Reform in trouble amid crackdown on crypto and foreign donors

Civil servant Philip Rycroft has put together a report “ringing the alarm bell” about “covert foreign influence campaigns” in UK politics. And the government has responded with an immediate crackdown on all cryptocurrency transactions in particular, which could cause big problems for Reform UK.

This increasing scrutiny of Reform’s dodgy finances comes just as the party has let its mask slip again by dropping its promise to part-nationalise energy and water companies.

A crackdown on Reform’s crypto shadiness

In 2025, Reform leader Nigel Farage promised a “crypto revolution”, saying the party would start to accept crypto donations. Reform has already received at least £12m from cryptocurrency investor Christopher Harborne alone. Harborne, who lives in Thailand, has long backed the British right, from the Tories to the Brexit Party.

Already in the pockets of shady big business interests, Farage has also been acting like a crypto lobbyist and fanatic in recent months. And as the Canary has reported, a recent investigation showed just how dangerous it was to allow Reform to keep:

exploiting a very obvious and gaping loophole in the political finance system

That’s because this situation has allowed Farage to:

hide who and where he is getting his dirty money from

Responding to Rycroft’s report, Housing, Communities and Local Government secretary Steve Reed said:

we will introduce an amendment to the representation of the people bill to place a moratorium on all political donations made through cryptocurrency… This moratorium will remain in place until the Electoral Commission and this parliament are satisfied there is sufficient regulation in place to ensure full confidence and transparency in donations being made in this way.

He also announced that overseas electors will no longer be able to donate more than £100,000 a year.

Reform deputy leader Richard Tice has predictably said his party will seek to repeal this law if it gets into government.

ALL dodgy funding in politics must stop

While the government’s decision is welcome, we all know that Keir Starmer’s Labour is also swimming in donations from lobbyists for foreign powers and shady corporate interests. Indeed, pro-Israel lobby figures even gained leading roles in the government’s ‘foreign interference’ probe in late 2025.

An important point in Rycroft’s report was that it’s not just traditional global foes pushing for influence, but also traditional “allies like the United States“.

In this context, Electoral Reform Society director Jess Garland has encouraged the government to take even stronger action by introducing:

a cap on how much all donors can give to a party, not just those based abroad

The public strongly supports this, she said, and it:

would help prevent our politics from being swamped with massive donations, which now frequently reach into the multiple millions.

This is true for Reform, Labour, the Tories, and the Liberal Democrats. Indeed, Labour Together — which Reed himself once directed — has itself received millions of pounds to exert massive influence over the Labour Party and its current cabinet.

As Unlock Democracy chief executive Tom Brake said:

Big money distorts politics regardless of its origin. A fixed cap is needed across the board to prevent large donations, whether from overseas voters or domestic sources, from buying influence.

Transparency International UK’s policy director Duncan Hames, meanwhile, stressed that:

A meaningful annual cap on donations is the most robust safeguard against both foreign interference and the outsized influence of big money in our politics.

We agree. And while we doubt Keir Starmer’s Labour will risk cutting its own funding stream off by doing so, it’s something we absolutely should be pushing for.

Featured image via the Canary