Nigel Farage
Nigel Paul Farage[c] (born 3 April 1964) is a British politician and broadcaster who has been the leader of Reform UK[a] since June 2024, having previously been its leader from 2019 to 2021. He was the leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) from 2006 to 2009, and 2010 to 2016. Farage served as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for South East England from 1999 until the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union (EU) in 2020.
"Farage" redirects here. For other people with the surname, see Farage (surname).
Nigel Farage
Richard Tice
Richard Tice
Richard Tice
Richard Tice
Role established
Role abolished
Paul Oakden
Jeffrey Titford (Acting)
Diane James
Office abolished
Constituency established
Constituency abolished
Reform UK (2019–present)
- Conservative (1978–1992)
- Anti-Federalist League (1992–1993)
- UKIP (1993–2018)
- Independent (2018–2019)[1]
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Gráinne Hayes(m. 1988; div. 1997)
-
Kirsten Mehr(m. 1999)
4
Politician, broadcaster, media personality
A prominent Eurosceptic since the early 1990s, Farage was first elected to the European Parliament (EP) in 1999. In 2004, he became the president of Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy.[b] Farage was elected UKIP's leader in 2006, and led the party at the 2009 EP election, when it won the second-most votes in the UK. He stood unsuccessfully in Buckingham at the 2010 general election before he returned as UKIP's leader that same year. At the 2014 EP election, UKIP won the most seats in the UK, pressuring David Cameron to call the 2016 EU membership referendum.[2][3][4] At the 2015 general election, Farage was an unsuccessful candidate in South Thanet.
After the successful referendum, Farage resigned as UKIP's leader. In 2018, he co-founded the Brexit Party, which drew support from those frustrated with the delayed implementation of Brexit by Theresa May's government, and won the most votes at the 2019 EP election, becoming the largest single party in the EP;[5][6] May announced her resignation days later, and was succeeded by Boris Johnson, whose government delivered Brexit in 2020. At the 2024 general election, Farage again became Reform UK's leader, and is standing for the party in Clacton.
Farage is known for his distinctive character and style, including his flamboyant personality,[7][8] fashion,[9][10][11][12] and social media presence,[13][14][15][16] as well as his form of British right-wing populism.[17] He was ranked second in The Daily Telegraph's Top 100 most influential right-wingers poll in 2013, behind Cameron, and was also named "Briton of the Year" by The Times in 2014.[18][19] He was ranked first on the New Statesman's Right Power List in 2023, described as "the most influential person on the British right".[20]
Early life and education
Nigel Paul Farage was born in Farnborough, Kent, England,[21][22][23] the son of Barbara (née Stevens) and Guy Justus Oscar Farage.[24][25][26] His father was a stockbroker who worked in the City of London. A 2012 BBC Radio 4 profile described Guy Farage as an alcoholic[24] who left the family home when Nigel was five years old.[27] His father gave up alcohol two years later, in 1971, and entered the antiques trade, having lost his Stock Exchange position; the next year, endorsed by friends, he returned to the trading floor at the new Stock Exchange Tower on Threadneedle Street.[28]
Farage's grandfather, Harry Farage, was a private who fought and was wounded in the First World War.[29] It has been suggested that the Farage name comes from a distant Huguenot ancestor.[30] Both parents of one of Farage's great-grandfathers were Germans who emigrated to London from the Frankfurt area shortly after 1861.[31] His German ancestor Nicholas Schrod was mentioned in newspapers in 1870 in connection with a dispute with two men over the Franco-Prussian War.[32]
Farage's first school was Greenhayes School for Boys in West Wickham and he subsequently spent a short period at a similar school in nearby Eden Park.[33] From 1975 to 1982, Farage was educated at Dulwich College, a fee-paying private school in south London. In his autobiography he pays tribute to the careers advice he received there from the England Test cricketer John Dewes, "who must have spotted that I was quite ballsy, probably good on a platform, unafraid of the limelight, a bit noisy and good at selling things".[34] Farage was active in the Conservative Party from his school days, having seen a visit to his school by Keith Joseph.[35]
In 1981, an English teacher who had not met the 17-year-old Farage, Chloe Deakin, wrote to the headmaster of Dulwich College, David Emms, asking him to reconsider his decision to appoint Farage as a prefect, citing concerns expressed by others over Farage's alleged 'fascist' views. Emms rejected those concerns, as did the College's deputy headmaster, Terry Walsh, who said later that Farage "was well-known for provoking people, especially left-wing English teachers who had no sense of humour". Farage later stated: "Any accusation [that] I was ever involved in far right politics is utterly untrue."[36]
Early career
After leaving school in 1982, Farage obtained employment in the City of London, trading commodities at the London Metal Exchange.[24] Initially, he joined the American commodity operation of brokerage firm Drexel Burnham Lambert,[26] transferring to Crédit Lyonnais Rouse in 1986.[26] He joined Refco in 1994, and Natixis Metals in 2003.[26]
Farage had joined the Conservative Party in 1978, but voted for the Green Party in 1989 because of what he saw as their then "sensible" and Eurosceptic policies.[35] He left the Conservatives in 1992 in protest at Prime Minister John Major's government's signing of the Treaty on European Union at Maastricht.[37][38] In 1992, Farage joined the Anti-Federalist League.[39] In 1993, he was a founding member of UKIP.[40] In 1994 Farage asked Enoch Powell to endorse UKIP; Powell declined.[41]
Post-Brexit career
Reform UK
During the very early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom, in March 2020, Farage wrote "protecting us all from an epidemic should be prioritised over the economy", and criticised the herd immunity policy which was being pursued at the time by Boris Johnson's government.[188]
In November 2020, Farage endorsed October's Great Barrington Declaration, which advocates focused protection of those most vulnerable to COVID-19 with the majority of the population allowed to resume normal life. He described lockdowns as "cruel and unnecessary", said he thought that "the cure is worse than the disease", and announced that the Brexit Party, which was being rebranded as Reform UK, would campaign against further lockdowns.[189][190] The Barrington approach was conceived by Sunetra Gupta, a professor of theoretical epidemiology at the University of Oxford, as well as Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford University and Martin Kulldorff of Harvard University. The scientists were concerned with lockdown's effects on public health and mental health, especially for the underprivileged, which they described as "devastating".[191][192] However, the approach has been criticised by Tedros Adhanom, the director-general of the World Health Organization, and Robert Lechler, the president of the British Academy of Medical Sciences.[193][194]
In 2020, Farage established a financial newsletter, Fortune and Freedom, which describes itself as "unregulated product published by Southbank Investment Research Limited".[195] On 28 March 2021 Dutch Green Business announced Farage had been appointed to the firm's advisory board.[196] The newsletter discusses issues related to pension investments.
On 6 March 2021 Farage announced in an interview with The Telegraph that he was retiring from politics and resigning as leader of Reform UK.[197][198] He became the party's honorary president and was replaced as the party's leader by Richard Tice.[199]
In July 2021 Farage criticised the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, accusing them of being a "taxi service" for illegal immigrants. This provoked a major public backlash – donations to the service rose 3000% in the wake of the remarks[200] and a fundraiser on GoFundMe raised over £120,000 to purchase a new rescue hovercraft for the charity with a suggestion the boat be christened The Flying Farage.[201] In November 2021 Farage published an op-ed in The Daily Telegraph contemplating a return to frontline politics, due to the English Channel migrant crossings and what he perceived as the Prime Minister's indifference to the issue.[202]
Farage has made videos on the Cameo platform and has fallen victim to several pranks intended to make him refer to various Irish republican slogans,[203] as well as internet memes such as Among Us and Big Chungus.[204]
Farage launched the Vote Power Not Poverty campaign to secure a referendum on Johnson's government's pledge to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050.[205]
In September 2022, Farage introduced a range of three gins made in Cornwall.[206]
In May 2023, Farage told BBC Newsnight that Brexit had failed due to the policies of successive Conservative governments, saying that their policies meant that the UK did not benefit economically from leaving the bloc.[207]
In September 2023, Farage was ranked first on the New Statesman's Right Power List, describing him as "the most influential person on the British right".[20] In February 2024, Farage revealed that he was "open-minded" about joining the Conservative Party after the general election, more than 30 years after he left the party.[208]
2024 general election
On 3 June 2024, Farage announced that he would return to frontline politics both as leader of Reform UK and as the party's candidate for Clacton in the 2024 general election.[209][210] Farage also pledged to lead the party for five years, and said he intends Reform UK to be the Official Opposition following the election rather than the Conservatives, who he described as incapable of being the Opposition due to "spending most of the last five years fighting each other rather than fighting for the interests of this country".[211] On 7 June, Farage took part in the BBC's 7-leader television debate, during which he called Sunak "unpatriotic" for his controversial decision to leave the D-Day 80th anniversary events early, and said his instincts were "not in line with those of the British people."[212][213]
On 4 June and 11 June, a banana milkshake was thrown over Farage, and other objects thrown at him, while he was campaigning, in Clacton and Barnsley respectively. The alleged perpetrators were arrested and charged with assault.[214][215][216][217] Farage was offered additional private security on 12 June by the Home Office, during his campaigning for the general election.[218]
On 17 June, Reform UK launched their manifesto, with Farage presenting it during an interview. It pledged to lower taxes, increase funding for public services, reform the NHS, partially renationalise utilities and critical national infrastructure, reform the House of Lords, and replace first-past-the-post voting with a system of proportional representation.[219] It also pledged to accelerate transport infrastructure in coastal regions, Wales, the North, and the Midlands, including rail and road links.[220][221] The party also wants to freeze non-essential immigration and recruit 40,000 new police officers.[222] Reform UK are the only major party to oppose the current net zero target made by the government, stating it has led to higher energy prices and caused harm to industries like steel. It pledges to support the environment with more tree planting, more recycling and less single use plastics.[223]
Farage stated in an interview with ITV News that he would remove university tuition fees if he won power but only for those studying science, technology, engineering, medicine or maths.[224]
Broadcasting career
Fox News
On 20 January 2017, the day of Trump's presidential inauguration, US news channel Fox News announced it had hired Farage as a commentator. He has since provided political analysis for both the main Fox News channel and its sister channel Fox Business Network.[323]
LBC
From January 2017 to June 2020 Farage hosted The Nigel Farage Show on the UK talk radio station LBC.[324] The show was broadcast live on Monday to Thursday evenings.[325]
Farage said on his show that Channel 4 journalist Jon Snow "should be attacked" for his "condescending bias" during coverage of a pro-Brexit protest in March 2019. Ofcom decided that Farage had not broken their broadcasting code since he clarified that he meant a verbal attack.[326]
On 31 October 2019, the day the UK was set to leave the European Union before the approval of a delay, Farage interviewed US President Donald Trump on his LBC show. Trump criticised Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Brexit deal, saying it made it difficult for the UK to strike a trade deal with the US.[327]
From March 2018 to July 2018, Farage hosted a podcast under the LBC banner entitled Farage Against The Machine, a play on words for the term 'rage against the machine', where he discussed the latest political developments and political news with political figures who Farage both agrees, and disagrees with. New episodes of the podcast were released every Friday, but the podcast was cancelled after the American rock music band Rage Against the Machine sent a cease and desist letter to Farage, demanding that Farage change the name of the podcast, which he was unwilling to do, prompting LBC to reluctantly trigger its cancellation.[328]
On 11 June 2020, LBC announced that Farage would be leaving the station "with immediate effect", noting that his contract had been up for renewal.[324]
Awards
In November 2016 Farage was honoured with the Lifetime Achievement Award for his role in the 2016 Brexit referendum at the 33rd Parliamentarian of the Year awards run by political magazine The Spectator.[368][369]
In December 2016 he was shortlisted for Time magazine's Person of the Year award.[370]
In February 2020, an honorary doctorate of laws degree was presented to Farage by Jerry Falwell Jr. during Liberty University's weekly convocation for his role in Brexit and 'support of freedom' in Europe and the United States.[371][372]
In June 2023, he won the award for Best Presenter at the annual TRIC Awards.[373]