Angela Rayner trying to stop Reform’s £72million donations is like something from a banana republic

YOU don’t have to be a deadly enemy of Reform UK to wonder whether the party is wise to allow itself to become so dependent on a few wealthy donors. The £72million given by two cryptocurrency entrepreneurs, Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne, should help the party professionalise its operations and develop some wise policies. Angela Rayner at the TUC conference Credit: Getty Images Nigel Farage’s Reform is laughing all the way to the bank Credit: Gareth Fuller/PA Wire But it will understandably lead many voters to wonder whether it is falling under the undue influence of one particular industry. Then, of course, there was the sting operation in which two Reform UK officials were filmed considering bending the rules, to make it look as though a donation from a phoney US donor had instead come from his UK-resident son. Sign up for The Sun newsletter Thank you! The matter is now under police investigation who may or may not decide any law has been broken, but the affair obviously doesn’t reflect well on Reform. Nevertheless, there is a bigger villain in this story: the Labour Party. READ MORE FROM ROSS CLARK To watch Angela Rayner threatening to deprive Reform of its latest donations by using backdated measures in the Representation of the People Bill is to witness something out of a banana republic. We have a Government that is blatantly engaged in gerrymandering the laws on political donations to its own advantage. The Bill would restrict donations from UK citizens who live abroad to no more than £100,000 a year. It is this rule that Rayner, the Housing Secretary responsible for electoral policy, wants to backdate to March 25 this year, which could make Reform’s latest donations invalid. Most read in The Sun But various Labour MPs have tabled even more restrictive amendments. Stella Creasy has proposed to limit political donations from any source to a maximum of £100,000 a year — with one exception. You can probably guess what the exception would be. Yes, it’s the trade unions, which have been bankrolling the party since its inception more than 100 years ago. Since 2019, the five biggest unions between them have donated nearly £60million to the party. Cryptocurrency entrepreneur Ben Delo donated £36million Credit: Enterprise News and Pictures Fellow crypto entrepreneur Christopher Harborne also gave £36m Credit: Enterprise News and Pictures The Government has already made life much easier for unions to hand over a portion of their members’ subscriptions to the party. The Employment Rights Act, which was supposed to be empowering workers, has in one instance done the opposite. Previously, unions had to ask their members actively to opt in to donating to their political funds. Members can still opt-out, but the default position now is that some of their hard-earned money can be skimmed off and given to a political party, which they might not actually support. As recent polls have revealed, just as many trade union members are planning to vote Reform in the next election as are intending to vote Labour. Reform leader Nigel Farage tells The Sun today that, if elected Prime Minister, he would retaliate against Labour’s gerrymandering, by making it more difficult for the trade unions to donate to Labour. If it means returning to a system where union members would have to opt-in for political donations, all well and good. But I hope he wouldn’t try to ban unions from making political donations altogether. A tit for tat battle is in no one’s interests. Labour wants us to believe that it is disadvantaged by wealthy donors choosing to back the Conservatives and Reform, yet actually it did extremely well in the lead-up to the last election campaign, when over a few weeks it was given £9.5million compared with a paltry £225,000 given to the Conservatives. It didn’t just come from the unions. Its biggest donation, £2.5million, came from Lord Sainsbury of Turville. In the year before the election, Dale Vince’s company Ecotricity gave the party £1.5million. If donations to Labour from businesses and wealthy individuals have dried up since the last election, the party needs to ask itself why. Might there be a connection with the Government’s anti-business policies? In the run-up to the last election there were plenty of entrepreneurs enthused by Labour’s promise of fiscal responsibility. Since then, the people who contribute most to the economy have been battered by tax rises and extra regulations. They have been hit by a rise in employers’ National Insurance, business rates, high energy prices driven by Net Zero policies and many other things. Worse, they have seen their taxes handed over for fat pay rises for unproductive public sector workers and to fund a surge in benefits. When Labour is out to punish anyone who is doing well in life, is it any wonder they are donating to other political parties in the hope of getting rid of this reckless government as soon as possible? Instead of addressing the issue of why business people suddenly find it so repellent, the Labour party has decided to try to defund its opponents while stuffing its own war chest with trade union money. Sorry, but it isn’t going to help win the next election, which may well already be beyond the party’s grasp. Labour’s brazen attempts to manipulate the law regarding donations is yet another reason for voters to look elsewhere. Comment now