{"id":192477,"date":"2024-12-10T20:36:08","date_gmt":"2024-12-10T20:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/10\/nigel-farage-recruits-property-tycoon-nick-candy-as-reform-treasurer\/"},"modified":"2024-12-10T20:36:08","modified_gmt":"2024-12-10T20:36:08","slug":"nigel-farage-recruits-property-tycoon-nick-candy-as-reform-treasurer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/10\/nigel-farage-recruits-property-tycoon-nick-candy-as-reform-treasurer\/","title":{"rendered":"Nigel Farage recruits property tycoon Nick Candy as Reform treasurer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Nigel<\/div>


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Reform UK has unveiled billionaire property developer – and former Conservative donor – Nick Candy as its treasurer, with the job of raising big money to fight the next general election. <\/p>\n

It is the latest in a series of announcements by Nigel Farage’s party aimed at showing it is serious about winning power.<\/p>\n

Candy, who is married to Australian singer and actress Holly Valance, who also supports Reform, made his money by buying and renovating properties with his brother Christian. <\/p>\n

The pair were privately educated, and bought their first property in London in 1995, using a \u00a36,000 loan from their grandmother. They have never disclosed their wealth, but describe themselves as “self-made billionaires<\/a>“.<\/p>\n

The property tycoon was close to former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, donating more than \u00a3270,000 to the party under his leadership and attending the then-PM’s wedding. <\/p>\n

Now he says Farage could win the next general election – and is promising to raise “tens of millions” for Reform UK, telling journalists he will donate a “seven figure sum” of his own cash as well.<\/p>\n

“This country needs change and I believe the person to make that change is Nigel Farage and I believe he’ll be the next prime minister of this country,” he said as he was unveiled to the cameras at Westminster.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Elon Musk has expressed interest in Candy’s appointment, amid speculation the billionaire owner of X is looking into offering Farage’s party a large donation.<\/p>\n

Candy said he and Musk exchanged messages following the announcement on Tuesday morning, but the new Reform UK treasurer refused to be drawn on any negotiations.<\/p>\n

When he was quizzed about the Donald Trump-supporting tycoon, Farage said: “We don’t know anything about Elon Musk other than he is supportive of our position.”<\/p>\n

But he joked: “If people offer us money legally, we’ll take it.” <\/p>\n

Businesses or individuals have to be registered in the UK to donate to a political party, raising questions about how the South African-born US citizen could give money to Reform.<\/p>\n

Farage denies Reform UK is becoming a party of millionaires and billionaires, saying the fundraising drive is about getting on an “even financial footing” with the other main parties.<\/p>\n

“If we do that we will achieve extraordinary things,” he added. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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As well as cash, Reform UK has been gaining valuable contacts in Westminster. <\/p>\n

Last week former Johnson adviser Tim Montgomerie, a veteran Tory commentator who founded the influential Conservative Home website, announced he was defecting to the party, citing immigration as a policy failure he could not forgive.<\/p>\n

Farage has a patchy record when it comes to high-profile signings. In his former life as UKIP leader he managed to fall out with figures such as TV personality Robert Kilroy-Silk, Tory defector Douglas Carswell and former EU auditor Marta Andreasen, shortly after unveiling them amid much fanfare.<\/p>\n

But he has also managed to attract wealthy backers in the past, such as insurance tycoon Arron Banks, who bankrolled his Brexit campaign. <\/p>\n

He is positioning Reform UK as the party for voters hungry for change – a platform Labour won a landslide election victory on just over five months ago.<\/p>\n

But Sir Keir Starmer’s decision to make difficult and unpopular decisions at the start of his premiership, along with a number of unforced errors, has seen Labour’s popularity plummet, as Reform’s has risen.<\/p>\n

Reform UK sits comfortably in third place ahead of the Liberal Democrats in national opinion polls, and is narrowing the gap with the two main parties.<\/p>\n

The fledgling party proved incapable of transforming the size of its support into seats at Westminster in July.<\/p>\n

The Liberal Democrats won 3.5 million votes and 72 MPs through their highly-targeted campaign, whereas Reform UK picked up just over four million votes, but only five seats.<\/p>\n

Farage is on a mission to learn from the Lib Dems how to make Westminster’s first-past-the-post voting system work for his party.<\/p>\n

Reform UK’s new multi-millionaire chairman Zia Yusuf has taken on the job of “professionalising” the party – no easy task when it has attracted so much controversy in its short life with its choice of candidates in particular.<\/p>\n

Farage has faced questions over James McMurdock<\/a>, the Reform MP for South Basildon and East Thurrock, who has a spent conviction after assaulting his girlfriend in 2006.<\/p>\n

The party has said it was aware of the previous conviction when McMurdock was selected as a candidate, and believes “strongly that people can change their lives”.<\/p>\n

But Reform UK is pledging to vet candidates more thoroughly ahead of next year’s local elections in an attempt to avoid embarrassment.<\/p>\n

One target is the new mayoral seat in Greater Lincolnshire, where former Conservative MP Andrea Jenkyns has been revealed as the party’s candidate.<\/p>\n

Reform has so far been seen largely as a threat to the Conservatives – but on the day after the general election, Farage made their strategy clear when he declared: “We’re coming for Labour”.<\/p>\n

The big parties will be watching Reform UK’s recent flurry of announcements nervously – and wondering whether they can keep this momentum up.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Reform UK has unveiled billionaire property developer – and former Conservative donor – Nick Candy as its treasurer, with the job of raising big money to fight the next general election. It is the latest in a series of announcements by Nigel Farage’s party aimed at showing it is serious about winning power. Candy, who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":192478,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/668e\/live\/f9030990-b72a-11ef-8768-5549ae405050.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[603],"tags":[51051,23751,5468,20164,6703,15354,1793,107032,29102],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192477"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192477"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192477\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":192479,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192477\/revisions\/192479"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/192478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}