I’ve obtained an exclusive audio recording of an event headlined by Reform UK politician Matthew Goodwin in Budapest yesterday, which poses some serious questions for his leader Nigel Farage.
First, the backstory.
Goodwin – a GB News presenter and former academic – is a big fan of Viktor Orbán’s outgoing autocratic regime. He even praised Orbán’s government as a “counterexample” to what he calls the ideology of “national self-loathing” in Britain.
This affinity for autocracy isn’t merely ideological. Goodwin has been a paid-up “visiting fellow” at a think tank – Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC) – which has been funded by Orbán’s pro-Russia regime.
In 2020, MCC was gifted more than $1.3 billion in Hungarian state funding, including a 10% stake in the country’s national oil company, MOL, which derives much of its income from selling Russian fossil fuels.
Goodwin has been employed as an MCC “visiting fellow” – a role that reportedly pays up to €10,000 a month. According to documents obtained by investigative outlet Átlátszó, MCC fellows are expected to give speeches, attend events, network, and place articles in Western outlets.
However, here’s where it gets tricky for Reform.
The party told the Good Law Project a couple of months ago that Goodwin was previously an MCC visiting fellow “for a brief period”. In other words, they suggested he no longer holds the role.
Yet, the page for yesterday’s event lists Goodwin as an “author, political commentator, visiting fellow at MCC”.
Goodwin was also defensive of his relationship with MCC when pressed on how much he could lose financially if Hungary’s incoming prime minister Péter Magyar strips the group of its government funding.
In response to a question by commentator Jon Worth, Goodwin said: “As you know, it is entirely standard in academia to have research fellowships with universities, with organisations around the world” – adding that trade unions and left-wing groups also regularly sponsor academic fellows and conferences.
“I’m very proud of every relationship I have with a conservative network,” he said. “I think it’s great that Hungary is investing in lots of different networks, bringing people into this country who have very different ideas. That is what democracy should be, in my mind, is exchanging ideas in the public square... I’m perfectly fine with all of my working relationships.”
I got in touch with Reform this morning to ask whether they misled the Good Law Project, but didn’t receive a response.
I also asked both Goodwin and MCC if he is still a visiting fellow – again, silence.
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Now, Reform and Goodwin could have got their wires crossed. Perhaps the nature of his current relationship with MCC was poorly communicated to a press officer who sent a response to the Good Law Project without checking the facts.
However, all the evidence indicates Goodwin still does have a paid relationship with an Orbán-backed institution – and this story wasn’t communicated to journalists when they were examining Goodwin’s ties to MCC.
Funnily enough, Goodwin has been almost completely silent on social media about Orbán’s historic defeat, but he did dedicate a few words to the election at yesterday’s event.
Primarily, he claimed that “the European Union is probably going to pressure” the new government “to do whatever it can in order to increase migration”.
He also tried to console the Fidesz supporters in the room – saying: “Having run for office myself recently and finished second... losses make you stronger”.
Goodwin was of course recently trounced in the Gorton and Denton by-election. It seems that autocratic politics isn’t so popular after all.
AT LAST, somebody's looking at Frank Furedi's deeply sinister MCC Brussels initiative and its roots in Canterbury University, Kent, where Furedi and Goodwin were colleagues. Once again, well spotted Sam Bright and I'm writing my own piece on this as we speak. The question I've posed is what will happen to MCC Brussels now that Orban has gone? This is a crucial question given the timid but nonetheless welcome decision by Starmer's Counterfeit Labour government to curtail direct funding to fascist parties from tax exiled hedge fund bosses and crypto-currency traders. This will make the role of the opaquely funded think tanks, like MCC Brussels, more important than ever BOTH in terms of FUNDING fascist parties and as regards the new rules of manufactured consent. My post should be ready before Novera Media comes on this evening.
… “bringing people into the country” - as long as they’re not immigrants, I suspect.