The former leader of Britain’s right-wing populist party Reform Britain has been jailed for accepting cash bribes in exchange for pro-Russian remarks in the European Parliament.
Nathan Gill, 52, was sentenced to 10-and-a-half years in prison at London’s Central Criminal Court on Friday after admitting receiving tens of thousands of pounds in cash over an eight-month period between December 2018 and July 2019.
The court heard that Gill and his handlers referred to the payment as a “Christmas present”. According to a report by British news agency PA Media, Mr. Gil has made a series of pro-Russian speeches and statements to the European Parliament and to Ukraine’s pro-Russian media outlets.
In her sentencing remarks at the Old Bailey, Mrs Justice Cheema Grubb said Gill’s offending was “not an isolated error of judgement, but a continuum”.
The court heard Mr Gill’s misconduct first came to light on September 13, 2021, after he was stopped at Manchester Airport as he was leaving for a trip to Russia.
A search of his cell phone revealed a series of messages between Mr. Gil and Oleg Voloshin, a pro-Russian Ukrainian. Voloshin was a government official in Kiev until 2014 and was subject to sanctions from the UK in 2022.
One message exchange revealed that Voloshin was paying Gil 5,000 euros (about $5,700) for comments he made on the pro-Russian news channel 112 Ukraine.
On another occasion after the 2019 European elections, Mr Voloshin promised Mr Gil a “reasonable reward” if he took his colleagues to a presentation on the conflict in Donbas by pro-Kremlin Ukrainian politician Viktor Medvedchuk at the Strasbourg parliament building. According to a PA media report, Gill replied: “I don’t mind dragging some people along.”
Mr Gill served as Leader of Reform UK Wales from March to May 2021, leading Reform UK’s 2021 Welsh Assembly election campaign. He is no longer a member of the party.
At the time of the crime, Gill was an elected member of the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) and a member of the European Parliament.
Nigel Farage, the current leader of Britain’s Reform Party, previously said he had no knowledge of Mr Gill’s activities and condemned him on “all sides”.
British Security Secretary Dan Jarvis said Mr Gill “used his privileged position in public office to advance Russia’s malign interests over those of the United Kingdom in exchange for money”.
In a statement, he called it a “betrayal of our country, our people, and our national security.”
