The Electoral Commission’s decision to probe the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) followed a European Parliament investigation which alleged Monday UKIP misspent funds totaling thousands of pounds.
According to the European Parliament, almost £146,700 ($183,000) allocated for parliamentary business had been used to benefit the party itself.
A group to which UKIP belongs -- the Europe-wide ADDE (Alliance for Direct Democracy in Europe) -- is at the center of that investigation.
The U.K.’s Electoral Commission confirmed Tuesday it had been contacted by the European Parliament which had “formally concluded that ADDE and IDDE [the Institute for Direct Democracy in Europe] used EU grant funding for the benefit of UKIP in breach of its rules”.