{"id":697675,"date":"2026-07-18T02:00:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T02:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/697675\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T02:00:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T02:00:08","slug":"uk-by-election-sees-record-34-candidates-as-farage-seeks-return-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/697675\/","title":{"rendered":"UK by-election sees record 34 candidates as Farage seeks return | News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Count Binface, a man with a bin on his head, is currently the Reform UK leader\u2019s top competition.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Published On 18 Jul 202618 Jul 2026<\/p>\n

Nigel Farage will face a record field of 33 opponents as he seeks to regain his parliamentary seat in a by-election triggered by his resignation earlier this month.<\/p>\n

Tendring District Council, which is administering the vote in Clacton, said the field of 34 candidates is believed to be the largest ever for a United Kingdom parliamentary election. Most constituency contests feature only a handful of candidates.<\/p>\n

Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n

Farage, leader of the right-wing Reform UK party, resigned as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Clacton after weeks of controversy over gifts and donations that he had not initially declared under parliamentary rules.<\/p>\n

The scrutiny intensified after it emerged in June that Farage had received a five-million-pound ($6.7m) gift from a billionaire cryptocurrency investor. Questions were later raised about other gifts and donations he had received, including allegations that one donor was a convicted fraudster.<\/p>\n

Farage has denied wrongdoing and says he is standing again so voters can decide whether he should continue to represent them in parliament.<\/p>\n

Britain\u2019s main political parties are not contesting the by-election, describing it as a \u201cmedia circus\u201d. That has left the contest largely to smaller parties, independent candidates and satirical campaigners.<\/p>\n

Among the best-known challengers is comedian Jon Harvey, standing as Count Binface, a novelty candidate who campaigns wearing a metal bin on his head. He previously ran against former Prime Minister Boris Johnson in Uxbridge and has twice contested London\u2019s mayoral election.<\/p>\n

Also standing is Alan \u201cHowling Laud\u201d Hope, leader of the Official Monster Raving Loony Party, a long-established satirical political party that has contested British elections for decades.<\/p>\n

Actor turned fringe far-right politician Lawrence Fox, who previously ran for the position of mayor of London, is also running.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in London on Friday, Farage said the by-election would allow voters to decide whether to return him to parliament.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe people of Clacton can decide whether they back me or whether they back the establishment.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve taken a punt because I like a gamble,\u201d he said. \u201cI think they\u2019re going to come down on my side. I hope and pray that they do. Yes, let the people decide. Let the people be my judge, not the Westminster elite.\u201d<\/p>\n

Online prediction market Polymarket gives Farage an implied probability of about 95 percent of winning the by-election, with Count Binface a distant second.<\/p>\n

The election will take place on August 13.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Count Binface, a man with a bin on his head, is currently the Reform UK leader\u2019s top competition.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":697676,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[591,59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-697675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-europe","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=697675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/697676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=697675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=697675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=697675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}