Nigel Farage

Credentials

• Dulwich College, 1975-1982. [1]

Background

Nigel Farage is the former leader and co-founder of the Brexit Party, which he set up ahead of the European Parliament elections in May 2019 to express “anger” over the fact that Britain had not yet withdrawn from the EU and to “change politics for good.” [24]

Farage was Vice-chairman of Leave Means Leave, a campaign group set up after the EU referendum to advocate a “hard” Brexit. He led the group with Chairman and property investor, Richard Tice and former head of the British Chambers of Commerce, John Longworth. [12]

Other members of Leave Means Leave included figures that have cast doubt on the veracity of climate science and the seriousness of climate change including Owen Paterson, Christopher Chope, Jacob Rees-Mogg and Peter Lilley. [12]

Leave Means Leave was based at 55 Tufton Street, home to several organisations pushing for a hard Brexit as well as the UK‘s principal climate science denial group, the Global Warming Policy Foundation.

Prior to the EU referendum, Farage led the UK Independence Party (UKIP), of which he was a founder member, until July 2016. [3], [13]

Farage has cast doubt on climate science on a number of occasions and both UKIP and the Brexit Party have fielded numerous climate science denying candidates. [4], [30]

UKIP’s party manifestos for the 2015 and 2017 elections both pledged to undo green initiatives, analysis by Carbon Brief showed. In 2015 it stated “the Climate Change Act is doing untold damage. UKIP will repeal it.” It also argued that “coal must be part of the solution” for cheap energy security and that it’s “time to get fracking.” These themes were repeated in 2017 when the party manifesto called again for the UK Climate Change Act to be repealed while pledging to “withdraw from the Paris climate agreement and the EU Emissions Trading scheme.” [5], [6]

UKIP’s primary goal was to seek the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union, and Farage stepped down as party leader following the EU referendum in June 2016, saying his “political ambition [had] been achieved.” During the Brexit campaign, Farage was a leading member of the unofficial pro-Brexit groups Leave.EU and Grassroots Out. [7], [8]

Since then Farage has toured the US and Australia, visiting like-minded conservative groups and appearing as a commentator on Fox News. [9], [10], [11]

Farage left UKIP in December 2018, saying the party’s leader Gerard Batten was “obsessed” with the issue of Islam and the ex-English Defence League leader Tommy Robinson. [25]

From 2017-2020, he was the host of the “Nigel Farage Show,” a radio phone-in on the London-based national radio station, LBC. [31]

Stance on Climate Change

January 23, 2020

Presenting a phone in on LBC during the Davos gathering of world leaders, Farage claimed that Donald Trump was taking a positive approach to climate action and criticised Prince Charles and Greta Thunberg for promoting “alarmism.” [32]

Farage suggested that population growth was the greatest driver of environmental impacts, including carbon emissions, saying: [32]

“The real problem we’ve got here, I’m going to put this to you, in my view, the real problem we’ve got here with loss of habitat, the destructive effects on biodiversity and all of these problems with carbon emissions or whatever else you want to worry about in the world, is simply because the global population is exploding, it’s the biggest problem that we face.” [32]

November 2015

In an interview with Spiked online: [14]

“I haven’t got a clue whether climate change is being driven by carbon-dioxide emissions.” [14]

“I think wind energy is the biggest collective economic insanity I’ve seen in my entire life. I’ve never seen anything more stupid, more illogical, or more irrational.” [14]

June 2013

In an interview with Edie: [15]

“I am not saying that man is having no influence on the climate, although as the years go by it looks increasingly unlikely. To be told that the science is settled [on global warming] is hard to accept. Where I grew up, our back wall joined onto Down House where Charles Darwin wrote [On the Origin of Species] and 150 years on, the science isn’t settled over Darwin and I can tell you science is never settled.” [15]

“It’s odd to focus on carbon dioxide. I’m an environmentalist; I’m against carbon monoxide and sulphur dioxide and toxins in our rivers. Yes, I’m all for pollution controls but to obsess with carbon dioxide, which as I understand it, is a perfectly natural occurring phenomenon, strikes me as strange.” [15]

September 2013

Speaking in the European Parliament: [16]

“We may have made one of the biggest and most stupid collective mistakes in history by getting so worried about global warming.” [16]

Key Quotes

April 18, 2023

Appearing on Sky News Australia, Farage called Just Stop Oil activists, who interrupted the UK Snooker Championship in March 2023, “a new student cult” who have “been indoctrinated” and are “overprivileged middle class kids.”

He said: “we’ve got to reach a point with these people where their intolerance is met by our intolerance.” [39]

January 9, 2023

In a GB News segment with Alan Miller from the Together campaign – titled “Britain has GIVEN UP on Christianity and embraced the new religion of Greta Thunberg” – Farage said:

“If people want this, they can have it, this is being imposed without any proper debate between parties. Final thought, the proposals in Canterbury and Oxford that you basically would not be allowed to drive your car out of a very local neighbourhood without a form of charge, this almost feels like a sort of climate lockdown, or am I exaggerating?” [37]

Concluding the segment, Farage reiterated: “If people want these things, that’s fine, they can have them, but it’s just being imposed, it’s crackers, it is the new religion as we give up on Christianity and we embrace the new religion of Greta Thunberg.”

December 15, 2022

In a GB News appearance, Farage labelled HSBC’s decision to no longer provide finance for “projects pertaining to new oil and gas fields and related infrastructure” a “self-inflicted act of lunacy” on the part of the UK. [38]

He said: 

“HSBC will stop funding future oil and gas exploration and development projects. They’re doing it because they want to help us meet our environmental targets. Oh aren’t they so virtuous and wonderful?”

He later added: “This is the madness that has gripped the corporate world. It’s damaging our country.”

August 12, 2019

In a speech to the Australian Conservative Political Action Conference reported by the Guardian, Farage made comments about the UK‘s Royal Family, saying: [28]

“When it comes to [the Queen’s] son [Prince Charles], when it comes to Charlie Boy and climate change, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Her mother, Her Royal Highness the Queen’s mother was a slightly overweight, chain-smoking gin drinker who lived to 101 years old. All I can say is Charlie Boy is now in his 70s … may the Queen live a very, very long time.”

Commenting on the marriage of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, he said:

“Terrifying! Here was Harry, here he was this young, brave, boisterous, all male, getting into trouble, turning up at stag parties inappropriately dressed, drinking too much and causing all sorts of mayhem. And then, a brave British officer who did his bit in Afghanistan. He was the most popular royal of a younger generation that we’ve seen for 100 years.

“And then he met Meghan Markle, and it’s fallen off a cliff. We’ve been told in the last week that Meghan and Harry will only have two children … and we’re all completely ignoring, the real problem the Earth faces, and that is the fact the population of the globe is exploding but no one dares talk about it, no one dares deal with it, and whether Prince Harry has two kids is irrelevant given there are now 2.6 billion Chinese and Indians on this Earth.” [28]

February 28, 2018

Farage said on Twitter: [17]

“Large parts of central London have no salt on the roads. Perhaps they are all so convinced by global warming they never thought any would be needed.” [17]

Key Actions

May 4, 2021

Farage joined Amsterdam-based carbon offset company Dutch Green Business, which aims to reduce carbon emissions by planting trees, as an adviser and spokesperson. He told Reuters: “I think people will want to plant trees and increase biodiversity through DGB who are actually quite sceptical about climate change. Equally there will be others who are very concerned about it.” He also said: “If their motivations are more about biodiversity than they are about climate change, so what?” [35]

According to The Guardian, Dutch Green Business is part owned by businessman John Mappin, a supporter of the conspiracy theorist QAnon movement. [36]

December 7, 2020

Farage stated that his new party, Reform UK, would recruit candidates to stand against “any and every” politician who backed Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s 10-point plan for a ‘Green Industrial Revolution,’ Breitbart reported. Farage also reportedly described Johnson’s policies to convert streets into cul-de-sacs as “madness,” and an opportunity for the government to “virtue-signal and show off its eco-credentials.” [34]

November 2, 2020

An interview with Farage by talkRADIO’s Mike Graham discussing the 2020 U.S. Presidential election was quoted in The Daily Express. In response to Graham claiming that “in Pennsylvania, Joe Biden’s home state, Biden has said he wants to do away with the oil business and fracking”, and “that is not going to play too well for one of the world’s centres for oil and fracking”, Farage responded: “these are blue-collar jobs, these are communities who traditionally vote Democrat but under Joe Biden they will lose their jobs”, continuing: “I think you are right, I think that is an absolute key for Pennsylvania”. [33]

July 4, 2019

Farage paid tribute to the late Christopher Booker in an interview with the right-wing website Breitbart, describing how Booker campaigned with him for the UK to leave the European Union in the 1990s. Farage also said during the interview: [29]

“[Booker] questioned whether CO2 was actually leading to climate change, he questioned all the attempts to shut down free speech and open debate.”

May 16, 2019

A Channel 4 News investigation revealed that Farage’s close ally, Arron Banks, had spent approximately £450,000 funding a lavish lifestyle for Farage in the year following the 2016 EU referendum. [27]

April 12, 2019

Farage launched the Brexit Party ahead of the European Union elections in May. Among the 70 candidates selected to stand was Annunziata Rees-Mogg, sister of the pro-Brexit, climate science denying Conservative MP, Jacob Rees-Mogg. Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Farage said his former party, UKIP, had allowed “the far right to join it and take it over and I’m afraid the brand is now tarnished,” while claiming that there was “no difference” in terms of policy between the two parties. Three UKIP MEPs announced they had defected to the party four days later. [24], [26]

February 9, 2019

It was announced that Farage would run in the upcoming European Parliament elections for a newly-registered Brexit Party, if Britain had not left the EU by this point. [13]

November 2016

Farage claimed the distinction of being the first British politician to meet with Donald Trump after the US presidential election. A photo taken on November 12 shows the two men standing in front of Trump’s golden elevator in New York City alongside millionaire UKIP and Brexit-backer Arron Banks, Breitbart UK editor Raheem Kassam, unofficial Brexit campaign group Leave.EU pollster Gerry Gunster, and Andy Wigmore, communications director of Leave.EU. [18], [19], [20]

July 2016

Farage attended the Republican National Convention during the 2016 presidential race which led to the election of Donald Trump. His goal was to spread the “Brexit gospel,” as Politico reported at the time. “I think there are a lot of Republican strategists who are looking very closely at what we did and how we did it,” Farage told Politico, adding “All I can do is to come and tell my story.” [21]

July 2015

Farage delivered a speech to the Heritage Foundation in Washington D.C. where he made the case for the US to support Brexit. The Heritage Foundation is a conservative “free enterprise” group with a history of promoting climate science denial. [22]

Affiliations

• LBC —Radio presenter (2017-2020). [32]
• The Brexit Party — Co-founder; former leader and MEP. [24], [23]
• United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) — Founding member, former leader and MEP. [3], [7]
• Leave.EU — Former member. [8]
• Grassroots Out — Former member. [8]
• Fox News — Commentator. [11]
• Leave Means Leave — Former Vice-chairman. [12]

Social Media

• @Nigel_Farage on Twitter.
• @nigelfarageofficial on Facebook.

Publications

• “My new Brexit party stands ready to defend democracy,” The Telegraph, February 8, 2019.
• “How can the BBC be fair about Brexit when it takes money from the EU? We need answers,” The Telegraph, February 6, 2019.
• “We must stop Gerard Batten turning Brexit into a plaything of the far Right,” The Telegraph, November 23, 2018.
• “If only we had a proper leader like Donald Trump taking on the EU, not Theresa the appeaser,” The Telegraph, July 26, 2018.
• “FARAGE FOR BREITBART: A Letter to America, On How You May Lose Your Greatest Ally,” Breitbart, July 17, 2015.

Resources

1. Nigel Farage. “Nigel Farage: My public school had a real social mix, but now only the mega-rich can afford the fees,” The Telegraph, March 14, 2015. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/rnPVG
2. “Nigel Farage profile,” European Parliament. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/LAEUW
3. Godfrey Bloom. “When we founded Ukip, Brexit was a lost cause. Nigel Farage changed all that,” The Telegraph, July 4, 2016. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/mzYg6
4. Karl Mathiesen. “How fast is Arctic sea ice melting?” The Guardian, September 18, 2013. Archived February 25, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/x3Sqx
5. Simon Evans. “Election 2015: What the manifestos say on climate and energy,” Carbon Brief, April 21, 2015. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/dqwdj
6. Simon Evans. “Election 2017: What the manifestos say on energy and climate change,” Carbon Brief, June 16, 2017. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/oTNkW
7. “UKIP leader Nigel Farage stands down,” BBC News, July 4, 2016. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/M5Iqq
8. Jim Pickard. “EU vote: Brexit camps set to merge but rifts remain,” Financial Times, February 10, 2016. Archived February 13, 2019. Archived .pdf on file at DeSmog.
9. Ben Jacobs. “Nigel Farage gets warm welcome at gathering of US right wing,” The Guardian, February 23, 2018. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/Rf0Vl
10. Naaman Zhou. “Nigel Farage tour: five arrested in protest outside Melbourne hotel,” The Guardian, September 7, 2018. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/NfB9i
11. Joe Concha. “Fox News signs Nigel Farage, backer of Trump and Brexit,” The Hill, 20 January, 2017. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/VQyuf
12. “Who we are,” Leave Means Leave. Archived February 4, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/36OM4
13. Shehab Khan. “Nigel Farage ‘will stand’ for new Brexit Party if Britain leaving the EU is delayed,” The Independent, February 9, 2019. Archived February 13, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/1zy9T
14. Ed King. “Nigel Farage on climate change: in his own words,” Climate Home News, March 11, 2015. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/EOSFd
15. Leigh Stringer. “UKIP‘s Nigel Farage on wind farms, global warming and Charles Darwin,” Edie, June 4, 2013. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/uPtqg
16. “What EC President Barroso really said in the European Parliament on 11 September,” European Commission, September 12, 2013. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/U0I18
17. “Large parts of central London have no salt on the roads. Perhaps they are all so convinced by global warming they never thought any would be needed.” Tweet by @Nigel_Farage, February 28, 2018. Retrieved from Twitter.com. Archived .png on file at DeSmog.
18. “Farage: ‘Real opportunity’ for UK business with Donald Trump,” BBC News, November 13, 2016. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/JMD2F
19. Jon Stone. “Nigel Farage branded ‘poppy-less popinjay’ for skipping Remembrance Sunday to visit Donald Trump,” The Independent, November 14, 2016. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/Tz2xN
20. Andrew Pierce, James Tapsfield. “Your gold door’s worth more than my house! The riotous inside story of Farage and his Ukip posse’s astonishing coup as he became the first foreign politician to meet President-elect Trump,” Daily Mail, November 14, 2016. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/rfVYl
21. Benjamin Oreskes. “Nigel Farage preaches Brexit gospel in Cleveland,” Politico, July 19, 2016. Archived February 18, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/BdzKc
22. “FARAGE FOR BREITBART: A Letter to America, On How You May Lose Your Greatest Ally,” Breitbart, July 17, 2015. Archived February 28, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/E3Jfw
23. “Nigel Farage resigns as UKIP leader: ‘I want my life back’,” BBC News, July 4, 2016. Archived April 16, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/volVf
24. “Nigel Farage launches Brexit Party ahead of European elections,” BBC News, April 12, 2019. Archived April 16, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/K3G0T
25. “Former leader Nigel Farage quits UKIP,” BBC News, December 4, 2018. Archived April 16, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/1ygsa
26. Samuel Osborne. “Ukip MEPs quit to join Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party,” The Independent, April 15, 2019. Archived April 16, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/te9pO
27. “Nigel Farage’s funding secrets revealed,” Channel 4 News, May 16, 2019. Archived June 20, 2019. Archive.fo URL: https://archive.fo/3MJBa
28. Michael McGowan, Ben Doherty. “Nigel Farage attacks Harry and Meghan, jokes about ‘overweight’ Queen Mother,” Guardian, August 12, 2019. Archived August 20, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.fo/IBrg8
29. Oliver JJ Lane. “Exclusive: Nigel Farage’s Tribute to British Eurosceptic ‘Literary Giant’ Christopher Booker,” Breitbart, July 4, 2019. Archived December 2, 2019. Archive.fo URL: http://archive.md/LdCzk
30. Richard Collett-White, “Election 2019: Here Are All the Brexit Party’s Climate Science Deniers,” DeSmog, May 1, 2019.
31. “Nigel Farage leaves radio station LBC,” BBC News, June 11, 2020. Archived August 30, 2020. Archive.fo URL: https://archive.fo/wip/TzW0k
32. “Nigel Farage compares President Donald Trump and Prince Charles on climate change,” YouTube video uploaded by user LBC Radio on on January 23, 2020 . Archived .mp4 on file at DeSmog.
33. Gerrard Kaonga. “Nigel Farage convinced Trump will win the US election as Biden makes errors in Pennsylvania”, The Daily Express, November 2, 2020. Archived November 3, 2020. Archive.vn URL: https://archive.vn/AFl1Q 
34. Kurt Zindulka. “Nigel Farage to Field Reform Party Candidates Against BOJO’s Anti-Car ‘Madness,’” Breitbart, December 7, 2020. Archived December 8, 2020. Archive.vn URL: https://archive.vn/lFViz 
35. Susanna Twidale. “Nigel Farage: Brexiteer, scourge of the woke – and eco-warrior?” Reuters, April 30, 2021. Archived May 4, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/ZlPKM 
36. Jasper Jolly. “Nigel Farage’s green employer is part-owned by QAnon believer,” The Guardian, March 29, 2021. Archived May 4, 2021. Archive.ph URL: https://archive.ph/unCk3
37. Nigel Farage. “Britain has GIVEN UP on Christianity and embraced the new religion of Greta Thunberg,” GB News, January 9, 2023. Archived February 22, 2023. Archived video on file at DeSmog.
38. George McMillan. “Nigel Farage labels HSBC’s decision to no longer finance new oil and gas fields a ‘self-inflicted act of LUNACY’,” GB News, December 15, 2022. Archived December 21, 2022. Archive URL: https://archive.is/klxot
39. “Snooker climate protestors not ’persuading anybody of anything’,” YouTube video uploaded by user Sky News Australia on April 18, 2023. Archived .mp4 on file at DeSmog.

Other Resources

• “Nigel Farage,” Wikipedia.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons | CC3.0