Reform plots £100m election war chest - the most any UK political party has ever raised

Published: 14:27, 13 June 2026 | Updated: 14:28, 13 June 2026 Reform UK is planning to raise a record breaking £100 million to fight the next General Election, it has been claimed. If they succeed, the poll favourites’ war chest would exceed any fighting fund ever built by a UK political party. Leading the charge for Party Leader Nigel Farage is its billionaire honorary treasurer Nick Candy. Buoyed by Reform’s landslide success in last month’s local elections where the party won 14 councils and now has 2400 councillors nationwide, he is believed to have told donors of the fundraising target. The money is needed to vet and recruit new candidates and to fight the London mayoral contest in 2028, according to the Telegraph. Reform candidate - former crown prosecutor Laila Cunningham - is believed to have a strong chance of winning in London, where incumbent for a decade Sadiq Khan has still not revealed whether he will stand yet again. Property developer Candy, the ex-husband of pop star and Neighbours actress Holly Valance, is a major donor himself to the party which he joined before the General Election in July 2024. The former ardent Tory supporter became its honorary treasurer that December. If Candy succeeds in driving forwards the gargantuan fundraising drive required to top Labour’s 2024 £86.7million fighting fund, raised from donations and membership fees, it will be a massive achievement for the party which leads the polls on a 27 percent approval rating. Reform UK is said to be planning to raise a record breaking £100 million to fight the next General Election  The May Ipsos poll showed Reform were up two percent from April, and ahead of Labour on 20 percent and the Conservatives on 19 percent. And the party has made a strong start with £9.2m in donations during the first three months of this year, more than double the donations received by Labour - £4.2m - and the Conservatives - £4m – in the same quarter. Major donors including crypto entrepreneurs Thai-based Christopher Harborne and Hong Kong based Ben Delo have boosted the fund with respective individual donations of £4m and £3m. According to official filings, the hefty handouts were made ahead of the Government capping donations from British citizens living overseas at £100,000 from March 25 this year. Last year, Mr Harborne gave a single donation of £9million to Reform UK, the largest ever donation to a UK political party by a living person. Since the cap, an unthwarted Mr Delo has said he will return home so he can donate even more to the party. Mr Farage is currently being investigated by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards over a previous £5million donation from Mr Harborne that he received before becoming an MP in 2024. In his defence, he says the ‘unconditional gift’ was made before he re-entered politics, so he was not obliged to declare it. Leading the charge for Party Leader Nigel Farage (pictured) is Reform's billionaire honorary treasurer Nick Candy  He said last month that the money was given to him as ‘a reward for campaigning for Brexit for 27 years’ which was confirmed by Mr Harborne. Other Reform donors include billionaire JCB owner Lord Bamford, husband of Daylesford Organic founder Carole Bamford, a close friend of the Royal Family. He is also a Conservative Party donor. His son and heir Jo Bamford recently threatened to quit Britain over Labour's inheritance tax raid on family firms. Leading fund manager Jeremy Hosking from Hosking Partners which invests in fossil fuels has also donated £1.7m to Reform. No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, or debate this issue live on our message boards. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.