Best Of

Dubai resident Richard Tice defends his leader from tax dodging when someone bought him a house in Clacton......Good to see Mr Balls on the case. Maybe the Telegraph could bring their experience to bear

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bN-BgdEkl90

Farage girlfriend buys a house and he co- habits with her

What has he done wrong

And nobody dislikes Farage more than I do but there are a lot more ways to trip him up than this

His trouble is that there is fairly convincing evidence she didn't use her money to buy the house. It's not clear what employment she's had that would get her the money to buy the house outright (there is no mortgage on it) and the story about her parents providing the money is paper thin (they don't appear to be especially wealthy).

If she used Farage's money, and he simply put her name on the deeds, that would have reduced stamp duty liability by about £40k. Coincidentally, a similar reduction to that from which Rayner benefited, and which Farage said was more than sufficient to drum her out of office.

He'll probably bluff this one out as it's a slightly complex story for his supporters to grasp. But unless he can pull an evidential rabbit out of the hat fast, he does look pretty much bang to rights.

I assume if evidence of these allegations is provided than that may well change the issue, but for now it seems just a rumour

Frankly, I would be delighted to see Farage outed but I do not think this is the magic bullet

Again, not a brilliant day to use the term "magic bullet", but still

The evidence is the career record of Farage's partner, and the evidence of the modest means of her parents. The couple could also very easily put the matter to bed by providing evidence of the gift from parents to daughter.

As I say, I don't think it will bring Farage down as he has the support of his party, and I don't think his supporters care enough about it. But it's reasonably convincing, to be frank.

Bit careless of me - an old man's innocent mistake !!!!!!!

Dubai resident Richard Tice defends his leader from tax dodging when someone bought him a house in Clacton......Good to see Mr Balls on the case. Maybe the Telegraph could bring their experience to bear

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bN-BgdEkl90

Farage girlfriend buys a house and he co- habits with her

What has he done wrong

And nobody dislikes Farage more than I do but there are a lot more ways to trip him up than this

His trouble is that there is fairly convincing evidence she didn't use her money to buy the house. It's not clear what employment she's had that would get her the money to buy the house outright (there is no mortgage on it) and the story about her parents providing the money is paper thin (they don't appear to be especially wealthy).

If she used Farage's money, and he simply put her name on the deeds, that would have reduced stamp duty liability by about £40k. Coincidentally, a similar reduction to that from which Rayner benefited, and which Farage said was more than sufficient to drum her out of office.

He'll probably bluff this one out as it's a slightly complex story for his supporters to grasp. But unless he can pull an evidential rabbit out of the hat fast, he does look pretty much bang to rights.

I assume if evidence of these allegations is provided than that may well change the issue, but for now it seems just a rumour

Frankly, I would be delighted to see Farage outed but I do not think this is the magic bullet

Again, not a brilliant day to use the term "magic bullet", but still

The evidence is the career record of Farage's partner, and the evidence of the modest means of her parents. The couple could also very easily put the matter to bed by providing evidence of the gift from parents to daughter.

As I say, I don't think it will bring Farage down as he has the support of his party, and I don't think his supporters care enough about it. But it's reasonably convincing, to be frank.

Dubai resident Richard Tice defends his leader from tax dodging when someone bought him a house in Clacton......Good to see Mr Balls on the case. Maybe the Telegraph could bring their experience to bear

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bN-BgdEkl90

Farage girlfriend buys a house and he co- habits with her

What has he done wrong

And nobody dislikes Farage more than I do but there are a lot more ways to trip him up than this

Except there is no mortgage on the £885,000 property and no-one can work out given her job history how she can afford to buy such a house.

Farage said she had money from her family.

The BBC had an article on this earlier: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce845w70g0yo

Not a smoking gun.

"Smoking gun" is probably not the best term to use today, but still.

I have to say you're being extremely generous to Farage there. £885k home with no mortgage, apparently bought outright from the personal resources of a lady whose career background appears to be a couple of failed businesses and some waitressing. The "wealthy parents" seem to live in a modest £300k flat in Strasbourg.

Maybe they are frugal, modest, and highly generous French pensioners. But you have to strongly suspect Farage provided the money and put the house in her name to reduce stamp duty liability by £40k (or to use the the colloquial term for that sum, a "Rayner").

Farage and his partner can easily disprove that if it's wrong, of course, by showing evidence of the gift from parents to daughter. Let's see if they do.

But where would Farage have got that kind of money from? I mean, I'm sure he would never have used his £2m expenses from the European Parliament for anything like that.