Nigel Farage 'is selling snake oil', says Dragons' Den star Theo Paphitis
The businessman said he is 'terrified' of a Nigel Farage government
Nigel Farage "is selling snake oil", claims entrepreneur and Dragons' Den star Theo Paphitis.
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The businessman said he is "terrified" of a Nigel Farage government, after a major exclusive LBC poll revealed if the election were now the Reform UK party would win a landslide victory.
Speaking to Lewis Goodall on Sunday, Mr Paphitis responded to Reform UK's announcement they would remove indefinite leave to remain, but fell short of calling the policy racist in the same way Sir Keir Starmer did.
Mr Farage’s party has pledged to scrap the settled status for all non-EU migrants, requiring those who have been granted indefinite leave to remain to re-apply under much stricter rules.
Mr Paphitis said: "You're talking to a first-generation immigrant. I always get a bit nervous when people throw words like that. I think we've got to be careful about what we say.
"There's certain people in certain parties that there's no question are selling snake oil.
"And what we don't want to do is have our streets full of unmarked cars, people in balaclavas with no identification, pulling people off the streets and making them disappear.
"That is not the United Kingdom and that is definitely not something I would like to see coming across from America to the United Kingdom.”
Reform UK’s policy chief Zia Yusuf announced the party will abolish ILR altogether, including rescinding it retrospectively, and close all loopholes to ensure only UK citizens receive welfare or social housing.
He said that hundreds of thousands of migrants who came to the UK under more relaxed post-Brexit rules introduced by Boris Johnson’s Tory government, as part of what Reform is branding the “Boriswave”, will in January begin to qualify for permanent residence.
Mr Yusuf said Reform’s proposals would “lead to hundreds of thousands of people having to apply and ultimately losing their settled status in the UK, which will be done on a staggered and orderly basis to allow businesses to train British workers to replace them”.
The savings to the taxpayer would exceed £230 billion, Mr Yusuf claimed.
‘Would you be scared of a Farage premiership?’
— LBC (@LBC) September 28, 2025
‘I’d be terrified.’
Former Dragon’s Den star @TheoPaphitis worries that Reform’s deportation plan will end with ‘people in balaclavas pulling people off the streets’. pic.twitter.com/uoUswgiMTm
Mr Paphitis claimed Mr Farage was "without question" selling snake oil and said he would be "terrified" of a Farage government.
The fears come from the things Mr Farage says and his following of the "Trump playbook", said Mr Paphitis.
"I mean, we're hearing things about people eating swans. We've heard about Trump talking about cats and dogs.
"I mean, we've got to cut this nonsense out. If he is a serious politician that seriously believes that he can run this country, that he's going to come up with proper policies, not nonsense."
