Reform leaders sue NCA over alleged leak of donation details

Nigel Farage and Richard Tice lodged High Court papers seeking more than £25,000 from the National Crime Agency over claims that private bank transaction details linked to Reform UK figures were leaked to journalists. The legal claim alleges misuse of private information, breach of confidence and unlawful data processing, while the NCA has denied responsibility.

The dispute began with Richard Tice’s letter to the agency’s chief asking for an investigation into alleged leaks of private financial information. At the center of the case is material that was reportedly first flagged to the NCA by banks concerned about suspicious activity, not generated by the crime agency itself. That distinction matters because the plaintiffs are trying to show not only that sensitive information existed, but that it was handled in a way that stripped away the protections expected around banking intelligence.

The financial material sits within a wider scrutiny of Reform UK’s funding. In July, the NCA was said to have received alerts over an £80,000 loan to Tice from George Cottrell, a convicted fraudster, and a separate suspicious activity report over a £1 million donation from Fiona Cottrell, George Cottrell’s mother, to a think tank owned by Tice. A further £5 million gift to Farage from a cryptocurrency billionaire was also part of the same round of attention on the party’s finances. Police were also investigating donations to Reform UK during the same period.

For Farage and Tice, the civil claim will turn on whether the information was private, whether it was shared in circumstances that carried an obligation of confidence, and whether any processing of the data lacked a lawful basis. For the NCA, the issue is whether a crime agency that handles highly sensitive banking reports can maintain public confidence if details of those reports reach the press.

The case also raises a broader institutional question. If the leaked material came from suspicious activity reports passed through the banking system, the dispute will test where responsibility lies when confidential financial intelligence is handled by police and crime agencies, then allegedly exposed outside the system. That is why the matter now reaches beyond party politics and into the credibility of the agencies meant to keep sensitive information secure.