Douglas Carswell dismisses suggestion that he use party’s ‘short money’ to hire 15 members of staff for his office

Nigel Farage has failed to resolve a standoff with Ukip’s only MP, Douglas Carswell, over whether the party should accept around £3m in public funding.

Carswell, the MP for Clacton, who defected from the Tories last year, has dismissed suggestions from Ukip aides that he use the money to hire 15 members of staff for his parliamentary office as “completely inappropriate”.

Amid speculation on Wednesday that Carswell could leave the party over the issue, a Ukip spokesman said: “Nigel Farage met with Douglas Carswell this afternoon and there’s ongoing discussion about how best to represent four million Ukip voters in a way that is sensible and correct.”

Carswell has denied suggestions that he could attempt to rejoin the Conservatives; the bookmaker William Hill now has him evens not to be a Ukip MP by the next election.



Should Carswell resign from Ukip, the party would lose the £650,000 a year in so-called “short money” to which it is entitled after getting 3.9m votes overall.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Wednesday, Carswell said: “There are one or two rather excitable staffers in Ukip who came up with a proposal that involved hiring 15 extra people. I mean, I’m not an American senator. I doubt that even Ed Miliband when he was leader of the opposition would have had 15 staff in his office.

“Ukip is meant to be different and Ukip is going to be different. And I think we need to make it absolutely clear that when we spend money, we are doing it because it is the right thing to do, not just simply because the money’s there.”



A senior party staffer told the BBC that it was up to the party how it spent the money, which would go to Ukip regardless of Carswell’s views. “This is him throwing his toys out of the pram because he thought Nigel wouldn’t be leader any more,” the staffer said.

If Carswell doesn’t accept some of the money, “the party will take a dim view of four million people going unrepresented,” the source said.



Carswell has said he will have to give “some very serious thought” to how much of the money he should take, given his role as Ukip’s sole representative in Westminster.

This week Carswell declined to comment to reporters about Farage’s decision to withdraw his resignation as leader of Ukip four days after standing down. However, on Wednesday he said he was “very pleased indeed” that Farage was returning as leader.

Farage had said for weeks that he would step down if he did not become an MP, arguing that it was not credible to lead the party without being in the Commons.



He failed to win his target seat of South Thanet by around 2,000 votes. Kent police are looking into a claim of electoral fraud in the constituency but Ukip said it knew nothing about the complaint or who had made it.

“Kent police has received a report of electoral fraud and inquiries are ongoing,” a spokesman for the force said.