UK: Nigel Farage resigns as MP, to run again in by-election

The best way to deal with growing scrutiny over undeclared financial support is to step down ... and stand again. That's the conclusion Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has come to by forcing a by-election.

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage on Tuesday said he would step down as a lawmaker to force a snap by-election in his own constituency.

The Brexit referendum figurehead, whose party is leading national polls, has come under pressure over reports about undeclared donations and funding.

What did Farage say about the by-election?

Farage said he would stand again in a televised speech in which he railed against press intrusion and accused the establishment of trying to hinder his party.

"I've decided that the people of Clacton should be the judges of my actions," he said, referring to the southeast England constituency he has represented for two years. "This will be a people versus the establishment by-election," he added in the statement.

"I have done nothing wrong," said Farage. "I have not broken the law in any way at all. I have not misused public money," Farage, a prominent ally of US President Donald Trump. 

Farage's anti-immigration Reform UK holds just eight of the 650 seats in the House of Commons. However, it has been leading polls ahead of the governing center-left Labour Party and the main opposition center-right Conservatives.

Why is Farage under pressure over undeclared funding?

The right-wing populist party leader spoke after reports about support from longtime ally and convicted fraudster George Cottrell.

Cottrell, who served a prison sentence in the United States, reportedly hired and paid three people to run Farage's social media before the general election, and continued to let him use a five-storey Georgian property near Buckingham Palace.

A new MP must register all current financial interests, plus significant registrable benefits received in the 12 months before their election, within one month of being elected.

Farage declared a trip to Belgium and a US domestic flight paid for by Cottrell, but did not declare the rest of the support that he received.

Both the Labour Party and the centrist Liberal Democrats have called for a parliamentary standards probe into the allegations, as well as an investigation by the UK Electoral Commission.

A separate parliamentary standards inquiry has already been launched into a £5 million ($6.7 million) undeclared personal gift to Farage from Thailand-based cryptocurrency billionaire Christopher Harborne. Farage claims that the money was a personal gift that he used to pay for security.

Edited by Zac Crellin

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