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First, I'm joined in the studio by LBC's political editor, Natasha Clark
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Natasha. Wes, I've got some news to bring you this afternoon. Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, has just put on social media in the last few minutes
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saying that he's going to make a statement on my future in public life at 2pm today
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Of course, as you can imagine, that set has racing in Westminster about what on earth
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this mystery announcement from Mr Farage could be. Of course, he's had a very difficult week, hasn't he
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as you've been talking about in this last hour with the Sunday Times story about his political gifts and donations
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including, of course, that £5 million donation from Christopher Harbourn and now as well money from George Cotterell
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So potentially it could be about that. And obviously yesterday you saw a very angry Nigel Farage
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arriving back in the United Kingdom, being door-stopped by Sky News and he accused them of harassing his daughter at one of his properties
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It's not quite clear what has happened there, whether Sky were trying to find Nigel Farage
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were trying to put those questions to him or something wider But as you can imagine it set absolute hairs racing in Westminster My WhatsApp is now pinging off with lots of people trying to figure out what is going on Of course we bring you the very latest when we have it
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But potentially a very big statement from Mr Frudge. We even had, you remember the reforms chairman, David Bull, a couple of weeks ago
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suggesting that Nigel Frudge should take a bit of a break from politics. That felt to many like a very coded message
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Again, he didn't quite explain what it was. But we have definitely seen less of Nigel Farage in public life
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He's been giving fewer press conferences. He's been giving lots of messages by video message rather than anything else
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He's been putting messages on social media, doing less press conferences. There is lots of speculation about Nigel Farage's political future today
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Wow. Well, in the first hour, we talked about the state funding of political parties off the back of Farage
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and I deliberately steered us away from just talking about Farage. Now I sort of wish we'd done Farage
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Instead I could have said, oh he's obviously listening. Maybe he's been listening and he's going to announce his support
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for the state funding of political parties. I somehow doubt it So do you have any clue at all as to where this is going Is this going to be a dramatic exit Is this going to be a two fingers up to the establishment as he been criticising
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it? Any clues at all at this stage? Look, we should say, we should couch that obviously Nigel Farage
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tweets quite a lot saying that he's going to be giving major press conferences, but it's usually
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not about his political future. So this does feel different. It feels like something is about to
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happen, like Nigel Farage is going to give us something. Reform sources have just been firing
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lots of text they're all being incredibly silent keeping very tight lipped on what this could be
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i imagine that he is going to address the row around the donations the row around his
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political future and he says he's making a statement on my future in public life that does
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beg the question is he going to be in public life and there has been suggestions that potentially
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nigel farage may want to at some point pass over the baton of reform leader to someone else at some
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point. And of course, Nigel Farage has been around in political life for a very, very long time
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He's made no secret of the fact that he wants to be prime minister and he wants to lead the country
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But equally, he has talked about in repeated interviews the toll that this has taken
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on his private life And obviously he talked about that in that pulled clip yesterday where he was talking about his daughter claims that his daughter was being harassed We should say that Sky News have said they did not visit an address of his daughter
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Again, not quite clear what has happened there. But it does feel like this could be a potentially very important moment for British politics
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especially considering Nigel Farage and the reform are leading in pretty much all of the polls
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and they have been for a very long time. And that's that announcement we're expecting at two o'clock this afternoon
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Yes, not quite clear exactly where it's going to be. but we'll bring, of course, to you at the very latest
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I imagine it might be Reform HQ. So we'll keep you posted
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It's very much teasing, keeping us all waiting. But again, Nigel Farage does this quite often
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Sometimes it just turns out to be Reform will be announcing their candidate for the latest mayoral by-election or whatever it might be
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But, of course, it could be something a lot bigger. So is this a big Farage announcement
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or is he doing what he's so often done very well, and I say it through gritted teeth as a political opponent
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of grabbing the microphone. He's very, very good at it, isn't he? He's very good at turning all the media on him
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Almost second to none in British politics. Being the person who can grab the microphone
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often to his opponent's frustration. Well, I'm sure you'll keep us posted, Natasha. Natasha
