Reform UK declares £10m in donationspublished at 11:36 GMT

11:36 GMT

Daniel Wainwright
BBC Verify senior data journalist

Reform UK has declared £10m worth of donations during the three months ending September 2025, according to the Electoral Commission, external.

That’s more than the declared donations to all other political parties combined.

One donor was behind £9m of Reform’s donations – Christopher Harborne – who donated to the party before in 2019 and 2020. He’s also previously donated to the Conservatives.

Harborne’s latest donation is the largest to a party by a living person in the Electoral Commission’s data going back to 2001.

The biggest on record was £10m to the Conservatives from Lord John Sainsbury which he left to the party in his will. He died in 2022.

His cousin Lord David Sainsbury donated £8m to the Liberal Democrats in 2019.

A bar chart shows the amounts declared in donations by political parties in the three months ending September 2025, excluding public funds. Reform UK: £10,293,511 Conservative: £4,662,110, Labour: £2,190,340, Lib Dem: £1,046,412, Green: £30,439 Plaid Cymru: £12,301 Others: £661,613 Source: Electoral Commission Note: Donations include ‘non cash’, such as services provided free of charge

Parties are required to submit quarterly reports on donations and loans to the Electoral Commission.

Donations from the same source in a calendar year must be declared once they go above £11,180 for the central party and every £2,300 after that.

Local party branches must declare donations once they go above £2,300.