Daily Express owner’s financial pledge suggests stable of newspapers will back Nigel Farage’s party at 2015 general election • Greenslade: If Richard Desmond’s papers back Ukip, it could affect the election result

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

Daily Express owner Richard Desmond has thrown his financial support behind Ukip, pledging £300,000 to Nigel Farage’s party less than five months before the general election.

The six-figure donation suggests that Desmond’s stable of newspapers – the Daily Express, Sunday Express, Daily Star and Daily Star Sunday – will back Ukip ahead of the vote next May.

Their endorsement would be a significant coup for Farage’s party as it seeks to build on the two by-election victories following the defection of Tory MPs, Mark Reckless and Douglas Carswell.

The gift was discussed at a private meeting between the Desmond and Farage earlier this month, according to Sky News.

In October, Desmond brought on board Lord Stevens, the Ukip peer and former chairman of Express Newspapers, as deputy chairman of the publisher.

The Daily Express has hinted at its support of Ukip in recent weeks, using a leader column on 3 December to blast “the EU’s wild extravagance” and side with Farage’s claim that the union was “a racket which looks after its own”.

On 22 November, the paper declared that Ukip was “leading the political agenda” following the election of Mark Reckless in Rochester and Strood. It said Ukip “demonstrated in Rochester and Strood, a constituency not thought to be favourable for the party, that it has the popular appeal and the campaign expertise needed to ensure wider success next year.

“Ukip is leading the political agenda. The Tories have been more effusively eurosceptic since the realisation that Ukip is more than a vehicle for protest votes. And both the Conservatives and Labour have upped their rhetoric on immigration in a bid to woo back Ukip voters. Yet still people are demonstrating disdain for the political establishment by deserting the major parties.”

A Ukip spokesman said: “We do not discuss donations. If we receive them we report them to the Electoral Commission in accordance with legislation.”

There was no record of the donation on the Electoral Commission website on Friday. The most recent gift was a sum of £5,000 from a private donor lodged in September.

However, since then the party has received the significant financial backing of former Conservative supporter Arron Banks, who pledged £1m to Ukip in October.

Banks, who previously gave £25,000 to the Tories, upgraded his Ukip donation from £100,000 to £1m after William Hague said he had never heard of him.

A spokesman for Desmond declined to comment.



• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email media@theguardian.com or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”.

• To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook.