22OCT

Delo and Harborne give Reform £72m

4 min read

16:26UTC

Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne each gave Reform UK £36m on consecutive days in September, according to PA Media, as the Met weighed reports about the party's polling.

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Key takeaway

Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne each gave Reform UK £36m, on consecutive days.

Ben Delo gave Reform UK £36m, announced on Friday 11 September, and Christopher Harborne matched it the next day, according to reports from PA Media, the UK national news agency⁠¹. The two gifts total £72m. Delo, a cryptocurrency entrepreneur whose earlier gifts to the party slipped past the new crypto-donation ban, is described by PA Media, citing The Telegraph, as giving £1m a month to the latest possible 2029 election date, paid upfront "to avoid attempts to block it". Harborne said he expected nothing in return and that Delo's gift had prompted his own⁠².

Neither sum is yet on the Electoral Commission register, the public record of party donations, which publishes the July-to-September quarter in early December.

The same weeks brought Reform a police inquiry over a far smaller sum. An undercover investigation by Verbatim Media, which made the programme for Channel 4 News, broadcast in early September, alleged that senior Reform figures told reporters posing as a US financier and his son how a US company could pay more than £30,000 for three opinion polls the party had commissioned⁠³. In the programme, James Orr, then head of policy, called one arrangement something that could "technically be a donation-in-kind". Orr and an aide to Nigel Farage stepped down after the broadcast.

Reform denied wrongdoing, called the sting a hoax by climate activists and said it would "fully cooperate with the investigation". The Metropolitan Police said in a statement reported on 10 September that it had received reports "relating to donations and polling involving a political party" and that there were "potential offences requiring investigation"⁠⁴. Its statement named no individual.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Political parties in Britain are funded mostly by gifts from members, unions, companies and rich individuals. There is no upper limit on what one person can give, but the donor must be on a UK electoral register or be a UK company, and large gifts must be reported. The Electoral Commission, the independent elections regulator, publishes the gifts every three months. These two will appear in December. Separately, a Channel 4 News programme alleged that people at Reform discussed ways for a US company to pay for party polling. The Metropolitan Police, London's police force, says it has received reports and is looking at whether offences were committed. Reform says it did nothing wrong.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

UK law caps what a party may spend, not what one donor may give. The Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 requires only that a donor be permissible and that the gift be reported, so a single large cheque from a UK-registered individual is lawful at any size.

The Channel 4 allegation turns on donations in kind. If a third party pays for something a party would otherwise buy, such as opinion polls, the payment can count as a donation, and a donation must come from a permissible source. A US company is not one; Reform denies wrongdoing and calls the programme a hoax.

Quarterly reporting adds a lag. A gift made in September reaches the public register only in the December release, after the debate on caps has moved on.

What could happen next?

Consequence
Reform enters the next general election cycle with campaign money already in the bank, before Parliament decides whether to cap donations.
Medium term · Assessed
Risk
If peers make any cap reach back, a prepaid multi-year gift becomes the obvious test case for whether retrospective party-finance law survives legal challenge.
Short term · Suggested
Meaning
The police assessment and the Electoral Commission's contact with law enforcement mean Reform's finances face scrutiny on two tracks at once, criminal and regulatory.
Short term · Assessed

Source Landscape

This story draws on neutral-leaning sources from United Kingdom and France

United Kingdom

France

LeftRight

Primary parallel: Before the 2005 general election, Labour and the Conservatives raised millions in loans from wealthy backers, which party-finance law did not then require them to declare. The Electoral Administration Act 2006 made loans reportable only from its commencement, so money already lent stayed outside the new rule.

Counter-parallel: The Metropolitan Police's cash-for-honours inquiry ran from March 2006 to July 2007, and the Crown Prosecution Service charged no one. Police inquiries into party money have a history of running long and ending without a prosecution.

Immediate: the reports say the combined sum exceeds what Labour or the Conservatives each spent at the 2024 general election, according to Electoral Commission spending returns cited in the coverage. Harborne also gave Reform £9m in 2025.

Structural: a party holding four years of funding in advance can commit to staff, offices and target-seat budgets now, while rivals fund campaigns year by year. Money banked early also cannot be stopped by any later change in a donor's residence or circumstances.

Consensus view: Lord Rennard, the Liberal Democrat peer, told the Lords at Second Reading that the two gifts could pay for a full national campaign at the legal spending limit twice over. Labour said Reform 'can't buy their way out of questions', and the Liberal Democrats' Lisa Smart accused Nigel Farage of trying to buy his way into power.

Counter-view: Harborne said he expected 'Nothing. No peerage, no policy change', and both donors are UK-registered individuals giving in a lawful form. Delo's earlier gifts already showed that money paid other than in cryptoassets falls outside the new ban.

Key tension: Whether a gift described as four years of monthly support, paid at once, counts for any future cap as one 2026 donation or as a stream of later ones.

First Reported In

Update #18 · Legal advice halts England's council mergers

Global (PA Media copy)· 7 Oct 2026

Read original →

Causes and effects

Caused by

Delo's £4m arrived as cash, not crypto

Delo's new gift follows his earlier Reform UK donations recorded on the Q2 register.

Occurred 3 Sept 2026

Read story →

Harborne gave Reform UK £9m, a UK records high

Harborne's £36m follows his earlier £9m gift to Reform UK recorded in 2025.

Occurred 1 Oct 2025

Read story →

This Event

Delo and Harborne give Reform £72m

Two donors gave Reform £72m in two days, in the same weeks that the Metropolitan Police received reports about the party's polling.

Different Perspectives

Scottish National Party / John Swinney

Swinney told the SNP conference in Aberdeen on 17 October that Scotland is ready for independence, but set no referendum date, bill or Section 30 request. He launched a new campaign instead and extended the £2 bus fare cap to the north east from April 2027.

Liberal Democrats / Ed Davey

Davey ruled out a national partnership with the Greens on 19 October after their Brighton conference passed a "Zionism is racism" motion, and wrote to two Jewish community bodies. He left untouched the councils the two parties already run together.

Reform UK / Richard Tice

Tice alleged ITV's reporter used false details to get a press-office job and said ITV had "likely broken the law", telling members not to speak to it until it apologises. Reform also opened investigations into members, with some suspensions, so the party is contesting the broadcaster and disciplining councillors at once.

Rhun ap Iorwerth / Welsh Government (Plaid Cymru)

Ap Iorwerth presented six priorities to the Senedd on 22 September without numeric targets or a named partner party, promising to work across the chamber where there is common ground. He says his government will be judged on results.

Michael Marra / Scottish Labour

Marra won the leadership on 19 September, and three days later his 17 MSPs backed Swinney's right-to-decide motion once their child-poverty amendment was written in. He says Scottish Labour's task is to tell voters what it stands for.

Andy Burnham / Labour Party

Burnham told conference in Liverpool on 29 September that Labour's next manifesto will commit to changing the electoral system, and invited every party into a National Commission on Electoral Reform. He has not named a replacement system, and no chair or remit has been published.

Written with AI from Lowdown's published reporting. Not individually reviewed by an editor. Editorial standards.