ANDREW PIERCE: HMRC claims £300,000 in tax on Ukip donation by arguing it is 'not a proper party' as MPs won their seats while they were Tories before defecting

By Andrew Pierce for the Daily Mail

Published: | Updated:

When is a political party not a political party? When it is Ukip, it seems.

Despite the fact it is defending 163 council seats in the local elections in May, HM Revenue and Customs is trying to prove Ukip is not a proper registered party.

Arron Banks, who gave Ukip £1million ahead of the 2015 General Election, spent two days in court last week challenging HMRC which wants him to pay £300,000 tax on that donation.

Arron Banks (pictured with Nigel Farage)  gave Ukip £1million ahead of the 2015 General Election

Arron Banks (pictured with Nigel Farage)  gave Ukip £1million ahead of the 2015 General Election

The current Treasury definition of a political party is one that has secured at least 150,000 votes and has one or two MPs elected to the Commons in a General Election.

While Ukip has indeed had three MPs — Bob Spink, Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless — all have been defectors from the Tory Party, so Ukip has never been able to boast an MP who was elected at a General Election.

HMRC sent a team of five barristers to do battle with Banks, who has come out fighting, arguing Ukip won the European elections in 2014 with 27.5 per cent of the vote, producing 23 MEPs.

‘I think it will come as a shock not just to Nigel Farage, who led Ukip, but to the millions of people who voted for Ukip that they were not voting for a political party,’ he told me.

Ironically, Banks expects to win his case not in London but at the European Court of Human Rights — which, of course, is loathed by Brexiteers.

Bercow, who is under huge pressure over bullying allegations, is indicating that he will carry on as Speak 

Bercow, who is under huge pressure over bullying allegations, is indicating that he will carry on as Speak 

Bercow's saviour?  

When he became Speaker, the insufferably pompous John Bercow pledged he would serve nine years then stand down. Bercow, who is under huge pressure over bullying allegations, is now indicating that he will carry on. Loathed by most Tory MPs, they should be careful what they wish for. A dark horse to replace Bercow is the Labour veteran and high priestess of political correctness Harriet Harman. It may yet be the even more awful prospect of Speaker Harman that saves Bercow from the exit lounge.

  • Lord Kerr, the former British Ambassador in Brussels, is displaying a worrying absent-mindedness — or perhaps he’s still in denial. ‘If we decide to leave the European Union, we will not have a seat in any of the councils of the EU,’ he said last week.

    Er... memo to Kerr: we voted to leave the EU on June 23, 2016.

  • Labour MP Chris Williamson regularly urges his followers on twitter to boycott Rupert Murdoch and his Sun newspaper. Oddly, his distaste doesn’t stop him appearing on the tycoon’s radio station, Talk UK, or taking £300 for doing so, according to the new MPs’ register of interests.
  •  A word of caution from former Lib Dem leader Lord Steel. Always sit in the back row at a funeral, he told readers of The Oldie magazine. ‘I went along to the [Scottish] Borders Crematorium to attend a neighbour’s funeral,’ Steel, 79 explained. ‘But on looking at the order of service, I realised that I’d got the date wrong. Luckily, I was sitting in the back row. So I was able to slip out without too much fuss.’
  •  Tory MP Zac Goldsmith confesses in Dogs Today that he’s still haunted by the behaviour of his first rescue mongrel, Tashi. ‘We went everywhere together,’ says Zac. ‘Tashi was extremely greedy. She once climbed on to a neighbouring table at a restaurant and consumed an entire pizza before I had time to intervene. The customers weren’t impressed.’

Javid wasn't so house-proud  

Housing and Local Government Secretary Sajid Javid launched a new initiative to stimulate house building this week

Housing and Local Government Secretary Sajid Javid launched a new initiative to stimulate house building this week

Housing and Local Government Secretary Sajid Javid launched a new initiative to stimulate house building in the Tory shires last week — and he didn’t pull his punches.

‘We’ve got a housing crisis. We’ve got no time for anyone who is just anti-development for the sake of it. We need to change our attitude,’ he declared.

Can this be the same Javid who, as a backbench MP in June 2016, slammed his local Bromsgrove council over plans for 1,300 homes on the Green Belt: ‘While I understand this land was designated for housing, there is significant concern about the implications such a large-scale development would have on local infrastructure, facilities and environment.’

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