Nigel Farage missed the parliamentary debate on the biggest reset to Brexit since the referendum because he is overseas on holiday, the Reform UK leader has said.
Following speculation that he was on holiday in France, Farage, who has not been seen in the Commons this week and did not present his GB News show on Monday, released a statement confirming he was away.
“There seems to be great consternation in the press that they have not seen me for 48 hours. Well, they will have to wait some time,” he wrote.
“After months of touring the UK in the run-up to our hugely successful local election campaign I will resume travelling the country next week as Reform moves to the next stage.
“Meanwhile I am having my first overseas break for three years, the jungle excepted. Well I say break … plenty of articles and fundraising calls!”
In 2023 Farage went to the jungle in Australia to take part in the ITV reality TV show I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! Since becoming the MP for Clacton last year, Farage has taken a number of overseas trips which were not entirely for parliamentary work.
He has made at least nine trips abroad, including eight to the US, since last year’s general election, with many of them either funded by donors or undertaken for paid employment such as speeches.
These included a visit to the US in support of Donald Trump in August last year where flights and accommodation for Farage and one staffer cost nearly £33,000, and a £27,000 trip to attend Trump’s inauguration in January this year.
His holiday takes place while the Commons is sitting, despite the fact that the chamber goes into recess from Thursday, and does not sit all of next week.
On Tuesday, MPs debated a statement from Keir Starmer on the UK’s negotiations with the EU on a series of Brexit-related changes to border checks, fishing and defence.
Farage used X to call this “a surrender agreement”, but his deputy, Richard Tice, spoke in the Commons for the party.
A Guardian analysis in March found that by that point, Farage had spent more than 800 hours on outside employment since being elected as an MP.
