Nigel Farage has blasted Ofcom for "election interference" in a fuelled rant posted to YouTube.
His frustration comes after Farage's Reform UK Party overtook Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's Conservatives in an opinion poll for the first time on Thursday ahead of Britain's election on July 4.
The poll by YouGov for the Times newspaper put Reform UK on 19 per cent, up from 17 per cent previously, and the Conservative Party unchanged on 18 per cent. The opposition Labour Party topped the poll with 37 per cent.
Speaking on camera Farage said: "Less than two weeks to go and we are doing well. Finally, the opinion polls are catching up with the truth. Often you see these polls, but actually the surveys have been done a week before, sometimes eight, 10 days before.
"But the last two polls out last night, one had us tied with the Conservatives on 19 per cent, and one had us one per cent ahead of the Conservatives on 19 per cent.
Nigel Farage went on a rant about Ofcom
Nigel Farage
"We're trailing them in Scotland and in London, but in most of England we are now clearly the challenges to Labour, albeit in some cases Labour is still a long way ahead. But we are having a major problem, a huge problem.
"If you watch the BBC, listen to it or any of the other broadcasters and I include in this ITV, GB News, Channel Four, some days you literally wouldn't know that Reform were lying second geographically in most of the country.
"Why is this? Well, I'll tell you. The regulator of broadcasters in Britain is Ofcom. Ofcom, a quango stuffed full of establishment types and the rules they've given broadcasters are very simple.
"They say whilst they should take into account the current level of opinion polls. The main determinant of how much coverage each party gets is their performance in the last two elections.
"Well, Reform UK is brand new. We've never contested a national election before and because of that the coverage we’re allocated is 8 per cent.
"We are getting the same level of coverage as the Green Party, despite the fact we're polling more than three times their number. All of these rules are designed to keep British politics and British broadcasting as a nice, cosy club.
Ofcom regulates broadcastersPA"Everybody's happy, everybody's doing well, and no new challengers are allowed. Well, this is now given where we are. And I've waited to say this, but given where we are, this is now an outrage. This now amounts to election interference.
"This is denying the public to hear arguments that are gaining great resonance out there on the ground. I can see that because our social media numbers are literally through the roof.
"Something is going on out there, and it's happening right through the age range in this country.
"I'm going to be looking today to try and find out whether there's anything within the broadcasting regulations, within the law that we can do to pressurise Ofcom to change these utterly ridiculous rules. But as you might have gathered right now, I'm pretty blooming angry about it.
Nigel Farage is the leader of Reform UK
Nigel Farage
"And for anyone, whatever their opinion, who wants a general election to be about an open, free and fair debate?
"I would suggest they should be pretty angry too. Ofcom are a disgrace they’re almost rigging this election in favour of the existing parties."
Reform's poll ratings have risen since Farage, best known for his successful campaign for Britain to leave the European Union, said he was returning to frontline politics, taking over leadership of the party and standing for election to parliament.
