Conor here: I don’t follow UK politics all that closely, but doesn’t this type of sleeze date back a long time. Lloyd George and Tony Blair’s time in office leap to mind. It looks like rather than importing a “big money playbook” it’s more of a guidebook for the style of horse the big money is backing:
BREAKING: New polls show Reform UK is on course to win the next election. “Labour would lose 246 seats and suffer historic losses in traditional heartlands.”
Labour must face the fact that Starmerism is a failure and must be abandoned. https://t.co/x97RbwKeo1
— Jason Hickel (@jasonhickel) April 20, 2025
By Ethan Shone, an investigations reporter for openDemocracy. He is particularly interested in dark money, lobbying and political corruption. Originally published at openDemocracy.
When Nigel Farage took to the stage at Reform’s local election campaign launch in Birmingham last month, he was clutching the cab of a JCB Pothole Pro – an innovation of the construction equipment manufacturer whose owner, Lord Bamford, has pumped millions of pounds into the British right in recent years.
Bamford became a Conservative peer in 2013, and the vast majority of the £10m or so he has donated to political causes has gone to that party or the campaign to leave the EU. But he stepped down from the Lords last year, and his decision to lend Farage the prop, along with a recent £8,000 donation of a helicopter tour of a JCB facility, is fueling rumours that he may join a growing number of Tory donors switching their support to Reform.
In the days after the event, it was reported that Lord Bamford and JCB could “take a leading role” in a national pothole repair programme under a Reform government. These claims, attributed to “sources close to Farage”, were first published in the in-house journal of Great British PAC (GB PAC), a new political organisation that wants to unite the British right ahead of the next general election.
But GB PAC says it didn’t just report on the pothole policy – it came up with it. The organisation, founded by Tory activist Claire Bullivant and fronted by former Reform deputy co-leader Ben Habib, told openDemocracy that the plan was drawn up by its policy director and “given” to Reform. Farage’s party declined to comment on this claim
Bullivant is keen to stress that GB PAC isn’t a political party. Instead, as its name suggests, it is a political action committee – an entity almost entirely unique to the US. There, PACs are used by corporations, special interest groups and the super-rich to funnel huge amounts of money into politics, either by donating directly to their favoured politicians in key races or mounting political campaigns on specific issues or in support of broad movements.
“They are very powerful over there,” explains Bullivant, who has worked as a journalist in the US. “They’re very good at the ‘drip drip drip’ of education and the behind-the-scenes legal initiatives. They’re also good at picking the right horses.
GB Pac may be US-inspired, but its website is determinedly British, awash with images that might be best described as patriotic AI slop. Lions clad in armour charge from the screen, inexplicably wielding Union Jack shields. The organisation’s goals, the site says, are to “save the country” and to “defend Britain against the current socialist government’s agenda”, and its leaders range from former secretaries of state to fringe far-right media influencers.
It’s not yet clear how seriously GB PAC should be taken as a political entity. The group’s policy head, who supposedly gifted the pothole plan to Farage, runs a blog/think tank called Brainfart Policy. But its arrival on the Westminster scene is worrying, regardless. It unquestionably marks the UK taking yet another step in the direction of Americanised politics, where big-money political donors hold outsized influence.
A Political Party?
GB PAC has helpfully already set out its spending priorities, should it suddenly come into a large amount of money.
Firstly, there are legal challenges. The group has highlighted three main policy areas it wishes to challenge the government on: the decision to hand over control of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, the cut to pensioners’ winter fuel payments, and the ban on issuing North Sea oil licenses. Bullivant says GB PAC has a team of four KCs working on these cases, led by Martin Howe KC, a well-respected and presumably expensive barrister.
Beyond that, GB PAC wants to embark on several other strands of work.
The organisation wants to train political operatives and movement leaders through its ‘academy’, which it describes as “more than just a training programme – it’s a blueprint for reshaping British politics”.
Then there is its ‘Media Watchers’ initiative, which seemingly involves GB PAC activists monitoring news coverage of the movement, “using advanced digital tools and social listening software” to identify ‘bias’ or ‘inaccurate reporting’. “We also maintain a comprehensive database of articles, reports, and public statements that misrepresent facts or display clear bias against centre-right policies,” its website says.
Perhaps most concerningly, it wants its supporters to send in Stasi-like reports on “activist judges, two-tier police and biased civil servants”. An image shared by the group multiple times on X calls on supporters to “REPORT THEM”. Written beneath this call to action is a strapline: “In 2029, justice will be served – no exceptions, no privileges.”
Bullivant doesn’t see how this message could be construed as ‘threatening’ – the word openDemocracy put to her in a phone interview in late-March – but did clarify that GB PAC would never publish the names of the people who are reported to them. This carries worrying echoes of another, increasingly prevalent feature of US politics, where pro-Israel campaign organisations collect “deportation lists” of activists and academics who speak out against the country.
At the time, Bullivant mostly wanted to stress that GB PAC hoped to bring together the existing parties on the right, rather than create a new rival one.
“Come 2029, I really want to make sure the right vote isn’t split again,” she said. “We’re definitely NOT a political party”.
But in the weeks following our conversation, rumours began to swirl that Habib, GB PAC’s chair and big-name star, had other ideas.
Habib was once a Conservative donor, who switched his allegiance to Farage and was elected as a member of the European Parliament for the Brexit Party in 2019. In 2023, he was made a co-deputy leader of Reform UK, but was removed from this post after failing to win a parliamentary seat in last year’s general election. Months later, he quit Reform altogether, citing “fundamental differences” with Farage over Brexit, the party’s structure, and “mass deportations” (which he says he supports and Farage does not).
Now it seems he is going it alone. On 7 April, Habib became the director of the Integrity Party, according to documents filed with the UK’s business register, Companies House.
A few days later, Bullivant sent a message to members of GB PAC, restating the group’s commitment to being “policy-first, principle-led, party-neutral”.
“Ben is still very much our chairman,” she wrote, “and will explain his latest move in due course.”
The new political party’s website says it is dedicated to promoting “social cohesion, strong institutions, functional economic systems, open communication, cultural identity, innovation, participation and governance, education and knowledge, social safety nets, and conflict resolution.” Anyone who wishes to become a “corporate partner” (read: donate over £2,000) is encouraged to get in touch.
‘Major Loopholes’
In the future, when the story of this period in British politics is written, GB PAC and the Integrity Party may not even appear in so much as a footnote. But the nature of the current political moment means that either group – or any similar future organisation – could chance upon the exact right combination of events to become a well-resourced, highly influential political vehicle overnight.
The £100m donation to Reform that Elon Musk was reported to have been considering earlier this year has, so far, failed to materialise. In the meantime, Musk’s at-one-time frenzied interest in UK politics seems to have waned, and his purported favoured son of the British right, Rupert Lowe, now sits as an independent MP, having had the Reform whip suspended over allegations that he verbally threatened the party’s chair. (Lowe has denied these allegations, calling them “vexatious”.) The latest Westminster gossip suggests Lowe could join the Conservatives.
All in all, the chances of that money appearing in Reform’s account, or even featuring at all in British politics, have fallen. But the chances are still significantly more than zero, and may well rise as the 2029 general election nears. Musk’s erratic nature means there’s always a possibility that one day soon, if the right tweet or meme catches his eye, the bet could be back on.
It’s worth keeping in mind that while to Musk, dropping £100m is roughly equivalent to me or you buying a round of drinks, the total donated to all UK political parties in 2024 – a general election year – was around £97m. Without blinking, on a whim, the richest man in the world could yet decide to fundamentally alter the course of British politics for a generation.
“I know Ben [Habib] is friends with [Musk],” Bullivant told openDemocracy. “Elon is interested in what we’re doing. He retweeted us a few weeks ago, which was very nice. I don’t know if they’ve talked about the PAC. But if he did want to give us money, there’s nothing to say he can’t.”
Other foreign donors could, too. Bullivant told openDemocracy that “some of the American PACs” have invited GB PAC to Washington in the coming months, though she wouldn’t say which.
An organisation such as GB PAC could be a very effective way of funnelling untraceable cash into British politics, from anyone, anywhere. Although UK political parties are barred from receiving foreign donations, there’s no such rule for other political entities. A PAC could take in money from overseas and donate it to a party as an effective way around the rules.
And openDemocracy understands that, unlike in the US, UK electoral law means a British PAC would not need to declare its funders. In fact, outside of an election period, it would likely not have any transparency requirements whatsoever. Even during an election period, it would probably be bound only by spending rules – if it campaigned on behalf of a party or a coherent grouping of parties, for example – but would still not need to declare its funders.
GB PAC, or the model it seems to have almost stumbled upon, may yet form a critical part of the expanding and changing right-wing ecosystem.
“The appearance of political action committees in the UK is deeply alarming,” said Susan Hawley, the director of Spotlight on Corruption.
“There are very real risks that outfits like this could supercharge huge flows of foreign money into the UK for political campaigning, which the UK’s current laws and framework are simply not equipped to tackle.
“Currently, major loopholes, which allow foreign funders to finance non-party political organisations and digital campaigns, pose an existential threat to our democracy.”
Hawley added: “It’s time the UK looked at the Canadian model of regulating third-party political campaigners in the same way as political parties, and banning them from using foreign funds for their campaigns.”
Even without help (that we know of) from GB PAC, Reform seems to be attracting significant donor interest. The party now resides in an expensive office in Westminster’s Millbank Tower, which has previously been home to Labour and Tory HQs and UN offices. It will soon share the building with, among others, a pro-Reform think tank that has already secured £1m in backing, according to the Financial Times.
Westminster’s money-watchers are eagerly awaiting Electoral Commission data due out in early June, which will show just how much Reform has brought in during its first period of intense fundraising. The expectation is that the figure will be significantly higher than for any other party, and likely for all the other major parties combined.
As Reform continues to dominate the national polls ahead of May’s local elections in England, Labour MPs in seats the party is targeting are acutely aware of the threat, particularly if the Reform candidates they’re up against can attract the kind of cash needed to resource a big national campaign.
One of these Labour MPs, who spoke to openDemocracy on condition of anonymity, said they feel the party should be highlighting the disconnect between Reform’s populist pitch and its elite, big-money backing. They feel unable to do so, they said, because of Labour’s own relationship with big-money funders.
“Parties should serve the people and not the super-rich. Labour must bring itself into line along with other parties. It’s time to end the role of big money in politics,” added the MP, who represents a constituency where Reform came second in last year’s general election.
Labour leader Keir Starmer would certainly struggle to make too much of any party taking cash from donors with overseas links, given two of his major backers are Labour’s own South African-born billionaire, Gary Lubner, and a Cayman Islands-controlled hedge fund – even if they are, respectively, a UK resident and a UK resident ‘for tax purposes’.
The Labour MP also told openDemocracy that “billionaire foreign oligarchs like Musk do not have our country’s interests at heart”, adding: “The super-rich should not be allowed to weaponise their wealth to dictate British politics.
“Reform are exposing themselves as domestic servants of the global elite. The law should be changed to prevent this corruption of democracy. We need total transparency about all their income sources
Whilst I certainly don’t rule out Reform forming the next government, the people they seem most adept at fighting are themselves. These are not serious people (to quote “Succession”). Unfortunately if the Trump 2.0 presidency is any example, that might not matter: people already loathe Starmer’s government.
Unless the Chancellor escapes the Treasury orthodoxy and turns on the funding taps in areas where we have under-utilised resources (like Blair did in his second term), Labour are toast. I remember very well Blair’s first government: he attempted to keep to spending plans that the defeated Conservatives had promised had they won. He just got lucky that a lot of other things went right so the pain wasn’t too bad. This time round Reeves/Starmer simply can’t do that: the country is in a profound funk and nobody has patience for any “jam tomorrow” promises.
It’ll be very interesting to see what happens at the local elections on 1st May. For instance, Nottinghamshire (currently Tory run with some independents who are really just Reform) will be very much in Reform’s sights. Labour don’t stand a chance anywhere and they know it. Their canvassers are all working in neighbouring Derbyshire which is more competitive but I doubt they’ll help things at all. By the way, for non-Brits, Nottingham city is not voting: it’s a unitary authority and not really part of Notts anymore in terms of all sorts of things.
As for the main article theme on a PAC, to be honest it isn’t needed. The press and non-MSM media already are licking their lips at the prospect of a Reform government.
The important sentence in this article is “They feel unable to do so, they said, because of Labour’s own relationship with big-money funders.”
I would suggest it’s worse than this. Labour is already completely captured. MPs and councillors get thrown out for showing any dissent to the Blairite project.
And it follows from the way that Labour and Tories alike are dependant on donors to fund their operations between election campaigns that, if Reform is to develop a machine to enable it to compete with the Government and the Opposition both in parliamentary debates and constituency management to place it in a position to become the next government, it needs funds from donors to hire fulltime researchers, communuications staff, and fulltime party agents at national, regional and constitueccy level, all of them preferably experienced and the majority transferring from the failed parties to the one party that is making a serious effort to identify the needs and identify WITH the needs of the ordinary elector facing a lifetime of precarious work with a failing health system and an educational system which leaves it’s graduates uneducated and carrying lifetime debt. Labour ain’t going to do it, the Tories ain’t going to do it and neither are the godforsaken Liberals. Large donations to Reform may enable Reform to achieve what the others have not – creating a decent social and physical infrastructure leading to a more productive economy.
The world of LabConLib currently revolves around a mindless war against Russia which we can only lose (and invite retaliation directed at the UK mainland), denying that a genocide is a genocide when it is committed by the Jewish State for lebensraum, and how best to get back into bed with the EU, the epitome and guiding light of totalitarian democracy, so that the LabConLib Uniparty can make things even worse for the average Brit. Reform members and electors think about shit jobs, student debt, the most severe housing crisis we have had since the early Victorian age and the Reform leadership is aware of the frustration with the present system that is building like expanding steam in a pressure cooker.
I say good luck to Reform in its efforts to make the UK a stronger, more productve and happier place to be as a supporter of the Workers Party, because something’s got to change never again to be the same and both Reform and the Workers party are a reflection of the despair felt by so many of my countrymen and women.
Reform is in fact a company, not a political party. It used to be majority owned by Nigel Farage but is now a company limited by guarantee but with only two guarantors, one of whom is Farage. The guarantors have control of the organisation. This is hardly symptomatic of a democratic organisation and leads one to ask: why this form of organisation rather than a normal political party?
UK politics is almost as depressing as US politics.
I find it hard to believe the sort of arrangements floated in this article are legal. I hope they are not.
UK electoral law is quite strict and there are crimes of misfeasance in public office so the scope for a UK “PAC” is in funding party machinery, not buying off individual politicians or funding election campaigns.
I wonder how this can be stopped? The Achilles heel of plans is always tax. UK tax rules make gifts to companies dangerous, especially companies where you have a material participation or control. Similarly, UK company law and tax are very strict about separate corporate legal personality. Finally, the machinery of limited companies assumes some sort of profit-seeking activity when you look at shareholder economic rights and their taxation.
Put together, I wonder how successfully one of these front companies could claim that (1) its affairs were not directed by its major donors and thus they were controlling parties and/or disguised participators and (2) the use of their gifts in accordance with their wishes represents a distribution that is unlawful in company law (no profits to distribute) and/or chargeable to income tax on the donor personally as a benefit….
Martin Howe KC is a smart guy though and a leading light in the IP bar at 8 New Square. I met him once or twice when I was doing mini-pupillages there.
Great British PAC does not seem to be a registered company. It is likely an Unincorporated Association, a massive loophole in the law which is allowed to funnel money to and from wherever it likes without reporting requirements, provided it doesn’t make a profit.
I suppose that all of this is only possible because both parties have wrecked themselves, wrecked the country and continue to throttle any dissenters. I have no idea what Starmer thinks he is doing but cutting off fuel for pensioners while giving billions to the Ukraine is just plain nuts. And then to commit the UK to do so every yer for the next century is psycho. And the only reason that Labour are in power is because the Tories proved themselves to be just a bigger a bunch of clowns who threw away their majority. Meanwhile the UK economy is swirling down the gurgler but neither party can offer any solution as the only real solution would be one where the elite would be forced to pay a fair share, particularly the City of London. Gunna get a lot worse before it starts to get any better I fear. To be blunt, the Reform party here is not the cure. It is merely the stench given off by the gangrene.
If people might indulge me for a moment in some “what-iffery”, I think 4 of the 5 major parties (the exception being the Greens but they do NOT get a pat on the head from me) need to be put out of their misery.
We need new parties, which should probably be heavily regional. How’s about a Mercia party for the Midlands? It’d definitely hold the balance of power after a General Election (120+ seats?). A Northumbrian/”General Northern” party. etc. THAT is how we begin to put this excuse for a country back together.
To use an Irish joke, how do we get to there from here? Well it’ll need boots on the ground for starters. But some out-of-the-box thinking regarding electoral reform might aid this process. I’ve mentioned before a voting system used for a while in certain Baltic states post-USSR and which (I stress) I’ve had no part in developing/championing but which *IS* based on a more general method of preferences I am one of the 3 world experts in: Best-Worst (Most-Least). I’m always honest and admit I never thought to use our method as a voting system but it has merit – you vote for a most preferred candidate but you MUST also indicate a least preferred candidate for your ballot to be valid. It’s actually quite intuitive when you see media “net approval scores” for leaders etc. The winner in a constituency is the person with highest net approval score. It penalises polarising people and favours people who don’t engage in populism. Worth a try? Because we are running out of options here in UK.
Trying to be positive, one ray of hope exists in the form of Gary Stephenson, whose you-tube products are high quality. They argue very eloquently for a wealth tax on the seriously rich. He is getting a growing following.
But the man needs support.
Were you able to vote for the Workers’ Party in the last election?
They ran some decent candidates, including George Galloway and Craig Murray.
Nope :(
Around here it is the standard Labour, Conservative, Reform, LibDem, Green quintuple. So I spoilt my ballot. Green stood a chance of getting my vote had they not seemed like they just copy pasted the views of every member of a 30-member focus group together, thus getting some good stuff like MMT but together with complete Treasury Orthodoxy nonsense. You can’t take a party like that seriously.
Under BW voting I kinda think the people you propose might get elected.