bag carriers to become a lord, to get 350 quid or whatever it is of a day tax -free, forever, because they carried your bag successfully for 18 months, having said you're going to abolish the whole institution and then still feathering that nest in that way, I think it's disgraceful.I mean I I actually think it's corrupt, and it's a banana -republic tactic of the political class in this country to basically look after their mates.And it's not the most important thing, and you'll both be very fair on that.

And yet, if you pare it back down, it's a disgrace.That's not a disgrace.I'm getting my mate to be a lord for no good reason other than I want him to, and he gets a living for life in a vastly overexpanded second chamber.

I can completely see where you're coming from.And I what I'm about to say, I don't think disagrees with you, but it perhaps sort of sits alongside what you're saying.The bag carriers who go in are quite vital to the running of the House of Lords.They tend to be younger.They tend to be in their sort of 30s, 40s, 50s.And even in your 50s, you are the youngest person in the House of Lords.

Pretty much.They are the ones who still want to do ministerial roles, for example.They are the ones who still want to go into government departments.They want to be whips.They turn up.They sit on committee.

they do things and they try really hard particularly actually the ones that sort of probably you know by rights weren't that qualified to be there because they really want to prove themselves so I do think they add value to the institution as currently exists.Is it bad that they're there in the first place?It sort of is the same as anybody else, isn't it?The one that really winds me up is party donors.That I just find, you know, absurd.I think the Conservative Party did quite a lot of that.

I'm sure that we could be able to dig out some Labour ones that I haven't paid as much attention to as well.They haven't even particularly served their country.Yes, many of them will be successful businessmen who have created jobs, etc.etc.But there are a lot of successful businessmen who don't get that ball ball.What I will also say as well is that 350 quid a day, it's tax free, it's only if you turn up and you've got to do something.

So you can't anymore just turn up, hang your coat up, you know, check in, you do have to vote, you do have to speak, you do have to do something.And if you add it up over the course of the year, it only comes and I'm aware I'm about to say a number that's above the national average salary it does only come to 50 grand a year and a lot of these people are professionals who probably could earn more elsewhere if you do become a minister it's unpaid and that means you can't take jobs elsewhere so it's not this sort of mega gravy train it's a decent salary but you're I don't even think unless you know I'm not quite sure where I am on inflation and and various things and fiscal drag but I don't even think you're a high -rate taxpayer Because it's counted as a benefit, not a salary.

So it's 50 grand tax -free, so that's 100 grand if you were to own it as a salary.So I do take the point.And some people really, it does annoy some of our listeners, whether it fits in the top three things people complain about, maybe it doesn't.One of our themes generally is how much can we trust the political establishment, because that's often raised, isn't it?

Yeah, I feel the same as you.I feel really aggrieved by it sometimes.I think some of those appointments are genuinely terrible.And for people who basically, and we saw this, we're going to talk to Emily Thornberry about Peter Mandelson, we actually saw this conversation play out in the Mandelson evidence sessions about Matthew Doyle, which was basically, we need to remove him, we need to give him something.Is it some big job, big foreign job, big ambassadorial job?Oh no, we'll just put him in the House of Lords.

and all the problems that come along with that.