Farage vs Binface: How Nigel humiliated himself | The News Agents

Nigel Farage called this by -election yesterday on the basis of it being a people versus the establishment by -election.That line is becoming harder and harder to prosecute.Why?Because it appears that his principal opponent, at least for now, is going to be a bin.

I was actually quite stunned by that.I was stunned by the speed at which it all happened.And you've been hearing little murmurings going, well, maybe Nigel is a bit of a problem.The whole thing is now a sham.The News Agent's podcast is brought to you by HSBC UK, opening up a world of opportunity.

This is a global production.Britain is broken and the public know it, and we need change.Why should I be judged today or in history in the future by Sky News and their ilk?The issue with my daughter was the final straw.Enough is enough.Why should they be the people that decide my fate when, as I repeat, I've done nothing wrong?

No, I've decided that the people of Clapton should be the judges of my actions.This will be a people versus the establishment by -election.

That's Nigel's first campaign video for a contest no one is entering.Reform says he's facing a deep state conspiracy.But as the by -election backfires, Has Farage been left looking ridiculous?Welcome to The News Agents.

The News Agents.

It's Maitlis.

And it's Lewis.And yesterday, when we were breaking down and digesting exactly why Nigel Farage had chosen to resign his own seat, resign his own seat before even the outcome of the respective inquiries into his financial conduct had concluded, we said,that by -elections sometimes have a habit, particularly self -imposed ones, a habit of running away from you and becoming unpredictable.And I think it's fair to say that not even 24 hours at the time of recording on, that is definitely the case because Nigel Farage called this by -election yesterday on the basis of it being a people versus the establishment by -election.i .e.

if you voted for him, it would be a poke between the eyes for the establishment, and if you voted for someone else, then that would be a loss for you, the people.And yet, less than 24 hours on, as I say, that line is becoming harder and harder to prosecute.Why?Because it appears that his principal opponent, at least for now, is going to be a bin.And when your principal opponent is a bin, it is quite hard to prosecute the idea that you were taking on the establishment, although I suppose we should say in fairness that that particular bin is a count.So Count Binface at the moment is the only principal opponent in this by -election because every other party, Labour, the Conservatives, the Greens, the Lib Dems, they are all refusing to put up a candidate against Farage because they are saying that this is a stunt, this is a gimmick and they're not going to play Farage's game.

And so the reformer now in a position where all they're able to do is say these people are cowards they're refusing to take us on but in terms of actually realising, exactly as we were saying Emily yesterday, actually realising something, a political product, something that this is going to do for Farage, already you are seeing the downsides of it because the first 24 hours of this by -election campaign against the bin have been dogged by questions about financial conduct and the financial affairs that Nigel Farage wanted to get away from.And just listen, the tone of this to me has been absolutelyfrom reform spokespeople who have clearly made a conscious decision to go out on the offensive.But the danger is instead they are sounding very, very rattled.Just listen to Robert Jenrick in an interview yesterday.

dodge an inquiry which he can feel was going the wrong way for him.

Nigel was very clear that he has broken no rules.He's an absolute...He's not the arbiter of that.That's not how it works as an MP.He's done absolutely nothing wrong.But he doesn't sit in judgment.

The people sit in judgment.Actually, there are rules about how an MP behaves.Actually, we're a democracy, or at least we in reform believe it.You might not think that if you look at the other parties.It sounds very Trumpian, because Donald Trump would say, the fact that voters vote for me, that trumps everything else.Look what the Labour Party is doing.

They've announced they're going to change the law so that British citizens cannot give donations to reform.You've changed subject there.I was asking about the rules that govern behaviour and MPs.This comes on the back of the Labour Party illegally cancelling the election of five million people.You've got the leader of the Conservative Party likening Nigel Farage to Jeremy Thorpe, a man who stood trial for incitement for murder.

You're jumping on different subjects there.

You've got parts of the media banging on the door of Nigel's own daughter's house, someone who's got nothing to do with public life.

You're jumping lots of subjects there.It's all the same story.Sky News knocking on someone's door is the same as whether an MP should accept the rules of Parliament.

That's quite a jumble.The establishment are trying to play judge and jury and executioner.Well, enough of that.

So that's Robert Jenrick there.I think it's fair to say playing every song from the MAGA chorus, deflection, dissembling, refusing to engage with the question and Gary Gibbon, who you were hearing there from Channel 4, asking exactly the right question, which is that even if you accept, even if you think, and you're Nigel Farage, that you've done nothing wrong, and I've no doubt whatsoever,he believes that, ultimately it is not for him.Simply by declaring it, to say that he hasn't.And what he's done, it would be one thing, I think, if he were going to the people of Clacton after that report, and if the report would come through with the full facts and he says, well, I'm going to let the people of Clacton be judge, jury and executioner on this one.But of course, he is seeking to preempt all of that process.

And when his constituents vote in this by -election, either for him or for Rabin, they actually won't be in full command or full possession.of the facts, because that report won't conclude until he's back in Parliament, as you were saying yesterday.

Yeah, I mean, look, the jokes at this point are rising to the stage.In the Clacton by -election, you've got a complete gimmick of a character and then you've got Count Binface.But I think if you break down what is actually happening here, you have got a man standing in a by -election on a ticket of, what, not telling people about his finances?Is it a pro -sleaze ticket?Is it an anti -transparency ticket?What does the chant go?

What do we want?More sleaze.When do we want it?We're not telling you.This is not a position on which you can actually legitimately fight a political argument.Just go to the people of Clacton and say, do you mind that I was given five million pounds that I'm not declaring?

Oh, no, I thought you wouldn't mind.That's fine.Let's move on.I mean, clearly, whether they vote or they don't even bother turning out, the whole thing is now a sham because you have, as you say, seen this completely concerted effort by the main parties.And I have to say, I was actually quite stunned by that.I was stunned by the speed at which it all happened.

We had talked about David Davis in 2008, sort of trying the same thing or trying a similar thing two decades earlier.But as soon as Kemi Badenoch was sort ofof the trap, she saw exactly where that was going.She called it, I think she called it, what was it, a hissy fit.That was her phrase.You had Keir Starmer in Ankara at the NATO summit saying the same thing.

Andy Burnham had already basically sort of waved it away.And then last night at about 11 o 'clock on Newsnight, one of the Green candidates who was there, sorry, the MP for Gordon and Denton, a Green MP, said we decided not to put anyone up.And I don't think we have seen that kind of consolidation amongst the main parties for a long time.And I think it has spooked not just Farage, but the people around Farage.And you're so right, Lewis, that the prickliness of Jenrick in that clip was repeated throughout the day.And he is, I think it's fair to say, one of reform's more pitiful media performers, because he tries to create a sense of exactly what you were saying at the beginning, the people versus the establishment.

So he kept telling journalists that they weren't part of the establishment, that he was not part of the establishment, that reform were anti -establishment.And you just look at poor little Robert Jenrick, who has literally been a Conservative MP for 10 years, who was literally giving those interviews in Westminster, who was the housing minister, who was the immigration minister, who was the health minister, who had a job in the Treasury.He was locked into three of the great offices of state.And he's sort of swinging his baseball bat around, trying to sound anti -establishment because he knows that's what Farage would want, in a very similar sort of tone, I think, to a J .D.Vance character in the Trump orbit.

And he wasn't the only one.We hadLeila Cunningham on with our colleague Tom Swarbrick, trying to say that Farage wasn't even a political player when he was the chairman chief executive of his own party.That was quite a one to tackle.

Why has the money that he received when he was politically active as the chairman of reform but not elected, why was that not declared?

Because he wasn't an MP and he didn't need to declare it.

But he was politically active at the time?

No, I mean being the chairman of a political party is like an honorary role.He was not politically active.

As the chairman of a political party?

Yeah, he was a social media influencer and he was a GB News presenter.

Whilst also the chief executive of a political party.

Yeah, but he was not politically active.You know, you could have, there are loads of people that are staffed at Reform.I wouldn't call them all politically active.

Even though they work for a political party?

Hang on, Tom, we have people working here in the back office who work for a political party, but there is no way anyone would deem them to be politically active.You know, they're doing accounts, It's just, there's a separation of roles.

They're not knocking on doors, they're not handing out leaflets, they're not giving speeches.

They're not putting their name out there and asking people to vote for them.

But Nigel Farage, as leader of that organisation before he was an MP, was doing that.He was asking all of those things.He was saying vote reform.

No, he was a social media influence.He was a GB News supporter.

He was not publicly agitating for people to vote for reform whilst the chairman of that organisation.

I haven't seen all his social media posts.Nigel's convinced and he's sure that he's sought legal advice.He has done nothing.

But you would agree if he had been advocating for reform in that role, he would be being politically active in the way in which you're absolutely right.The person who's the accountant would not.

I don't know.I'm not sure.I don't know the exact term.of what politically active and it seems to be quite subjective depending on who you're talking to.

The thing I can't get my head around with this, Emily, is a piece of political strategy.And Farage is normally a pretty acute, smart strategist.But I think that something is going on where I don't know whether it's the emotion of all of this.He's clearly genuinely, I think ridiculously, but genuinely aggrieved that people have been asking him these questions.genuinely aggrieved that he feels that people are questioning the fact that he should be allowed to be a kind of de facto leader of the opposition, which is how he's styled himself, but also be allowed to sell gold bullion and have side hustles and be a brand ambassador.You know, he genuinely, if you listen to his speech yesterday, he genuinely seemed pissed off and irritated and incredulous, actually, that these two things could not cohabit and could not coexist.

Despite the fact, of course, that, you know, what only needs to extend the logic by, you know, an iota to see how ridiculous it is. I mean, imagine if Andy Burnham had had, say, a month or two in between being mayor of Greater Manchester and coming in as an MP and potential prime minister.And then it emerged that someone had just given him this lottery win, as Nigel Farage described it, a five million or 10 million, and he hadn't told anybody about it.I mean, it would genuinely be a resignation matter for an incoming Prime Minister, right?It doesn't require any leap of imagination or logic or interrogation or real thought, right?It is just so self -evident.And yet Farage, for whatever reason, isn't willing or isn't able to see it.

And so what he then does, and this is very Trumpian, you're right, and it's very what Trump does to Rubio and to Vance, what he does is then go and gets his minions to peddle nonsense.to peddlers, they know it's nonsense, they know it's ridiculous, and they know if the shoe was on the other foot they would be excoriating, they would be absolutely rightly lambasting of a political opponent, but they're forced to sort of claim that 2 plus 2, all of them, equals 5, becauselike MAGA, reform is basically a one -man band and it is something of a cult of personality.And also much like MAGA, there is in the back of their mind, these people right now, the generics, the Tices, the Youssefs, the possibility of an imminent succession battle.Because when I said yesterday that, you know, this was what Farage has done was partly born of weakness.It was certainly born to some extent of external weakness, i .

e.he was losing his sure -footedness in the polls, with the politics, the bandwagon appeared to be moving on a bit, he was losing momentum, he was trying to regain momentum and regain attention.There's an internal part of that story as well, which is that over the last few weeks, for the first time, you've been hearing internal murmurings from Reform, which is usually kind of phalanx -like in their approach to party loyalty, and you've been hearing little murmurings going, well, maybe Nigel is a bit of a problem, or Maybe Nigel isn't the right man to take us into the election, and I'm sure they have no doubt that Farage is going to win this by -election.But if he emerges, as I think he will, and he's damaged himself here, if he emerges a diminished figure, a more eccentric looking figure, a less prime ministerial looking figure, but just a bit like he always used to look sometime, which is a bit more of a fringe figure on British politics.And I think there's a huge danger of that for him, because I think, you know, he's setting himself up as a future prime minister, and there's a real danger that a lot of the public turns around and go, this is not the sort of thing that prime ministers do.You know, it seems hot -headed and eccentric and weird and fringe, as I say.

Then maybe there will be, who knows, before the end of the Parliament, a succession battle.And of course, therefore, you're going to have all of the prize, the premium for the Yusufs and the Tises and the Generics is to look as swivel -eyed as possible and as loyal as possible for the king, for the master, even if it means that they have to say that black is white and white is black, which we'll be hearing a lot of in the coming days and weeks.

Yeah, I mean, it's interesting that you think he was genuinely aggrieved, because we have also learnedovernight of a certain bit of timing which could have played a part in why he suddenly jumped in front of that lectern yesterday.The Guardian has reported that actually the £5 million gift to Farage from Christopher Harbourn was was reported to the National Crime Agency, reported by bankers who were concerned that it may have been laundered money.Now, Farage was given, we understand, a deadline of 1pm yesterday to respond to a report about this article.So, and we should just explain that, you know, if bankers raise suspicious activity, It's not proof of wrongdoing.It is just an invitation for the agency to examine the transaction.

But the fact that the Guardian was sniffing around this, that they knew that bankers had raised it, it's just interesting that they were expecting to get a response from Farage at 1 p .m.and actually a couple of hours earlier, he put out his own social media post saying, I will tell you everything at 2.And at 2 p .m., he is not answering.

those questions.He's not talking about the SAR.He's not talking about the Guardian's reporting.He's just saying, leave me alone, leave my family alone.I'm furious, because he still believes that defensiveness is the best form of the fight.And actually, what has been so interesting is just seeing how other people have treated him rather phlegmatically.

And we're going to play you a clip of our own colleague, Nick Ferrari, this morning, who is explaining why he hadn't managed to get Farage or in fact anyone from Reform on the show this morning and where he thinks that relationship went wrong.

I should tell you this, by the way, Reform UK refusing to speak to me today.So take from that what you will.I apologise to all my listeners, but Reform UK, I'm afraid war has broken out between the two of us.speak to me. I think it might be down as the Times newspaper points out that question I asked when he said it was none of my business and he could buy a fleet of Ferraris if he so chooses.The Times writes today.With all due respect, what's it got to do with you?

If you tell me what happened with the five million pounds then we're solved.It's an unconditional gift.I can spend it on Ferraris if I want.I don't think that helped relations between us.

And I do think that Whilst Farage is unable to answer the questions, his whole USP kind of crumbles a bit because His whole shtick has been putting it to the big guys, putting it to big money, putting it to big industry, putting it to the guys in control, putting it to the politicians and the establishment and the EU and all the rest of it.And here he is.And here they all are having to defend exactly the stuff that makes them look utterly out of touch and elite, whether it's big money, whether it's cryptocurrency, whether it's obfuscation, Farage, educated at Dulwich College, you know, learned his skills as a city trader, he will come into a pension from the European Parliament, the EU, within a year or two years time of £73 ,000 a year.So the fact that he has kind of lost the ability, as it were, to go after people who he thinks are the establishment, because he's not telling us anything about his own finances, is what might ultimately scupper this?

It is, again, it goes back to that question of calling the by -election in the first place, right, which is that if you do not have a good answer to the questions of your finances, then the best thing, or perhaps the worst thing that you could possibly do, is call a by -election where you will be required to repeatedly answer questions about your finances.And whether you think he's got, you know, and it's clear that Farage had notgot good, you heard it in that clip that Nick Ferrari played there.He didn't have a good answer whenever that was, a week or 10 days ago.And what has become clear in the last 24 hours since the by -election was called is they still don't have good answers.And as a result of that, they're doing, and we all know this from our personal lives, it happens in politics as well.

When you're in a corner, very often you will try and fight your way out of it.you'll start to try and use your claws, you'll try and go on the offensive to try and distract.And the problem is, is that even if you buy the idea that maybe, you know, Farage likes to feel like he's in control of events, there is no doubt that what he has managed to do in the last 24 hours is once again, make the entire news cycle and the Westminster, the entire sort of world of Westminster, the news media focus on him.him and he has a unique ability to do that.He is the Pied Piper of British politics and yet he has elected to do that and to play that trick which he singularly, with the exception of perhaps a few people like Boris Johnson, can compete with.He's chosen to play that card at precisely the moment he didn't wish attention to be on him.

So there is this weird paradox and conundrum at the heart of this political move.And as I say, I note some interesting polling done by YouGov, I think in the last 24 hours saying two thirds of people think that this by -election move is a mistake.And if I was sat in Reform HQ, I can see the logic maybe of going on the offensive.That is something where he feels at his most comfortable.He likes the feeling of taking people on the media, on the establishment and so on.But the danger is, is that if you're trying to go to make the transition as he has been, from a 20 % politician, 25 % politician, maybe, to a 30 % politician or 35 % politician, or even a 40 % politician, which is what reform were briefing 12 months ago was their objective, and their aim.

then you need to bring a load of people on board who are sceptical of you, who think maybe you're a bit unreliable, who think you're a bit unpredictable, who don't think you're traditional prime ministerial material, and then to watch you in I think can be barely knocked, not in totally, totally off the money here in what could at least be credibly described as a hissy fit, resigning your seat before some inquiry is due and endless noise, which people won't pay the attention to the details of, but all they'll hear is 5 million and inquiry and donation and crypto and that kind of background noise of politics attaches to you.And suddenly I think getting to 30 % or 35 % politician gets way harder because you look like, as I say, something that you could always say about Farage and his worse was that he was a politician for a small, devoted group of people, but not a wider, more pluralistic politician for a wider group of people for whom you could govern and assemble a governing majority.So I think in a way, Nigel Farage has had many shades to his career, whether you like him or not, he's had some very, very impressive ones politically.I don't think this will be falling into that category.

I guess the question is still, you know, what happens to that by -election win?He does have a way of surprising us always, Lewis.He does have a way of pulling rabbits out of their hats sort of time and time again.I mean, yeah, it feels premature to write this off too quickly.Well, joining us now in the studio is Joe Powell.He's the Labour MP for Kensington and Bayswater and also a campaigner against dirty money in politics with a parliamentary group.

Joe, we've talked a lot already about the politics of the by -election and the sort of circus that may surround that.But it might be worth just taking people back a step to the actual allegations.We know that there are questions that haven't been answered.We know there are questionswhere Farage is or isn't being transparent with the money and the donations.What are the actual lines of inquiry that people in your position are looking at now?

Well I agree it's hard to keep up because there's so many layers to this but the parliamentary standards commissioner we know has had at least four letters from MPs or others asking him to investigate.So the first one was should Nigel Farage have declared or not the five million pounds from Christopher Harbourn, the cryptocurrency trader based in Thailand who had also donated 25 million pounds to the Brexit party reform and iterations of that party.So that first one was on transparency.The second one is whether he should have declared his five homes and the rules there are clear if they're for personal use and family use you don't have to declare them but we know in the past for example Jeremy Hunt did declare properties that he owned.So there's another transparency question.The third one is now about the Cottrell money and whether again that should have been declared because it was essentially money for political activities.

This is the convicted criminal who seemed to be working alongside Farage and giving him money.

Exactly and we now know today that his mother had also donated large amount of money directly to Richard Tice.And then the fourth line of inquiry, which is the one I've personally been most concerned about, is conflict of interest.Because if you go back to, you know, remember Cash for Questions and all those scandals about whether politicians were acting in the interests of people paying them, you know, we know that Nigel Farage has spent a huge amount of time on cryptocurrency policy in general, and we know that he had this meeting with the Governor of the Bank of England where he raised concerns about the Bank of England's policies that, if implemented, would certainly have hurt Christopher Harbourn.So all of these things are connected.

So just how do we know about the Bank of England meeting?Was that public?

Well, it was reported by The Guardian last week.It feels like that was many scandals ago now.And that is because they uncovered that he had brought it up in this meeting.And so what we wanted to do is find out more information.So a Liberal Democrat MP actually is the one who wrote to the Standards Commissioner, but I wrote to the Bank of England governor, Andrew Bailey, and he actually replied to me last night.And he said, I'm happy to confirm that no policy changes have taken place as a result of the interventions by Mr. Farage.

And as a general point, by the nature of the bank's role, we are regularly subject to lobbying, and I can assure you we are able to spot it and appropriately discount it.So what I read from that is that clearly Nigel Farage did come in and attempt to lobby for this very specific crypto currency policy changes and I have a serious question about the interests involved in the motivation for doing that.

So just a step back, is there a legitimate reason why a politician, an MP, would go and see the Bank of England governor and say I am genuinely worried about the direction of this policy?

Yeah of course and he's not any politician, you know, he wants to be Prime Minister, his party is leading in the polls, so it's fine by me if he goes to meet with the governor of the Bank of England to talk about reform's policy priorities.But what are the policy priorities of reform that would affect the general public?You think he might want to go in and talk about managing inflation or debt costs or our relationship with trading partners in Europe or whatever it is.But he chose to use the meeting to focus on this very specific policy area on cryptocurrency regulation.And we have to remember, cryptocurrency is..know it's a relatively new innovation in finances and there are billions of pounds at stake over how you regulate it and he wants a very liberal model of regulation that would allow his friends like Christopher Harbourn to continue to make billions of pounds and of course while there have been lots of people that have made a lot of money through cryptocurrency there are also lots of people that have bankrupted themselves because it is such an unregulated space.

So, I mean, Joe, he would push back very strongly on that and say, just because I received a donation from a crypto billionaire doesn't mean that I was lobbying for crypto billionaire friendly policies with the governor of the Bank of England.

Sure, but let's look at what Nigel Farage is.So clearly he is generally sceptical of the role of the Bank of England.That's why he advertises gold bullion for £22 ,500 an hour.He wants people to be distrustful of this state institution that helps manage the economy in a way that he probably feels like should never have been made independent.We know that Liz Truss would have liked to have got rid of independence of the Bank of England.That's his background on that issue.

And he may authentically believe that.But those same people have been pumping significant amounts of money into the reform party and now have been personally donating to him.And for me, that is a conflict of interest.

When you say, for me, does this feel like dirty business?

I think it's sleazy.Now, of course, we have to be careful.The Parliamentary Standards Commissioner has to make an independent judgment and, you know, the last thing he wants is people applying any sort of pressure.So, you know, that is the next step.And whatever happens, we need to make sure that this by -election stunt does not mean that those investigations are halted.They should restart immediately if he wins this by -election.

So the Commissioner, we're actually waiting any day for the Commissioner's report to come back.I mean, do you have an idea of the timescale now?Because Daniel Greenberg could find against Farage and he could then choose to allot a certain number of days that Farage was banned from being an MP.I mean, has that all gone away now?Does the whole question of whether I mean, if Farage has resigned, then even if the Commissioner finds something, can he tell Farage to step away from his job as an MP?Presumably not.

Well, that's why this whole theory of potentially having two by -elections has arisen, which I know sounds crazy, but the Standards Commissioner at this point will have to pause their investigation.Nigel Farage is no longer an MP.I know he has to get the Ritz passed.

Well that comes down to the Chancellor.So your government could actually decide not to let him resign.

As far as I understand that is very, very unlikely to happen.So we have to assume that this by -election is going to go forward and that Nigel Farage is very likely to win it.So he will come back as an MP at which point the rules are very clear, the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner can recommence their investigations.As I've said there could be up to four, we know of at least two that have been confirmed because Nigel Farage has confirmed them.That's on the money from Cottrell and the money from Harborne.at that point, and this is where it does start to get again quite technical, the Standards Commissioner will make a recommendation to the Committee on Standards, which is a mixture of MPs and independent experts, and people will remember this of course from the Boris Johnson era, and then if Nigel Farage doesn't accept their judgment we could go to a vote in the House.

If the suspension is over a certain number of daysyou could then have the potential for a recall petition and a second by -election.

It does feel to me that there are sort of two games going on here simultaneously, that the government, Labour, I mean all the main parties, are adhering to this parliamentary process which has rules, standards, a commissioner, a series of dates, and Farage and reform are going down the line of direct democracy.Ask the voters what they want.If they want me, then to hell with the rest of it.I wonder how far those sort of clash into each other, that he can paint your party, your government, as being old school.Like, why aren't you talking to the voters?They don't care about this.

They're not asking me questions.

They've just re -voted me. I am sure that that is Nigel Farage's theory of how he gets out of this mess, but I think that he's making a mistake.We are not Trumpian America.Britain is not yet in the position where we are so polarised politically that people are just going to ignore the blatant corruption happening in the White House or the fact that members of Trump's family are getting various contracts and all the rest of it.has clearly been very effective at saying, you know, this is, this is, you know, the establishment trying to shut me down, and Farage is trying to use the same language.But I don't think it works, because he you know, this by -election is backfiring in my view.I think the fact that you have no major political party standing against him really does make it look like a vanity exercise.

I mean, if you had two, sorry, if it really is down to Binface and Farage, is that enough?Can you just have two candidates in a by -election?

I'm not sure.I think Lawrence Fordmay also be running.I'm sure there'll be some other characters that will come out the woodwork.I don't know on the two rule, but you know.

Well, let's say Farage wins by 70 % of the vote.Just imagine it.

Yeah.Well, if Count Binface gets 30%, I think that's quite embarrassing for Farage personally.But the point is, and this is where I think he I suspect what's happened is he accepted there was a possibility.that the Standards Commissioner could find in a way that could lead to a suspension and a recall petition.Now, I'm not saying that's guaranteed.I can't prejudge what the Standards Commissioner would do, but that was certainly a possibility.

So rather than being dragged to a by -election, he felt like, I'll do it on my own terms.And I'll do it before all these facts are made public.And then everyone would be so bored to tears of, you know, Clacton and by -elections, that when the Standards Commissioner finally comes out, it will feel like old news.I suspect that's what he's thinking.But there are so many layers to this.We've just found out in the last hour that the National Crime Agency didn't just have one suspicious activity report about this money, but there are several.

And suspicious activity reports are when banks feel like there is a high risk of money laundering.They're not things that are just done routinely.So I think this has got a lot more to run.The question about the establishment and direct democracy, for me, the really important thing to communicate is it is in fact the opposite.Nigel Farage is deliberately trying to avoid this kind of public scrutiny, and he's acting in the interest of the establishment people that are funding him, and I think that's what we've got to convey.His interests are not the British public's, they're the people that are funding him, so he can try to land this me against the establishment line as much as he likes, but I think this money makes sense.

it a lot harder to do that.

How much time do you think Labour should spend talking about Nigel Farage over the coming weeks?

I would like to spend as little time as possible talking about it.I think we just ignore him and come back when the by -election is finished and focus again on the real questions about his finances.This whole thing has been about attention.He forced everyone to watch a really tedious lengthy speech before he got to his announcement yesterday.And of course, everyone's streaming it and watching it.

Is it a mistake for broadcasters to show that live?

Well, I think they probably had to, but he played that very well.And, you know, of course, it was news at the end, but he was able to go through his whole narrative about being a victim first.

I suppose I'm just coming back to the same question, which is that as we sit here waiting for an actual kind of legitimate parliamentary process to evolve, reform's still top of the polls.

Yeah I mean maybe sliding a little bit and of course having lost several by -elections in a row now, some of which they were expected to win, so I think there is an anti -reform majority in the country and you know that may not be the case in Clacton which is the most reform -friendly seat in the entire country.Let's not forget that.You know, it'd be very hard, I think, for him to lose that, even if there were, you know, mainstream parties running.But, you know, I don't think they're in a great place.And I do think, you know, having knocked on a lot of doors in both Gorton and Denton and Makefield, it was interesting that by the time we got to Makefield, people were bringing up this 5 million pound donation.Like, people were mentioning it.

It's, I think, cut through in a way that previous kind of accusations of wrongdoing around Farage or Tice's taxes or whatever hadn't really done so.But this has cut through.in a way that I think will have a meaningful impact.

Jebel, thanks very much.Thank you.

Is the ceasefire done?Is the MOU dead?

It's a very interesting question.To me, I think it's over.I don't want to deal with them anymore.They're scum.You know what scum is?They're scum.

They're sick people.They're led by sick people.And they're vicious, violent people.And if they had a nuclear weapon, they'd use it.As far as I'm concerned, it's over.

Well, it's been a busy old day at NATO, where it seems that top of Trump's mind are the incursions in the Straits of Hormuz, which has led to retaliation by America.And indeed, as you've heard, the decree that the peace deal, the ceasefire is now officially over.That tends to come about once you're calling your opposite number scum and liars.So at the moment, five to two on Wednesday, that memorandum of understanding that was on and off so many times over the course of the last month has now been called officially off, at least by the US side.Meanwhile, the Spanish are having to get used to a brand new threat over trade, which has been halted with America, and they have hit back.And they've said the reason we're being targeted is because we accept neither blackmail nor threats, in other words, from Trump.

Their health minister says we are a sovereign democratic country that defends multilateralism and peace.Terrible it is to confuse diplomacy with thuggery.So a little word there from Spain at NATO as things are all going well.

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