Farage faces donations blow in crackdown on ‘Big Money’ from super rich living overseasA new law on political donations is expected to be retrospective
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Nicholas Cecil, Chief Reporter @nicholascecil2 minutes ago
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Ministers were pressing ahead with a clampdown on “Big Money” in British politics amid a huge row over two £36 million donations from crypto-billionaires to Reform UK.
Peers are to debate on Monday possible major reforms to political donations including from people living overseas.
Donations to Reform from Christopher Harborne and Ben Delo, disclosed over the weekend, together amount to three quarters of the money spent at the last general election by all parties combined.
Ben Delo and Nigel FarageGetty Images/PA
One of the reforms set to be debated in Parliament is a £100,000 limit on donations from overseas electors.
Schools minister Georgia Gould, MP for Queen’s Park and Maida Vale who was on the media round for the Government, said: “We’re changing the rules because there was overarching concern about the amount of money going into politics.
“What we don’t want to see is in our democracy is it’s not people you know individual people are knocking their door and their views they’re influencing elections, but big money some of it from overseas.”
Robert Jenrick, the party’s economic spokesman, stressed the donations were “entirely in line with the law as it is, and as far as we know, the law as it’s going to be in the future”.
But Communities Secretary Angela Rayner appeared to suggest they could be covered by a cap on overseas donors, which would be backdated to March 25.
She told the BBC: “With the retrospective action, anyone that’s received donations that don’t comply with what was in the Rycroft review, what legislation is currently going through Parliament, would have 60 days to return that money.
“That is not for those individuals, let me be really clear, I do not understand those individual circumstances, but that the retrospective action will apply from March 25.”
Communities Secretary Angela Rayner with Reform UK Treasury spokesman Robert Jenrick before appearing on the BBC’s Sunday With Laura KuenssbergPA
The rule, which limit donations from overseas electors to £100,000 per year, was proposed in a review by former civil servant Philip Rycroft aimed at countering foreign influence in UK politics.
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It would also apply to donations made in the first year that someone moves back to the UK.
Mr Delo has been based in Hong Kong but said in April he would return to the UK to avoid restrictions on overseas donors, and Mr Harborne is based in Thailand.
Proposals for a general cap are also likely to feature heavily in the House of Lords, which will debate the Government’s Representation of the People Bill on Monday.
But previous attempts by MPs to impose a general cap failed after the Government promised to task officials with investigating how a measure would work.
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey is expected to push for a cap on political donationsPA
On Sunday, Ms Rayner suggested a cap was still on the table, telling the BBC she wanted to stop people “being able to overpower and buy their way into democracy”.
The Liberal Democrats are likely to push for a cap, having called for “emergency legislation” to impose one and saying the donations exposed “a dangerous flaw in our democratic system”.
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