Thai-based crypto investor funding Reform unlikely to avoid cap on overseas donations

Christopher Harborne, the Thailand-based crypto investor who has given millions of pounds to Reform UK , would be unlikely to get around a planned cap on overseas political donations even if he has registered to vote in the UK, it is understood. Harborne, who also gave Nigel Farage, the Reform leader, £5m as a “gift”, has registered to vote in Hampshire, the Times reported , with a spokesperson for the billionaire quoted in the paper saying that he had decided to become a “registered voter in the UK”. The move could be viewed as an attempt to help Harborne get around planned changes to the political donations system, which could put a £100,000 annual cap on Britons based abroad, as well as other measures such as blocking donations made in cryptocurrency. The Times reported Harborne’s decision to register to vote as a possible way for him to continue giving large sums to Reform, citing an interview in April in which he said the government should not be able to stop him donating as he chose, adding: “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.” However, the planned changes to donations, among 15 recommendations in an independent report in March by Sir Philip Rycroft, a former senior civil servant, set out the idea that a cap of between £100,000 and £300,000 a year should apply to “British voters living abroad”. …