Good afternoon.
At midday today, Nigel Farage announced on X that he would be making a 2pm speech on his ‘future in public life’. After the longest two hours in history, Farage delivered a stinging rebuke against the attempts of the media and the political establishment to smear his reputation on the basis of spurious financial allegations, rejecting their right to judge him and offering the chance to do so to the people of Clacton by resigning as a Member of Parliament in order to trigger a by-election, in which he intends to stand.
What to make of this speech? Will Farage return to Parliament triumphant? And what does this mean for Reform’s future prospects?
