Wounding Victory: Nigel Farage Beats Count Binface

It was never really in doubt. The Reform UK leader, Nigel Farage, irritated, bothered, and keen to throw scrutiny off his financial affairs, was returned in the most pointless of by-elections on August 13. His share of the vote in the seat of Clacton was 63.34% (22,239 votes). The second in the voting tally, with 26.9% (9,455 votes), was a candidate sporting a bin, promoting himself as a 5,900-year-old intergalactic warrior hailing from Sigma IX by the name of Count Binface. No major party offered to stand a candidate, which did not prevent voters from filling in the longest ballot paper in UK electoral history.

The whole fuss began with an April 2024 gift of £5 million from the cryptocurrency investor and billionaire donor Christopher Harborne. This caught the interest of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, given that Farage had failed to declare Harborne’s gift. An investigation was commenced on May 13 for failing “to register an interest.” The Sunday Times then reported that the eternally cherubic George Cottrell, an aristocrat convicted of wire fraud in the US in 2017, provided funding to Reform UK to cover private security, staffing for Farage’s social media team and generous digs. Clearly, the Reform leader was showing his love for easy cash a bit too freely.

These donations and gifts were bound to raise stir interest. Regulations outlined by the parliamentary rule book state that MPs, subject to various qualifications, must register “any gifts, benefits or hospitality with a value of over £300 which they receive from a UK source.” Multiple benefits arising from the same source over the value of £300 in a calendar year must also be registered. Purely personal gifts and benefits are exempt. Farage has insisted with mechanical consistency that Harborne’s donation was received when he was not an MP and that, in any case, it was purely personal.

Forcing the by-election was Farage’s frail effort to seek absolution at the ballot box. When he resigned in July, he spoke of the people of Clacton as being the only relevant “judges” of his actions. “This will be a people versus the establishment by-election.” Except that it wasn’t. The second placed Count Binface, a satirist by the name of Jon Harvey, had every reason to be thrilled by that evident fact, and said so on social media. “I came first in the Clacton byelection! Of the candidates who bothered to turn up for the results.”

In later remarks, the Count pondered the significance of his electoral tally. “What does that tell you? Well, it tells you that Nigel, who said he didn’t want to be humiliated, maybe has been. As for me – I’m over the moon – I’m over your moon, I’m over my moons – and what comes next, we shall see.” One irrebuttable fact had presented itself: “over one in four people in this constituency would rather have Count Binface as their MP than the leader of Reform UK.”

Having run an unnecessary, miscalculated stunt, Farage thought it below him to honour that great British tradition of turning up for the election count. He preferred a gathering of supporters at an airfield located on the outskirts of Clacton. “I am damned if I am going to stand on a stage, having won a resounding victory… and be demeaned and humiliated by nobodies,” he sneered. A party spokesperson hoped to add some contextual justification by saying that Essex Police had “advised Nigel not to attend the count tonight due to a credible threat against him.” The BBC, however, reported that the police had done no such thing to any candidate. A police spokesperson also informed the press that there had been a “robust policing operation to ensure the safety and security of all participants in the count.”

Lee Anderson, Reform UK’s boisterous MP for Ashfield, sought to dampen the inconsistencies by turning the focus back to Farage’s grateful followers. “It was a great occasion that it is only right that he spends that time with his members, his activists, with his supporters.” With blinding self-assurance, he called Farage’s victory “stunning”, a sign that the electors of Clacton had “stuck two fingers up to people like the BBC, the establishment, the blob, the whole of Westminster.” Really?

Farage’s wounding victory was exactly what he deserved. Defeat would have afforded him a martyr’s exit, an unworthy dispensation. Having assailed the establishment repeatedly from outside the people’s chamber, doing arguably his greatest and most damaging work, his presence in the House of Commons has forced him to abide by standards that most displease him. The parliamentary standards investigation into his finances will continue (the announcement of its resumption was made within hours of the result), with the wheels of invigilation possibly moving to a decision by the Commons standards committee. Were it to find against Farage, he would be suspended for 10 sitting days, his fate falling to a vote in the House of Commons. This may place him and Clacton on the road to yet another by-election if the good burghers of that seat were to petition it (more than 7,978 voters – 10% of the registered total – would have to approve). Hopefully, the Count will be able to return from Sigma IX for the hysterical show.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. Email: [email protected]