Nigel Farage has threatened to take authorized motion towards Tory chief Kemi Badenoch if she doesn’t apologise for accusing him of publishing a “fake” ticker displaying Reform UK’s membership growing to overhaul the Conservatives.
The Reform UK chief has reacted furiously to Ms Badenoch’s assertion that he was “manipulating [his] own supporters” with a ticker that’s “coded to tick up automatically” after it confirmed the rebel right-wing occasion had gone previous 131,680 members – the variety of eligible Conservative Occasion members in its management election within the autumn.
He’s demanding an apology from Ms Badenoch for the “accusations of fraud and dishonesty” that he labelled “disgraceful”, and stated he’s “not going to take it lying down”.
“I think it’s an absolutely outrageous thing for her to have said,” he continued. “I know she’s got a very bad temper. I know she’s well known for lashing out at people, but I am not at all happy, and I’m going to take some action.”
He added that he’ll affirm inside two days precisely what this motion can be if she doesn’t apologise for the “intemperate outburst”.
Ms Badenoch and the Conservative Occasion have been contacted for remark.
‘It is a pretend’
The row began after Reform UK stated on Boxing Day that it formally had extra members than the Conservative Occasion, which Mr Farage, occasion chief and MP for Clacton-on-Sea, hailed as a “historic moment”, describing his occasion as “the real opposition”.
Reform UK additionally shared a video of the membership tracker being projected on to the Conservative Occasion headquarters in London.
However Conservative chief Kemi Badenoch accused the occasion of issuing deceptive figures: “Manipulating your own supporters at Xmas eh, Nigel?. It’s not real. It’s a fake… [the website has been] coded to tick up automatically.”
Posting on X, she added that the Tories had “gained thousands of new members since the leadership election”.
Reform UK hit again at Ms Badenoch, publishing a screenshot of a web-based register claiming to point out “active memberships”.
Do Reform’s claims stack up?
Some tickers are certainly “coded to tick up automatically”. That is usually performed when the info isn’t up to date usually and so, within the meantime, the counter is made to extend at practical intervals.
Any ticker displaying authorities debt, unemployment or international temperatures, as an example, is sort of definitely going up at an everyday, pre-programmed price.
Particularly, we checked out a video posted by Nigel Farage on X, which exhibits an uninterrupted view of the counter from 4pm on Christmas day to 2pm on Boxing Day.
The chart above exhibits the variety of new members added each half-hour throughout that 22-hour stretch.
What we are able to see is that it varies loads – only a few folks be part of in a single day, and there’s a large surge from round 11am on Boxing Day.
This was across the time that it was first reported Reform UK had acquired extra members than the Conservatives, which offered a burst of publicity to the occasion.
If the ticker was merely growing mechanically, we’d anticipate a a lot flatter line.
Political events within the UK aren’t required to disclose their membership numbers, a lot much less present information that may be independently verified.
The Conservative Occasion had 131,680 members as of the November management contest, whereas Labour had 366,604 members as of March 2024.
Reform UK chair Zia Yusuf additionally waded into the row, claiming that folks whose memberships of the Tory occasion had lapsed voted within the autumn management election that noticed Ms Badenoch elected to the position.
In a name with journalists earlier, he repeated the assertion, and after placing out a name on social media for folks to contact him if that they had voted within the management election however are now not occasion members, he stated he has acquired “just so many” that he has not but been capable of confirm their claims.
Reform UK has stated it can undergo an audit of its membership numbers by one of many “big four” accountancy companies if the Tories do the identical.
Farage will get private
Chatting with journalists earlier, Mr Farage was very important of Ms Badenoch personally, saying her declare that their membership quantity ticker had been faked “reflects her personality”.
He labelled her “aggressive” and “liable to lashing out”, and stated he thinks she wrote her tweet out of a “slight sense of anger”.
“She’s got to fully disprove this, and she’s going to find life a lot more difficult and bitterly regret putting this out on Boxing Day afternoon,” he added.
