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Little is known about Restore Britain’s funding. The far-right party, seen as a disrupter on Reform UK’s right flank, was only formally registered as a party in February, meaning further donations records will begin to appear in the coming months, should they cross the threshold for declaration.
The party, currently polling around four per cent, was set up in February with startup cash of £2.5 million. It’s a huge amount for a party with just one sitting MP, ex-Reform politician Rupert Lowe. However, due to a gap in electoral law, Lowe does not have to declare where that money came from, because assets belonging to a party at time of registration are not subject to standard rules around donation transparency.
While there is no suggestion of any financial wrongdoing on the part of Lowe or Restore, this represents a blind spot which could allow for “dark money” to flow into British politics.
What is known so far, however, paints a picture of a party accepting membership and/or donations from a string of extreme or scandal-hit individuals, as well as from property developers, management consultants, and members of the cryptocurrency community.
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The ‘Cromwell Club’ Money Men
Central to this is Restore’s exclusive donations vessel, the ‘Cromwell Club’, which people can join for an annual fee of £2,500 per year. The club appears to be named after Oliver Cromwell, the 17th century republican leader responsible for the direct killing of thousands in Ireland during his conquest there. The Restore Britain Page makes clear that “All donations will be used to support political campaigning and the operations of Restore Britain”.
The Cromwell Club page reminds potential contributors that “If you donate more than £11,180 to Restore Britain in a calendar year, we are legally required to report the donation to the Electoral Commission, which will publish the donor’s details.”
Because the membership list is not published, what is known so far about the Club’s membership is patchy, but several individuals on social media have made a point of stating that they have signed up for entry into the elite tier of Restore’s donor base.
Businessman and political activist John Mappin has said that he has joined the Club, stating on X: “We are proud to support Rupert’s vision and proud to have donated to Restore’s Cromwell Club”. Mappin, owner of the Camelot Castle Hotel in Cornwall, was an early backer of Turning Point UK, and along with his wife Irina hosted the launch event for the offshoot of the US right-wing student activist organisation.
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Mappin was involved in anti-vaccine campaigning during the pandemic, and in 2022 The Times reported that the ‘leading conspiracy theorist’ was offering a discount to guests who could prove they had posted anti-vax comments.
Jonathan Wong, an organiser of “Abolish Asylum Day”, also made his donation known. An associate of the far-right UK influencer Carl Benjamin (AKA Sargon of Akkad), and contributor to the ‘anti-woke’ media outlet Vox Populi, Wong congratulated Mappin under his post claiming membership, writing “Welcome to the Cromwell Club” – with a saluting face and a Union Flag emoji.
Another self-described Restore donor is – or was – English far-right YouTuber Miles Routledge (AKA Lord Miles), a Restore activist and supporter who has called Steve Laws a “liberal” for wanting to deport millions of people from the UK, saying: “I have better solutions”.
In a post last July, he wrote: “What brings me joy and hope in this world is that by 2039 we’ll have another Hitler to lead another great uprising.”
In the case of Routledge/Miles, it seems he later fell out with the party over the donation, tweeting that he “donated £2.5k to Restore and was promised a simple thank you call, never happened, no email either. Was going to donate substantially more”.
Also announcing himself as a Cromwell Club member is James Holmes, a property developer from an affluent area of Sheffield behind the “Fly the Flag” campaign, who caused controversy in the local area when he draped a 100-foot-wide, £3,000 Union Flag over a large former council building he owns in the area. He announced that he had become a member of the ‘exclusive’ donors club in a post on Facebook.
One Ashton Ward, co-founder of management consultant firm Eton Bridge Partners, has also indicated that he has joined the Club.
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Crypto Comrades
Finally, members of the cryptocurrency online community have also donated to join Cromwell. An account going by the name “Walshy”, reportedly belonging to the co-lead of ‘Neiro’, a cryptocurrency inspired by Elon Musk’s Dogecoin, has stated on X that he became a member of the Club. The account posted that it had donated in excess of £11,000 to Restore Britain and Rupert Lowe.
Another crypto account, ‘WhaleFUD’, likewise tweeted that “The crypto community supporting Restore Britain $BRITAIN has joined the Cromwell Club and will soon have a call with Restore Britain leader”, and another crypto-linked poster, “KROP”, p