Nigel Farage will try to shake off ongoing scrutiny about funding both he and Reform UK have received as the party’s conference begins.
The Clacton MP has just returned to parliament after winning a by-election he called in his constituency in protest at the Commons’ standards inquiry against him over a donation from Christopher Harborne.
On the eve of the Reform conference, which begins in Birmingham on Thursday, Mr Farage told the BBC his party is up against a “complainant society” and suggested that he would not get a fair hearing on whether he broke parliamentary rules for failing to declare the cash, because the MPs on the committee have already prejudged him as guilty.
Reform’s conference begins as it fell behind the Conservatives into third place in the polls -–its lowest performance in the last 18 months.
In a new voting intention poll from More in Common on 1 September, the right-wing party has landed on 22 per cent, four points behind Labour and one point behind the Tories.