A lunch date with Truss for man-of-the-people Farage

Nigel Farage missed Laura Kuenssberg’s BBC TV show at the weekend, claiming he was too “under the weather” to appear, and not at all because he might be asked awkward questions about his pal Donald Trump’s plans to unilaterally annex Greenland.

Happily though, he was well enough the next day to be up and about again. Not to attend Parliament, on behalf of his Clacton constituents, which was debating, among other things, the crisis in Iran, the postponement of local elections, the new Chinese Embassy and planned changes to business rates for the retail industry.

But rather to attend a lunch hosted by the Heartland Institute – a climate-denying US think tank which also denies decades of evidence on the dangers of smoking – alongside mayfly-like former Tory PM Liz Truss, concrete-growing pundit Mike Graham and a group of US fossil fuel lobbyists. Pictures that emerged of the group at the exclusive Mark’s club in Mayfair have curiously since disappeared from social media.

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It’s the latest man-of-the-people day out for Farage, who is this week also attending the World Economic Forum in Davos. Might this be the same World Economic Forum which conspiracy theorist Farage has previously said Reform would “reject the influence of” and “cancel Britain’s membership of”, despite Britain not actually being a member? Nor is any country – the Forum is not a collection of nation states like the European Union or Nato, but is made up of 1,000 companies, typically global enterprises with more than $5 billion in turnover.

In 2023, Farage called Keir Starmer a “full-on globalist, hanging out with his mates at the WEF”. And three years earlier in a video about Davos, Farage described it as a place where decisions are made that “bow down to the European Union”, calling the attenders “people deciding our futures in Swiss ski resorts”.

Still, one man once brought praise from the Reform leader for attending Davos, according to a January 2012 tweet: “Congratulations to Prince Andrew for his comments at the reception he hosted in Davos. Supporting Britain!” he wrote. That’s aged well.