Reform UK barrister tries to bully NationCymru into removing top party official’s name from story

Martin Shipton

A Reform UK barrister has tried to bully NationCymru after we named the party’s director of communications as implicated in the events that led to the proposed suspension of Reform MS Laura Anne Jones from the Senedd.

We can also disclose that Ed Sumner informed a NationCymru reporter he had been told by Ms Jones to instruct staff to “diddle” her mileage claims.

A barrister who is also a senior Reform activist wrote to Nation’s editor claiming that Mr Sumner’s privacy rights had been infringed and demanding that we remove his name from the story. The barrister, Adam Richardson, then initiated a legal process that could lead to a privacy claim in the High Court.

We maintain that Mr Sumner, who previously worked for Ms Jones when she was a Conservative MS, has no privacy rights in the matter.

‘Sickening’

In July 2024 NationCymru published a story headlined: “‘Sickening’ messages reveal toxic culture of Tory Senedd group”.

It read: “‘Sickening’ and ‘hateful’ messages obtained by Nation.Cymru have revealed the toxic working atmosphere within the Conservative Senedd group.

“The communications associated with Shadow Culture Minister Laura Anne Jones include disparaging comments about other party members and jokes about an MS’s dead father.

“Screen grabs show that in the early hours of New Year’s Day 2024, the South Wales East MS sent a message in a chat to her Senedd staffer Edward Sumner and Conservative General Election candidate for Cardiff North and Cardiff Councillor Joel Williams.

“The pair responded with offensive remarks and laughing emojis about ‘multiculturalism’ and ‘gays’.

“They also made cruel jokes about Shadow Transport Minister Natasha Asghar and her late father, the former Tory MS, Mohammad ‘Oscar’ Asghar.

“Despite Ms Jones being present in the chat, she did not appear to reprimand her team for the offensive conversations.

“We have redacted telephone numbers from the images but have confirmed that some laughing emojis were sent from Ms Jones’ telephone number in response to jokes about Ms Asghar.

“In a discussion about London’s New Year firework display, Mr Sumner wrote: ‘Fuck me. This firework display. All about immigration, diversity and gays.’

“Cllr Williams replied: ‘The worst display yet!’

“Mr Sumner added: ‘All about what we have in common, trying to force immigration and multiculturalism on us.’

“After describing the display as “woke”, Cllr Williams – a former Big Brother star – appeared to poke fun at Ms Asghar who last year failed in her bid to become the Conservative candidate for London Mayor.

“The Cardiff councillor wrote: ‘We wouldn’t have this if Natasha was Mayor of London would we. A massive LED display of Natasha and Asghar airlines. A display of all her ‘interviews’. A real [reel] of her responses to the plethora of Facebook comments regarding Israel / Hamas.’

“Responding, Mr Sumner wrote: ‘Finishes on a drone show of Mohammed looking down on us all. RIP DAD X.’

“Mr Asghar died unexpectedly in 2020 and his daughter vowed to continue his legacy after being elected to the Senedd in May for the same region her father served.

“Leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats Jane Dodds has called for an investigation into the workplace culture of the Welsh Tories.

“She said: ‘These comments are truly sickening, and everyone involved in the exchanges of these deplorable messages must be immediately suspended. These messages are unacceptable in any workplace let alone in an office of an elected representative, which is why there must be an immediate investigation into the workplace culture of the Welsh Conservative party in the Senedd. We cannot allow our democratic institutions to be tarnished by hateful messages that are sadly becoming increasingly more frequent thanks to the influence of individuals from the hard right.’

“Leader of the Cardiff Lib Dems, Rodney Berman has called for the council whip to be removed from Cllr Williams.

“Mr Berman said: “This is not at all fitting behaviour for someone in public office as a Cardiff Conservative councillor or someone aspiring to be an MP and it doesn’t reflect the open and liberal Cardiff I know. The council whip should be withdrawn and the Conservatives should withdraw their support for his candidacy in Cardiff North with immediate effect while a full investigation takes place. The Welsh Conservatives seem to have become infected by the worst of the Trumpian hard right. Given all the recent scandals within the last few months it is abundantly clear that there needs to be an investigation into workplace culture within the Welsh Conservatives.”

“NationCymru made Ms Asghar aware of the messages we had obtained prior to publication.

“In a statement, she said: ‘As this weekend is particularly difficult for us as a family with it being four years since my father’s death and Father’s Day, I will not be commenting at the moment. Instead, as a family, we will be reflecting on my late dad’s life and praying for his soul with our loved ones.’

“We asked Cllr Williams if he regretted the comments he had made about Ms Asghar.

“In a statement he said: ‘I’ve contacted Natasha’s Office to explain the context of these messages and how no offence was meant by them. The tongue-in-cheek comments I made were in the early hours of New Years and said in jest, in a private WhatsApp Group. These comments proceed an application Natasha submitted for the London Mayoral candidacy. Reference to ‘Ashgar Airlines’ dates back to a longstanding joke I had with Natasha’s dad, Oscar after he remarked he wanted to buy Cardiff Airport from the Welsh Government and turn it around.”

“Further messages sent by Mr Sumner included a jibe at Tory MS Tom Giffard for being ‘lazy’ and a message describing Tory Chief of Staff Paul Smith as a ‘prick’.

“Both Mr Giffard and Mr Smith did not respond to our requests for comment.

“It comes just weeks after we revealed Ms Jones was under investigation by South Wales Police and the Senedd’s Standards Commissioner over alleged false mileage claims.”

Non-disclosure agreement

We can now reveal that during a conversation with a Nation.Cymru reporter, Mr Sumner revealed that he had been instructed by Ms Jones to tell staff to ‘diddle’ her mileage claims, and that when he ceased working for her he had signed a non-disclosure agreement that forbade him to discuss the matter with anyone but the police.

Following an investigation into Ms Jones’ mileage claims, the police decided to take no action.

Last week a report by Senedd Standards Commissioner Douglas Bain was published in which he recommended that Ms Jones should be suspended from the Senedd for two weeks because of a racial slur she wrote in one of the messages she exchanged with members of her staff.

Mr Sumner’s name was redacted from the Commissioner’s report, but as we had identified him in our previous article we named him in our article about the report.

Following the publication of our latest article, we received a letter from Adam Richardson, a barrister who is himself a Reform activist and a longstanding associate of Nigel Farage. As recently as September 2025 Mr Richardson was reported to be the “secretary” of Reform.

In the letter Mr Richardson said he was representing Mr Sumner, who is now employed as Reform UK’s director of communications, and claimed we were infringing his client’s privacy rights. He demanded that we remove Mr Sumner’s name from our story and threatened legal action. He began a pre-claim process, claiming there was no public interest in naming his client and asserting that because his name had been redacted in the Commissioner’s report, we had no legal right to identify Mr Sumner.

He cited a number of legal precedents, none of which were relevant to this matter, including one which referred to the supermodel Naomi Campbell being photographed as she came out of a rehab clinic.

We told Mr Richardson that we regarded his arguments as spurious and that we had no intention of removing Mr Suimner’s name from our story.

He has nevertheless persisted in threatening legal action.

Freedom of expression

Mark Mansfield, the CEO/Editor of NationCymru said: “We will not give in to the bullying of a Reform barrister. It’s ironic that he wants to curtail our right to freedom of expression given that his party constantly claims it is a defender of free speech. It seems free speech only exists for people who agree with them.

“Of course the toxic exchanges within the Tory Senedd group is a matter of public interest and Ed Sumner was very much involved in it.

“This episode has perhaps given us a flavour of how a Reform UK government would behave towards the media. It’s very reminiscent of Donald Trump.”