Nigel Farage faces an expenses investigation into almost £60,000 of “missing” European Union funds paid into his personal bank account.
The Ukip leader has received £15,500 a year from the EU since at least 2009 to pay for the upkeep of his constituency office, a small converted grain store near Bognor Regis, according to transparency reports filed on the party’s website.
However, the grain store was given rent-free to Mr Farage by Ukip supporters 15 years ago.
Utilities and other non-rental costs amount to no more than £3,000 a year, according to the former office manager, leaving about £12,000 a year unexplained.
The Ukip leader, who has made strides in the polls after condemning the former culture secretary Maria Miller’s expenses abuse last week, confirmed that he received his office rent free but insisted that he legitimately spent more than £1,000 a month to run the 620 sq ft property.
A former senior Ukip official has filed a formal complaint about Mr Farage to the EU anti-fraud office OLAF.
The complainant wishes to remain anonymous because of “physical threats” allegedly made by other Ukip officials against members who raised questions about the party’s finances.
Ukip MEPs have only filed transparency reports since July 2009, meaning that it is possible Mr Farage spent more than £200,000 of EU funds on “office management and running” costs on his office since his election in 1999. Under EU and Ukip guidelines, such spending is limited to rent, water, electricity, heating, insurance and business rates.
Stationery, office equipment, staff and communications come under separate spending categories. Like all MEPs, Mr Farage receives a general expenditure allowance (GEA) of about £3,800 a month to rent and run an office in his home country.
No MEP is required to file receipts to show how this money is spent, however, opening the system up to potential abuse. “You shove it down your trousers if you want to,” Mike Nattrass, a former Ukip MEP, said. “The EU will never ask them to justify it.
That’s the trouble with it. It goes into your bank account whether you want it or not.” Mr Farage accepted that MEPs “don’t need any receipts or any justification” to receive EU allowances.
He said that he used his GEA to run the grain store as well as a smaller office located at his home.
“I don’t pay rent on the office but I obviously pay for everything else,” he said.
“Whether it’s the burglar alarm or electricity.” Mr Farage disputed a statement by David Samuel-Camps, the grain store’s office manager in 2010, who said that running costs amounted to only £3,000 a year. “About £1,000 a month is roughly what it is,” the Ukip leader said.
“Exceptionally I put more money in as and when it’s needed.” Mr Farage also revealed that he used a proportion of his GEA to pay more than £1,000 a month towards a controversial second EU pension scheme of which he was a member between 1999 and 2009. Under the generous scheme, which was criticised by many MEPs at the time, members paid in £1,052 from their own money every month which was supplemented by a generous taxpayer-funded payment of £2,104.
Like other MEPs, Mr Farage’s contribution to the pension was deducted from his GEA before the rest was deposited into his bank account.
The system relied on MEPs being honest enough to fund the shortfall in GEA out of their own cash. Mr Farage insists he did so.
Last year the Ukip leader was embarrassed after it was revealed he had set up the Farage Family Educational Trust on the Isle of Man in order to mitigate tax, although he said that he did not personally benefit.
Mr Farage was last night forced to deny claims made by former staff members that he transferred European funds into other offshore bank accounts he controlled which were located in the Cayman Islands and the Isle of Man.
Mr Farage said that any inquiries into such matters were “completely, wholly unacceptable” and added that he would not answer “any more questions of that nature”. An EU spokeswoman confirmed: “It is on the MEP’s honour that the assumption is made that the money is spent properly.” A Ukip spokesman said: “Nigel Farage is confident that he has abided by European parliamentary rules at all times when spending allowances.”
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This inquiry may well show Nigel Farage’s lies regarding his off shore account in the tax haven of The Isle of Man about which he lied and claimed he did not use – I feel sure few readers will consider a deposit of £1/4 Million to Farage Family Educational Trust to be so inconsequential that it doesn’t count as a deposit of any consequence!
Interestingly on a quick check the other day I note that it seems that having publicised the details of Farage Family Educational Trust and large deposits into it by Nigel Farage to reduce his tax liabilities on his over generous income the account seems to be further obfuscated and made less traceable!
Nigel Farage’s EU bank account to avoid British tax, where as an MEP he can avoid paying into British taxation and pays a reduced rate as an MEP are still traceable but the account(s) in The Cayman Islands are beyond my ability to trace them but I’m sure Steven Woolfe would be able to help t6he police investigate those, as perhaps could Dr. Dick Horsnell could help re IoM accounts!
Greg Lance - Watkins (Greg_L-W)
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