Left Foot Forward

Nigel Farage has been mocked for celebrating Iceland’s decision not to restart talks on joining the European Union, despite the country already enjoying many of the benefits of close integration with the bloc. On August 29, Icelanders voted against resuming EU accession talks 13 years after negotiations were abandoned. Of the more than 225,000 people who voted, 52.8 percent rejected the government’s proposal, while 47.2 percent backed it.

As Britain surfaces from a summer of prolonged drought, record heat and wildfires, the evidence is becoming harder to ignore. Climate change is increasing the likelihood of the extreme heat and dry conditions that make wildfires more common and dangerous. Scientists overwhelmingly agree that human activity is driving climate change, yet the right-wing media appears determined to find almost anything else to blame.

James Cleverly has vowed to end Sadiq Khan’s supposed ‘war on motorists’ if he becomes London mayor, putting opposition to the capital’s clean-air policies at the centre of his pitch. The former home and foreign secretary recently announced he was quitting the Tory front bench, where he was shadow housing, communities and local government secretary, to seek the party’s nomination for the London mayoral election in 2028.

Why does President Trump seem so unconcerned about the fast-approaching midterm elections? He is deeply unpopular, yet he dismisses widespread anxiety about the war with Iran, “affordability,” higher prices, tariffs, diminished access to healthcare and the trade war with Canada, which will contribute to inflation. It is as if he is living in a bubble, which he may be.

Reform’s head of policy, James Orr, and his media aide Dan Jukes have stepped down after an undercover investigation revealed they had plotted ways to get around electoral law on foreign donations. Reform said Jukes and Orr have been suspended pending an internal investigation. However, in an interview this morning, Reform MP Lee Anderson said there is “no chance of them coming back” and “They have gone”.

Labour will be causing a right headache for Nigel Farage at the Reform UK conference taking place at the end of this week, and will be sending a van to mock him over his undeclared £5 million gift. The Huffpost reports a van will be circling the NEC venue in Birmingham showing an image of Farage shoulder-deep in wads of cash with the slogan: “You have 5 million questions to answer, Nigel.

Reform MP Lee Anderson has been accused of wanting to copy authoritarian regimes after saying there should be a referendum on reintroducing the death penalty. In a Sun article published on Wednesday, Anderson said he thought the public would vote to bring back capital punishment in the UK. The death penalty was abolished in the UK in 1969, but Anderson has voiced support for it since he became an MP in 2019.

Ben Delo, the crypto billionaire who was convicted in the US for not having adequate anti-money-laundering controls at his crypto firm BitMEX, has donated another £4 million to Reform. Delo was given a 30-month probation sentence in 2022, but Donald Trump granted him a presidential pardon for the offence in 2025. Delo gave two lots of £2 million to Reform in January and March this year while he lived in Hong Kong.

Nigel Farage finds himself embroiled in a fresh political scandal on the eve of his party’s conference, after footage was released by undercover reporters showing his team appearing to plot to avoid electoral laws on foreign donations in an undercover investigation broadcast by Channel 4 News. A senior aide to Farage, Dan Jukes, was filmed suggesting a way to get around electoral law to secure a foreign donation of £500,000 for Reform UK.

Andy Burnham has been warned that his government has “missed opportunities” to reform British democracy by failing to introduce a donations cap or changes to the voting system in its elections bill. The Representation of the People Bill passed its third reading yesterday, but key amendments from backbenchers on voting reform and a donations cap were not heard.