Exclusive: Reform leader’s use of television star-style arrangement is a practice criticised across the political spectrum
Nigel Farage is using a private company to reduce his tax bill on his GB News media appearances and other outside employment in a television star-style arrangement that has in recent years become frowned on by major broadcasters.
The Reform UK leader diverts money from his prime-time TV show into his company, which means that he paid only 25% corporation tax on profits, instead of 40% income tax, and could offset some expenses.
The Clacton MP, who is also paid a £94,000-a-year MP’s salary, has in the past criticised people who try to avoid tax as the “common enemy” and has previously come under fire for setting up a trust fund in an offshore tax haven.
He has also claimed that some tax avoidance schemes were acceptable. “Most forms of legal tax avoidance are OK, but clearly some are not,” he said in 2014, adding that nobody voluntarily paid anything to HMRC while defending reducing a tax bill within the law.
