# Nigel Farage
**Nigel Farage** (Nigel Paul Farage, born 1964 in Farnborough, Kent) is a British politician who has been the Reform UK Member of Parliament for Clacton since winning a by-election on 13 August 2026, after a career as a Eurosceptic campaigner, [Member of the European Parliament](https://www.edgepedia.org/member-of-the-european-parliament), and party leader who never previously won a House of Commons seat.[1](https://members.parliament.uk/member/5091/career) • [2](https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/4525/NIGEL_FARAGE/history/8) He co-founded the [UK Independence Party](https://www.edgepedia.org/uk-independence-party) (UKIP) after leaving the Conservative Party over the [Maastricht Treaty](https://www.edgepedia.org/maastricht-treaty), led UKIP to victory in the 2014 European elections, helped bring about the 2016 Brexit referendum, and founded the Brexit Party, which won the 2019 European elections.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) • [4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Current office | Reform UK MP for Clacton since winning the 13 August 2026 by-election; first won the seat at his eighth attempt, aged 60[1](https://members.parliament.uk/member/5091/career) • [5](https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/brexit-campaigner-farage-promises-trouble-after-election-uk-parliament-2024-07-05/) |
| Commons record before 2024 | Seven unsuccessful candidacies: Eastleigh (1994), Salisbury (1997), Bexhill and Battle (2001), South Thanet (2005), Bromley and Chislehurst (2006), Buckingham (2010), South Thanet (2015)[1](https://members.parliament.uk/member/5091/career) |
| European Parliament | MEP for South-East England 1999–2020; Chair of the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy Group from 17 January 2017 to 1 July 2019[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) • [2](https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/4525/NIGEL_FARAGE/history/8) |
| Brexit referendum | 51.9% of British voters chose to leave the EU on 23 June 2016; Farage resigned the UKIP leadership the following July[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) |
| 2024 general election | Won Clacton with 21,225 votes (46.2%); Reform UK won four seats nationally on 14% of the vote[6](https://electionresults.parliament.uk/members/5091/elections) • [4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) |
| 2026 | Announced his resignation as MP in July 2026 and won the resulting Clacton by-election on 13 August 2026 with 22,239 votes (63.3%)[6](https://electionresults.parliament.uk/members/5091/elections) • [4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) |
| Early career | Left school for the London Metal Exchange in 1982 at 18; brokered for Drexel Burnham Lambert and later Credit Lyonnais Rouse, Refco, and Natexis Metal[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) • [4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) |
## Early life and City career
Nigel Paul Farage was born in 1964 in Kent. His father, Guy Oscar Justus Farage, left the family when Nigel was five.[7](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36701855) He attended [Dulwich College](https://www.edgepedia.org/dulwich-college) and, at 18, decided against university, becoming a trader on the [London Metal Exchange](https://www.edgepedia.org/london-metal-exchange) in 1982.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) [The Italian](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-italian) encyclopedia Treccani records his broking career at Drexel Burnham Lambert from 1982 and later at Credit Lyonnais Rouse, Refco, and Natexis Metal.[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/)
His break with the Conservative Party came over European integration. He quit the party after the UK signed the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 and joined the Anti-Federalist League, from which UKIP emerged in 1993.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) • [4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/)
## UKIP years and the European Parliament
Farage was elected to the [European Parliament](https://www.edgepedia.org/european-parliament) as MEP for South-East England in 1999 and served there until 2020.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) He became UKIP leader in 2006, stood down in 2009 to challenge the Speaker John Bercow in Buckingham in 2010, and then won a second leadership contest in 2010 despite again failing to enter the Commons.[7](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36701855)
Under his leadership UKIP moved from protest party to electoral force. At the 2009 European elections UKIP outpolled Labour and the Liberal Democrats.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) In 2013 the party took 23% of the vote at the local elections, against 25% for the Conservatives and 29% for Labour, its best local result.[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) In 2014 he led UKIP to the largest share of the vote in the European election, and at the 2015 general election UKIP became the third-biggest party by votes.[7](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36701855) In the European Parliament he sat with the [Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy](https://www.edgepedia.org/europe-of-freedom-and-direct-democracy) (EFDD) group, chairing it from 17 January 2017 until 1 July 2019; his party affiliation within the term shifted from UKIP (until 4 December 2018) to independent, and then to the Brexit Party from 12 February 2019.[2](https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/4525/NIGEL_FARAGE/history/8)
## The Brexit referendum and aftermath
Reuters summarizes the mechanism of his influence: his two-decade presence in the European Parliament helped drive the Conservatives to call the 2016 referendum on EU membership, in which Britons narrowly voted to leave.[5](https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/brexit-campaigner-farage-promises-trouble-after-election-uk-parliament-2024-07-05/) The BBC's biographical timeline credits him with helping persuade more than 17 million people to vote Leave.[7](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36701855) On 23 June 2016 about 51.9% of British voters favored leaving the EU; Farage resigned the UKIP leadership in July 2016.[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/)
## Brexit Party, media career, and interlude
He launched the Brexit Party in April 2019, and at the European elections that May it won 31.7% of the vote, ahead of the Liberal Democrats (20.5%), Labour (13.6%), and the Conservatives (9.2%).[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) • [4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) He left front-line politics in 2021 to present on [GB News](https://www.edgepedia.org/gb-news), and appeared on the reality show *I'm a Celebrity* in 2023, in the same period as the closure of his Coutts bank account.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) The Guardian describes GB News in 2021 as at that time a media novelty in the UK, on which he periodically tried to ignite public concern about migration via "small boats".[8](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jun/04/farage-the-maverick-who-inflamed-uks-brexit-vote-is-back-to-haunt-rightwing-allies)
The Coutts episode became a defining controversy of this period. On his own website Farage claims that his 2023 fightback against being "debanked" led to the sacking of two chief executives and a government promise to change the law on political debanking; these outcomes are self-reported.[9](https://nfarage.com/about/) The same site records that he won News Presenter of the Year at the [Television](https://www.edgepedia.org/television) and Radio Industry Awards in 2023 for his daily GB News show, and that Donald Trump dubbed him "Mr Brexit".[9](https://nfarage.com/about/)
## Reform UK, the 2024 return, and after
On 3 June 2024 Farage announced that he would stand as [Reform UK](https://www.edgepedia.org/reform-uk)'s candidate in Clacton and take over as the party's leader once again.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) At the 4 July 2024 general election he won the seat with 21,225 votes, a 46.2% share, at the eighth attempt and aged 60.[6](https://electionresults.parliament.uk/members/5091/elections) • [5](https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/brexit-campaigner-farage-promises-trouble-after-election-uk-parliament-2024-07-05/) Reform UK won four seats nationally on 14% of the vote.[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) After his victory he said: "My plan is to build a mass national movement over the course of the next few years and hopefully be big enough to challenge the general election properly in 2029."[5](https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/brexit-campaigner-farage-promises-trouble-after-election-uk-parliament-2024-07-05/)
The party's local-election trajectory continued after 2024: in May 2025 Reform UK won half the contested council seats, and in May 2026 local elections Labour lost about 170 council seats.[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) In July 2026 Farage announced his resignation as an MP ahead of a by-election at which he could stand again, and on 13 August 2026 he won the Clacton by-election with 22,239 votes (63.3%) for Reform UK.[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) • [6](https://electionresults.parliament.uk/members/5091/elections)
## Political positions
Reform UK's platform under Farage, as profiled by the BBC, includes freezing non-essential immigration, reaching "Net Zero Immigration", the immediate deportation of foreign criminals, leaving the [European Convention on Human Rights](https://www.edgepedia.org/european-convention-on-human-rights), cutting foreign aid by 50%, raising the income tax threshold to £20,000, removing inheritance tax on estates under £2 million, and building 10,000 new prison places.[3](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo) Reuters adds pledges to push back small-boat migrants to France before they land and to deny benefits and free healthcare to non-genuine refugees for five years.[5](https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/brexit-campaigner-farage-promises-trouble-after-election-uk-parliament-2024-07-05/)
## By the numbers
His career is quantified by a long series of near-misses followed by breakthroughs. Before 2024 he contested seven Commons seats without success; his best previous results were second place in South Thanet in 2015 with 16,026 votes (32.4%) and third in Buckingham in 2010 with 8,401 votes (17.4%).[1](https://members.parliament.uk/member/5091/career) • [6](https://electionresults.parliament.uk/members/5091/elections) The parties he led peaked at 31.7% in the 2019 European elections and 14% of the national vote in 2024, when Reform UK won four seats.[4](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/) His own margins in Clacton rose from 46.2% (21,225 votes) in July 2024 to 63.3% (22,239 votes) in the August 2026 by-election.[6](https://electionresults.parliament.uk/members/5091/elections)
## Assessment and style
The Guardian frames Farage's persona and strategy as the UK counterpart to Donald Trump within the transnational populist right.[8](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jun/04/farage-the-maverick-who-inflamed-uks-brexit-vote-is-back-to-haunt-rightwing-allies) After the Brexit vote he became a presenter on GB News in 2021 and periodically campaigned on small boats outside [Westminster](https://www.edgepedia.org/westminster).[8](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jun/04/farage-the-maverick-who-inflamed-uks-brexit-vote-is-back-to-haunt-rightwing-allies) Reuters, in its 2024 report, called him a "Brexit kingpin" whose European Parliament career reshaped the Conservative Party's agenda on Europe.[5](https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/brexit-campaigner-farage-promises-trouble-after-election-uk-parliament-2024-07-05/)
## References
1. [Nigel Farage — Parliamentary career, UK Parliament](https://members.parliament.uk/member/5091/career)
2. [8th parliamentary term — Nigel FARAGE, European Parliament](https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/4525/NIGEL_FARAGE/history/8)
3. [Who is Nigel Farage? — BBC News](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722409n17wo)
4. [Farage, Nigel Paul — Treccani Enciclopedia](https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/nigel-paul-farage/)
5. [Brexit campaigner Farage promises 'trouble' after election to UK parliament — Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/brexit-campaigner-farage-promises-trouble-after-election-uk-parliament-2024-07-05/)
6. [Nigel Farage — Elections contested, House of Commons election results](https://electionresults.parliament.uk/members/5091/elections)
7. [The Nigel Farage story — BBC News](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36701855)
8. [Nigel Farage, the man who wants to be the UK's answer to Donald Trump — The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jun/04/farage-the-maverick-who-inflamed-uks-brexit-vote-is-back-to-haunt-rightwing-allies)
9. [About — Nigel Farage (official site; self-published)](https://nfarage.com/about/)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Politics and government › Government and public administration › Politicians and government officeholders (biographies) › British politicians*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 27, 2026; Sep 28, 2026; Sep 29, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Sep 27, 2026; Sep 28, 2026; Sep 29, 2026; Oct 12, 2026; Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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