How Reform's £72m Crypto Cash Could Trigger An Early General Election

Massive donations to Reform UK from two crypto billionaires could lead to Andy Burnham calling an early general election, according to a former government adviser.

Speaking to the HuffPost UK political podcast Commons People, Liz Bates said an imminent change in the law will probably see the party having to hand back the “game changing” £72 million they received from Ben Delo and Christopher Harborne.

If that happens, she said the prime minister could be tempted to call an election before the pair are finally able to donate the money again.

Delo, who lived in Hong Kong until recently, and Thailand-based Harborne each gave Reform £36m in the space of 24 hours last weekend.

However, a law currently going through parliament would cap the amount of money foreign donors can give to UK political parties at £100,000.

In order to give more than that, they will have had to be resident in the UK for at least a year by March 2026.

That is when former top civil servant Philip Rycroft published his report calling for a shake-up of the rules on political donation to prevent foreign interference in British democracy.

That could mean Delo and Harborne’s cash will be prohibited until both men have lived in the UK longer.

Bates, who was a special adviser to former housing secretary Steve Reed until he was sacked by Burnham in July, said the new law gives the PM a window of opportunity.

She said: “When I saw this news [of the donation], I thought ‘will Labour call an early general election?’.

“If I was in the Labour Party and if I was in No.10, I would be thinking, given the way the law will be, my expectation would be [Reform] will have to give this money back.

“But once [Delo and Harborne] have been resident in the UK for a year, they will then be able to donate this amount of money because the law will change.

“So as soon as you’ve been resident in the UK for a year, they can bung this money straight back in.

“And so if I was in the Labour Party, and I was in Andy Burnham’s office, I would be thinking ‘if we call an early general election after the law has changed, then there might be a period of time when they can’t spend this money’.

“If they go long and have an election in 2029, then Reform will inevitably have this £72m.”

Bates, who is also a former Sky News political journalist, said waiting until Reform have the money before calling an election runs the risk of Nigel Farage becoming prime minister.

“Farage, with £72m behind him, if they spent it in the right way, I think that is a formidable force to take on,” she said. “It wouldn’t surprise me if it could buy him an election.”

Westminster is awash with speculation that Burnham could be tempted to call an election within months, even though he has repeatedly denied he plans to do so.

In July, he told the BBC: “There’s no early general election. I don’t think people want it.”

Nevertheless, it has been reported that some senior Labour figures want to make next month’s Holborn and St Pancras by-election a dry run for a national poll.

The Greens have chosen party leader Zack Polanski to be their candidate and believe they have a real chance of causing a major upset in Keir Starmer’s old constituency.

The former PM retained the north London seat, which Labour have held since it was formed in 1083, with a majority of around 11,500.

Were Labour’s Sagal Abdi-Wali to win, some in Labour believe that would show that Burnham has stopped the party losing voters to the Greens, and tee up a possible snap election.

However, a senior Labour source told HuffPost UK that suggestions that a Labour by-election victory will trigger an early poll were “utter utter horsegrade manure”.

“Everything about that suggestion is wrong,” the insider said.

Another source said: “It’s utter nonsense. No is even talking about prepping for a general election yet.”

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