Richard Tice

Richard James Sunley Tice (born 13 September 1964) is a British businessman and politician who has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Boston and Skegness and Deputy Leader of Reform UK since 2024, having previously been the chairman of the party from 2019 to 2021 and again briefly in 2024. Since 2023, he has also been Reform UK's energy and foreign-policy spokesman. He became the leader of Reform UK in March 2021, but stood down in June 2024 and was succeeded by Nigel Farage.

A multi-millionaire, Tice was the chief executive officer (CEO) of the property group CLS Holdings from 2010 to 2014, after which he became CEO of the property asset management group Quidnet Capital LLP. He was a founder and co-chairman of the pro-Brexit campaign groups Leave.EU and Leave Means Leave. Tice had been a long-term donor and member of the Conservative Party until 2019, when he financed the founding of the Brexit Party, which was later renamed Reform UK. He owns one-third of the company that controls the party. He was elected a member of the European Parliament (MEP) for East of England at the 2019 European Parliament (EP) election, holding this role until the UK's withdrawal from the European Union (EU) in January 2020.

In June 2024, Tice stood down as leader and was replaced by Farage, following his return to frontline politics. Tice stood in Boston and Skegness at the 2024 general election and was elected to Parliament after defeating the incumbent Conservative, Matt Warman. After the election, he became Deputy Leader of Reform UK.

Early life

Tice was born on 13 September 1964 in Farnham, Surrey, son of the philanthropist Joan Mary Tice (née Sunley) who died in 2019. He is a maternal grandson of the property developer Bernard Sunley.

Tice was educated at the private Uppingham School. He subsequently received a bachelor's degree in construction economics and quantity surveying from the University of Salford. He attended the evangelical Christian Iwerne camps.

Property career

After graduation in 1987, Tice's first occupation was at the housing developer London and Metropolitan. This included time at its Paris office, where he learnt French. In 1991 he started working for the housebuilding and commercial property company founded by his grandfather, The Sunley Group. Tice was its joint chief executive officer (CEO) for 14 years before leaving the company in 2006.

Tice then ran his own debt advisory consultancy before joining the property investment group CLS Holdings in 2010, leading major planning property applications in Vauxhall, London. He was its CEO until 2014. Tice left the company to become CEO of the property investment firm Quidnet Capital Partners LLP, having been removed from CLS' board due to a potential conflict of interest.

Television presenter

Tice was a television presenter for TalkTV before moving to GB News in September 2023.

Political career

Conservative Party

Before joining the Brexit Party, Tice was a donor and member of the Conservative Party for most of his adult life. Tice wrote a 2008 report for the think tank Reform called "Academies: A model education?". In 2017, he co-wrote a pamphlet for the think tank UK 2020, "Timebomb: how the university cartel is failing Britain's students", which included recommendations on how to expand two-year degrees. He produced a follow-up report on student finances called "Defusing the debt timebomb" which he sent to the then-Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond.

In a May 2018 article on the ''ConservativeHome'' website, Tice argued for the importance of expanding the availability of homes for people on lower incomes and how this could be achieved more effectively. He felt that crime could also be reduced if housing was better managed.

Euroscepticism

Tice is a Eurosceptic. He was a director of the campaign group, Business for Sterling, which campaigned for the United Kingdom not to adopt the Euro in the late 1990s. Tice donated £1,750 to the Eurosceptic MP David Davis' candidacy in the 2001 Conservative Party leadership election.

In July 2015, Tice co-founded, with the businessman Arron Banks, the pro-Brexit Leave.EU campaign group. It was originally known as The Know.EU before being rebranded in September of that year. He also donated £38,000 to the pro-Brexit campaign group Grassroots Out. Shortly after the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union in the 2016 referendum, he left Leave.EU, and co-founded the pressure group Leave Means Leave, co-chairing it with businessman John Longworth. In October 2017, they were placed jointly at Number 90 on Iain Dale's list of the "Top 100 Most Influential People on the Right".

Tice, Banks, Andy Wigmore and Nigel Farage were referred to by sections of the media as the "Bad Boys of Brexit", a group who facilitated it. Tice wrote a number of articles advocating a no-deal Brexit, and was the first to use the phrase, "no deal is better than a bad deal" in relation to Brexit in July 2016, which was later used by then-Prime Minister Theresa May in her Lancaster House speech outlining the government's approach to negotiations in January 2017.

Brexit Party and Reform UK

The Brexit Party, a right-wing populist and Eurosceptic political party, was formed as an incorporated limited company on 23 November 2018, and Tice was appointed a director on 8 May 2019. In his role as the chairman of the Brexit Party he regularly represented it with appearances in the media, including inclusion on the panel of BBC Radio 4's ''Any Questions?''. He was the chairman when the party participated in the 2019 European Parliament election, under Nigel Farage's leadership. In that election, it won 29 seats in the European Parliament, having existed for only six months.

Tice stood as a candidate at the 2019 European Parliament election. He was first on his party's list in the East of England constituency, and was elected as one of its three MEPs for that region. In the European Parliament, he was a member of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, and was part of the delegation for relations with Canada.

In November 2019, it was announced that Tice would be standing as the Brexit Party candidate for the Hartlepool constituency at the 2019 general election. He finished in third place, with 25.8% of the vote.

On 30 October 2020, Farage applied to the Electoral Commission to change the Brexit Party's name to Reform UK, described on its website as "Reform UK Party Limited Company number 11694875, registered in England & Wales" in which Tice owns one-third of the shares. On 6 March 2021, it was announced that Tice would become Leader of Reform UK following Farage's resignation.

In March 2021, Tice announced he would be the Reform UK candidate for the Havering and Redbridge constituency in the 2021 London Assembly election. He came second-to-last with 5,143 votes. Tice was also the lead Reform UK candidate on the Londonwide list, though the party finished tenth with 1% of all votes cast.

In December 2021, Tice stood in the by-election for the Old Bexley and Sidcup constituency following the death of the sitting MP, James Brokenshire. He received 1,432 votes, a 6.6% vote share.

In June 2024, Tice stood down as leader and was replaced by Farage, after his return to frontline politics. Tice stood in Boston and Skegness at the 2024 general election and was elected to Parliament after defeating the incumbent Conservative, Matt Warman. In addition to Tice, four other Reform UK candidates were elected to parliament; Farage, Lee Anderson, Rupert Lowe and James McMurdock. Speaking in the House of Commons, Tice compared Home Secretary Yvette Cooper and Prime Minister Keir Starmer's plan to "smash the gangs" through the Border Security Command as "a game of Whac-A-Mole". In January 2025, Tice voted along with all other Reform UK MPs for a new national inquiry into rape gangs. Reform UK was the only party to vote in unison. The bill was lost at 364 votes to 111, a majority of 253, against the amendment.

Climate change

Tice rejects that there is a scientific consensus on climate change, stating during an interview with Sky News in February 2025 that it was "absolute garbage" to suggest human activities were the main contribution to climate change. He said: "The climate changed for millions of years before man-made CO2." His comments on climate change are counter to the findings of over 200 international scientists and were directly rejected by Dr George Adamson from King's College London, Professor Sheila Rowan, vice president of The Royal Society of independent scientists, Dr Andrew Jarvis from Lancaster University, who called Tice's comments "categorically wrong", and Bob Ward, policy director at LSE University's Grantham Research Institute and Geological Society fellow, who called Tice's comments "pure misinformation".

International politics

In 2022, Tice co-authored with Sam Ashworth-Hayes a paper for the Henry Jackson Society which argued that international sanctions failed to deter Russia from invading Ukraine and that this should be a lesson for the West's approach to China on the issue of Taiwan. They wrote that "sanctions against China should be planned in advance, and clear warning given to relevant private sector actors and sectors that they will be expected to cease business with China in the event of a conflict with Taiwan".

When referring to the U.S. Republican Party politician, Ron DeSantis in late April 2023, Tice described him as "a courageous, bold leader and that's very interesting" and someone who "doesn't muck about — he just gets stuff done and tells it as it is" and said that he was trying to establish links with DeSantis.

During Prime Minister's Question Time in February 2025, Tice argued that British tax money should not be used to fund UNRWA and stated that the organisation is "riddled with Hamas sympathisers" citing evidence given by British-Israel hostage Emily Damari who had been held captive by Hamas. In May 2025, Tice gave a keynote speech at an event in Hampstead organised by the National Jewish Assembly in which he said the “scariest and hardest” thing to do in the House of Commons was to speak up for Israel and the Jewish community.

Election results

Personal life

Tice is divorced after a 24-year marriage with his ex-wife Emma, with whom he has three children. He began a relationship with the right-wing political journalist Isabel Oakeshott in 2018, and separated from his wife in March 2019.

Tice grew up and first went to school in Northampton, and is a supporter of Northampton Saints rugby club. Tice was a member of the governing body of Northampton Academy between 2005 and 2019 and has also been vice chair of trustees at Uppingham School.

A long-time contributor to the magazine ''Property Week'', Tice is a regular commentator on developments within the property world.

In October 2019, openDemocracy revealed that two offshore companies in tax havens had owned shares in Tice's family business, Sunley Family Limited, since 1994.

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Tice, Richard
1964 births
Living people
Alumni of the University of Salford
Brexit Party MEPs
British broadcaster-politicians
British chief executives
British Eurosceptics
Conservatism in the United Kingdom
Conservative Party (UK) donors
Conservative Party (UK) people
GB News
Leaders of Reform UK
MEPs for England 2019–2020
People educated at Elstree School
People educated at Uppingham School
People from Farnham
Politicians from Surrey
Sunley family
Reform UK MPs
UK MPs 2024–present