(Bloomberg) — Reform UK’s Richard Tice said the party’s decision to discipline a lawmaker who’s been critical of its leader Nigel Farage over bullying allegations was the right one to make, although it was “unfortunate” and “difficult,” in an interview on Sky News on Sunday.
The insurgent right-wing party has instructed an independent lawyer to investigate Rupert Lowe, who it says made physical threats against its chairman, Zia Yusuf. It withdrew the whip from the lawmaker last week, effectively expelling him from the parliamentary party, and has referred the threats to the police. Reform UK also said it has seen evidence of “workplace bullying” and derogatory and discriminatory remarks by Lowe against female colleagues.
Lowe, in a response to the allegations on the social media platform X, said the party’s statement was “maliciously concocted to drag my name through the mud with zero credible evidence against me. All because I dared to pose a few reasonable questions of Reform’s leadership.”
The furore has thrown Reform UK — which has been riding high in public opinion, overtaking the main opposition Conservatives and even the governing Labour Party in some polls — into crisis.
Lowe has been touted by Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and a senior adviser to US President Donald Trump, as a potential replacement for Farage.
Asked about the timing of the decision to investigate Lowe, Tice said an additional threat made toward Yusuf was the tipping point.
“You get to a point where you can’t tolerate this anymore,” Tice said. “Rupert had been doing some great work on a variety of important issues but ultimately if you can’t work with someone, if a situation becomes impossible, which regrettably and in our honest opinion is where we got to, then you have to say, this is not going to end well.”
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