NIGEL Farage is facing a second financial probe after the European Parliament began looking at £450,000 of lifestyle support given to the MEP by Leave donor Arron Banks.
Mr Farage did not declare the financial assistance, which was given in 2016, and included a £13,000-a-month home in Chelsea, a car and driver, and US visits. He says there was no need to register it as it was not political.
After Channel 4 News reported the figures, LibDem MEP Catherine Bearder, one of the parliament’s financial scrutineers, or ‘quaestors’, demanded an urgent investigation.
Parliament president Antonio Tajani has now referred the matter to an advisory committee of five MEPs. However they will not start work until next month and sanctions are rare.
The development came on the same day the Electoral Commission visited the offices of Mr Farage’s Brexit Party to review its funding operation.
Former Labour PM Gordon Brown had warned the Party could be receiving illegal foreign donations through the online PayPal system.
On LBC radio, Mr Farage said: “We don’t take foreign currency, end of that conversation.”
However payments to a UK PayPal account are converted into sterling, regardless of the original currency.
Mr Farage accused the Commission of being “absolutely full of Remainers” and in cahoots with an establishment conspiracy against his party, which is expected to win tomorrow’s EU election across the UK and pick up one of the six seats in Scotland.
He said: “I bet we’re more compliant than any of the other parties in this election. I’ve crossed with the Electoral Commission before - they are not a neutral organisation, absolutely full of Remainers, full of establishment figures.”
He went on: “I’m not stupid. I’ve set this up to take on the Labour and Conservative parties who, I think, have betrayed the biggest democratic vote in our nation’s history. I know that when you do that the establishment will not come out with a tray of gin and tonics and say ‘well done’. I understand how it works.”
He also accused Channel 4 News of being “political activists” and said his party had stopped talking to them.
He said: “This is a two way street - the relationship between people in politics and the media is always going to be a slightly tense one, obviously, but it only works if everybody ultimately has a bit of respect for each other. And we as an organisation have at the moment lost respect for Channel 4 News.”
Channel 4 News said it hoped to resolve its access ban from Brexit Party events as soon as possible.
An Electoral Commission spokesman said: “We have seen significant public concern about the way the party raises funds. We have not seen evidence of electoral offences, but the law in this area is complex and we want to satisfy ourselves the party’s systems are robust.
“Our regulatory work during this campaign - for the European Parliamentary elections - has not deviated from our usual approach. We are an independent and impartial organisation which is accountable to Parliament.
“We regulate as is proportionate to the issue, regardless of a party’s politics. Our decision to visit is not related to comments made by the former prime minister.”
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