BNP Supporter jailed for racist attack on children

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A MAN who shouted racial abuse at Asian children and chanted "BNP" at them has been jailed for eight months.

Steven Moorhouse, 26, of Rushton Hill Close, Pellon, Halifax, admitted racially aggravated common assault and harassment between June and July last year.

The children, who cannot be named for legal reasons, were aged between eight and 13.

Paul Williams, prosecuting, said Moorhouse made an inappropriate comment to a 12-year-old girl and her two younger brothers took exception.

Mr Williams said: "He said, 'Have you got an older sister? I need a woman to keep me off drugs'."

When the boys, eight and 10, objected, Moorhouse unleashed a tirade of racial abuse on them.

"He told them to go back to their own country," said Mr Williams, "While walking away he repeated the phrase, 'BNP, BNP'."

A week later, Moorhouse abused a 13-year-old white girl and her Asian boyfriend and threatened to return with a knife and stab one of them.

On July 4 he again used racist language towards the brothers from the earlier incident and swung out at one of them, clipping him with his finger.

Moorhouse – who has previous convictions for assault, threatening behaviour and harassment and committed the latest offences in breach of a suspended sentence – was overheard shouting that he would get the BNP to come and slit someone's throat.

Jailing him, Recorder Richard Mansell QC said: "You resort to violent, threatening, bullying behaviour when things don't go your way."

Halifax Courier

English Defence League: new wave of extremists plotting summer of unrest

English Defence League members attend a march in January this year. The group is attracting interest from convicted football hooligans and violent far-right splinter groups. Photograph: Oli Scarff/Getty Images

Forged on football terraces and targeting Muslim communities, rightwingers return to the streets in an increasingly violent form

In the back room of a sparsely decorated pub in Bolton a man with a shaved head and a tattoo poking out above his shirt collar hands out what look like wraps of cocaine to his friends. It is just after 11am but behind him the pub is already packed with young, mainly white, men. Suddenly it erupts.

"We want our country back. We want our country back … Muslim bombers off our streets." The chants ring out as tables are thumped and plastic pint glasses are thrust into the air.

"It is going to be a good 'un today," says the shaven-headed man, leaning across the table towards me to make himself heard. "We're going to get to twat some Pakis – I can feel it."

The pub, a few hundred yards from Bolton railway station, is the latest gathering point for the most significant rightwing street movement the UK has seen since the heyday of the National Front in the 1970s.

For the past four months the Guardian has joined English Defence League demonstrations, witnessing its growing popularity, from protests attracting just a few hundred hardcore activists at the end of last year to rallies and marches which are bringing thousands of people on to the street – and into direct conflict with the police and local Muslim communities.

The EDL plans to step up its campaign in coming weeks, culminating in marches through some of the UK's most high-profile Muslim communities, raising the spectre of widespread unrest.

With the British National party beset by infighting and recriminations after its poor showing in last month's local and national elections, the UK is facing the prospect of rightwing activists turning away from the ballot box and back to the street for the first time in three decades.

The English Defence League sprang up in Luton last year in reaction to a demonstration by a small extreme Islamist group during a homecoming parade by the Royal Anglian Regiment.

Since then this chaotic organisation – based largely around existing football groups and hooligan networks – has mobilised thousands of people against what it terms "Islamic extremism".

In telephone conversations and face-to-face meetings, members of the EDL's secretive leadership team repeatedly told the Guardian that the group is not racist and just wants to "peacefully protest against militant Islam".

But at each demonstration I attended while making an undercover film for the Guardian's investigative film unit, Guardian Films, I was confronted by casual – often brutal – racism, a widespread hatred of Muslims and often the threat of violence.

It was only possible to film some of the most alarming scenes with a hidden camera. Inside a pub in Stoke in January about 3,000 EDL supporters gathered for the first demonstration of the year. They had spent the past four hours drinking. The balcony around the top of the cavernous pub was draped in flags bearing the names of different football clubs – Wolves, Newcastle, Aston Villa – and the chants "We all hate Muslims" and "Muslim bombers off our streets" filled the air. The atmosphere was tense, and not just because of the growing anti-Islamic rhetoric. The pub was packed with rival football gangs from across the Midlands and the north of England. Twice, fighting broke out as old rivalries failed to be subdued by the new enemy – Islam. "They're just kids," said one man. "That is not what we are here for today."

As we moved outside for the EDL protest – during which supporters became involved in violent clashes with the police – a woman asked me for a donation to support the "heroes coming back injured from Afghanistan". I put a pound in the bucket. "Thanks love," she said. "They go over there and fight for this country and then come back to be faced with these Pakis everywhere." She paused, before adding: "But to be honest it is the niggers I can't stand."

This kind of casual racism is not hard to find on EDL demonstrations. The Guardian has also identified a number of known rightwing extremists who are taking an interest the movement – from convicted football hooligans to members of violent rightwing splinter groups. The EDL says it is doing what it can to keep them away but acknowledged their influence.

"At previous events, we have had far-right groups like Combat 18 turning up," the EDL's self-proclaimed leader, who uses the pseudonym Tommy Robinson, said in a local newspaper interview. "It's naive to guarantee no violence."

Nick Lowles, of the anti-fascist group Searchlight, says these groups have a growing – and dangerous – influence.

"What we are seeing is more organised fringe elements – the National Front, old networks of Combat 18 people and members of the BNP – who are getting involved specifically to try and use the EDL to spark serious disorder," says Lowles. "This is a serious development; we just need one of these demonstrations to go wrong – for there to be a serious incident – and it won't just lead to disorder in Dudley, Bolton or wherever, it will spread to towns and cities across the country."

Strange coalition

But the EDL is not a simple rerun of previous far-right street groups. On each demonstration there is a smattering of non–white faces and one of the group's leaders is Guramit Singh, a British-born Sikh. The organisation's core support appears to be young white men who are often fuelled by drink and sometimes drugs. But its Islamophobic message seems to have acted as a lightning rod for a strange coalition – from rightwing Christians who see it as being on the frontline in the "global fight against Islam" to gay rights activists.

At the front of the EDL demonstration in Bolton in March, among the banners decrying Islam, was a man holding up a pink triangle. He looked nervous when I asked him what he was doing there. "This is the symbol gay people were made to wear under Hitler," he said. "Islam poses the same threat and we are here to express our opposition to that." It turns out he is a member of the EDL's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender division, which has 115 members.

Many of the people I met said they had never been involved in rightwing politics before. "I finished my night shift at 5am and we got on a coach down from Wigan about six," says Steve as the Victoria line tube train rattles along towards Pimlico and the EDL's London demonstration a few weeks later. "Reckon I should be back in time for it to start again at 10."

The carriage is packed with around 50 EDL supporters who set off from the north-west that morning. They launch into one of the EDL's favourite songs: "There were 10 Muslim bombers in the air." Steve explains over the din how his factory is being "overrun by immigrants". Like others on EDL demonstrations, he exudes a sense of excitement that "something is happening". "We have had enough, no one is taking us seriously … about anything – but they are going to have to listen now."

But the EDL is not only attracting disaffected working-class men. On a chilly evening in early March, Alan Lake settles into his seat in a cafe in central London. This smartly dressed man in his mid-40s has emerged as a key figure in the organisation and is quickly into his stride – warning that the UK will have Sharia law in the next 40 years "unless something is done".

A London-based IT consultant, Lake has spoken at several EDL rallies and sees himself as one of the organisation's thinkers. "The middle-class intellectuals are coming forward and also American speakers – some of them quite famous, although I can't give you names yet … they love the fact that we can have people that can go on the streets."

Addressing a far-right anti-Islam conference in Sweden last year, Lake told delegates it was necessary to build a united "anti-Jihad movement" and spoke of the need for "people that are ready to go out in the street", boasting that he and his friends had begun to build alliances with "more physical groups like football fans". Lake says he is opposed to violence or confrontation but regularly returns to the importance of the EDL's physical presence.

"The EDL has a lot of support and is growing quickly and crucially what it has done is deliver an activist movement on the streets," he tells me subsequently. Pressed on the levels of violence at the demonstrations, he replies: "These people are not middle-class female teachers … if they continue to be suppressed it will turn nasty in one way or another … We have put bodies on the street, writing letters to the Times does not work … if we are going to have a mess that is so much grist to the mill."

Lake says he is exploring a political future for the EDL – and argues it should consider throwing its weight behind the UK Independence party. He later introduces me to Magnus Nielsen – a Ukip candidate in the general election – who has agreed to speak at forthcoming EDL rallies. Nielsen describes Muhammad as a "criminal psychopath", "the first cult leader" and "psychiatrically deranged". Lake says there is "some synergy" between the two groups.

A few weeks later Lake tells me that he is no longer an EDL spokesman. "I am really working on the Ukip thing so we can offer people an alternative," he says.

A spokesman for Ukip said it would not form any alliance with the EDL or any other "extremist" group.

However, these efforts appear to be part of tentative steps by the EDL to expand its reach beyond its street demonstrations. In March a delegation of activists travelled to Berlin to take part in an anti-Islam rally in support of far-right anti-immigrant Dutch politician Geert Wilders. It is also forging tentative links with the US anti-Islam group Stop the Islamification of America, whose New York demonstration was advertised on the EDL website in April.

Growing unrest

The upshot appears to be a movement that, although chaotic and beset by infighting, seems to be growing in scope and sometimes violence. At a protest in Dudley last month, demonstrators threw missiles at the police before ripping down barriers and rampaging through the town in an attempt to confront anti-racist protesters and local Asian youths. In Aylesbury a few weeks later they again clashed with police.

And despite the group's protestations to the contrary, the prospect of serious unrest is growing. The list of towns the EDL plans to hit this summer is lengthening – Newcastletomorrow, Cardiff, Dudley and Bradford over the next few weeks. According to Lowles the stakes are high. "What we are seeing now is the most serious, most dangerous political phenomenon that we have had in Britain for a number of years," he says. "With EDL protests that are growing week in, week out there is a chance for major disorder and a political shift to the right."

But the appeal of the EDL is not just down to the extreme opinions expressed by people such as Lake and Nielsen. In Stoke a group of teenagers who were on their first EDL demonstration said they had come after reading reports that "the Muslims" were planning to march through Wootton Bassett with 500 coffins. The proposed march was called by Anjem Choudary and his small extremist group Islam4UK. The group is reviled by the majority of Muslims and the demonstration did not go ahead. But this was lost on the outraged teenagers who turned up in Stoke and subsequently travelled to two of the next three EDL events.

Outside the Morpeth Arms on the banks of the Thames in March supporters gathered for the EDL's London demonstration. One who had travelled down from Blackburn was eager to know who had seen a television documentary that he thought showed how a Muslim group were taking over politics in east London. The EDL had carried a link to the film on the front of its website and most of the supporters drinking in the sunshine knew about it.

For Matthew Goodwin, an academic who specialises in far-right politics at Manchester University, this is a crucial difference between the EDL and previous far-right street movements.

"The reason why the EDL's adoption of Islamophobia is particularly significant is that unlike the 1970s, when the National Front was embracing antisemitism, there are now sections of the media and the British establishment that are relatively sympathetic towards Islamophobia," says Goodwin. "It is not difficult to look through the media and find quite hostile views towards Islam and Muslims. That is fundamentally different to the 1970s, when very few newspapers or politicians were endorsing the NF's antisemitic message."

"The point for your average voter is that if they see the EDL marching through their streets shouting about how the neighbourhood is about to be swamped by Muslims or how the UK is going to be Islamified by 2040, they are also receiving these cues from other sections of British society … the message of the EDL may well be legitimised if that continues."

The people on the sharp end of the EDL's message echo this view. Mujibul Islam, chair of the youth committee of the Muslim Council of Britain, says the foundations for the growth of the EDL have been laid not just by extremists but by countless political speeches and newspaper articles. "It simply would not be acceptable to say the things that are being said on these demonstrations about any other group – black people, Jewish people. But we are now in a position where it seems almost acceptable to say these things about Muslims."

He said the growth of the EDL was having a real impact on the way ordinary Muslims were being treated. "A woman I know got on to a tube train which had a lot of EDL supporters on recently and was really badly abused; another man was attacked as he made his way home on the train. These are the consequences of what we are seeing now. It is not just a theoretical debate about freedom of speech."

The Guardian

EDL member seen kicking officer

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A MEMBER of the English Defence League who was involved in the disorder which broke out at a rally in Stoke-on-Trent has been jailed for 16 weeks.

Jake Payne travelled up to the city from his home with friends to attend the event in Hanley city centre on January 23 this year.

Laura Jones, prosecuting, told North Staffordshire magistrates: "Payne was seen by officers at 3.20pm as part of a crowd in hostile confrontation with police.

"He was seen to kick out violently at one police officer, then encouraging some of the people in the crowd to behave in a disorderly fashion."

She said Payne admitted he was a member of the EDL and had previous convictions for public order offences.

Payne, aged 22 of Florey Gardens, Aylesbury, pleaded guilty to using threatening abusive or insulting words of behaviour with intent and failing to answer to his bail.

Lee Yates, defending, said: "He says he wishes to be sentenced and sent to prison forthwith because he knows from past experience he is unable to comply with community orders."

Stoke Sentinel

English Defence League: Inside the violent world of Britain's new far right

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The English Defence League is planning a series of demonstrations this summer.
(To watch the video, go here)

Undercover Guardian investigation reveals plan by English Defence League to hit racially sensitive areas in attempt to provoke disorder over summer

MPs expressed concern tonight after it emerged that far-right activists are planning to step up their provocative street campaign by targeting some of the UK's highest-profile Muslim communities, raising fears of widespread unrest this summer.

Undercover footage shot by the Guardian reveals the English Defence League, which has staged a number of violent protests in towns and cities across the country this year, is planning to "hit" Bradford and the London borough of Tower Hamlets as it intensifies its street protests. Senior figures in the coalition government were briefed on the threat posed by EDL marches this week. [Today] up to 2,000 EDL supporters are expected to descend on Newcastle for its latest protest.

MPs said the group's decision to target some of the UK's most prominent Muslim communities was a blatant attempt to provoke mayhem and disorder. "This group has no positive agenda," said the Bradford South MP, Gerry Sutcliffe. "It is an agenda of hate that is designed to divide people and communities. We support legitimate protest but this is not legitimate, it is designed to stir up trouble. The people of Bradford will want no part of it."

The English Defence League, which started in Luton last year, has become the most significant far-right street movement in the UK since the National Front in the 1970s. A Guardian investigation has identified a number of known rightwing extremists who are taking an interest in the movement – from convicted football hooligans to members of violent rightwing splinter groups.

Thousands of people have attended its protests – many of which have descended into violence and racist and Islamophobic chanting. Supporters are split into "divisions" spread across the UK and as many as 3,000 people are attracted to its protests.

The group also appears to be drawing support from the armed forces. Its online armed forces division has 842 members and the EDL says many serving soldiers have attended its demonstrations. A spokeswoman for the EDL, whose husband is a serving soldier, said: "The soldiers are fighting Islamic extremism in Afghanistan and Iraq and the EDL are fighting it here … Not all the armed forces support the English Defence League but a majority do."

Following the British National party's poor showing in this month's local and national elections anti-racist campaigners say some far-right activists may be turning away from the ballot box and returning to violent street demonstrations for the first time in three decades.

Nick Lowles, from Searchlight, said: "What we are seeing now is the most serious, most dangerous, political phenomenon that we have had in Britain for a number of years. With EDL protests that are growing week in, week out there is a chance for major disorder and a major political shift to the right in this country."

In undercover footage shot by Guardian Films, EDL spokesman Guramit Singh says its Bradford demonstration "will be huge". He adds: "The problem with Bradford is the security threat, it is a highly populated Muslim area. They are very militant as well. Bradford is a place that has got to be hit."

Singh, who was speaking during an EDL demonstration in Dudley in April, said the organisation would also be targeting Tower Hamlets.

A spokesman for the EDL confirmed it would hold a demonstration in Bradford on 28 August because the city was "on course to be one of the first places to become a no-go area for non-Muslims". The EDL has already announced demonstrations in Cardiff and Dudley.

The former Home Office minister Phil Woolas said: "This is a deliberate attempt by the EDL at division and provocation, to try and push young Muslims into the hands of extremists, in order to perpetuate the divide. It is dangerous."

The EDL claims it is a peaceful and non-racist organisation only concerned with protesting against "militant Islam". However, over the last four months the Guardian has attended its demonstrations and witnessed racism, violence and virulent Islamophobia. During the election campaign David Cameron described the EDL as "dreadful people" and said the organisation would "always be under review".

A spokesman for the Home Office said that although the government was committed to restoring the right to "non-violent protest … violence and intimidation are wholly unacceptable and the police have powers to deal with individuals who commit such acts. The government condemns those who seek to spread hatred."

He added: "Individual members of EDL – like all members of the public – are of course subject to the law, and all suspected criminal offences will be robustly investigated and dealt with by the police."

Guardian

PFA takes a stand over Wayne Brown’s BNP revelations

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Wayne Brown

Leicester player Wayne Brown’s admission that he voted for the British National Party at the General Election has angered teammates, including PFA chairman Chris Powell, and fellow professionals – and has come as a major disappointment to the Professional Footballers’ Association.

The PFA has worked hard for many years with a number of anti-racism bodies to try and eradicate racism from our sport, at all levels, and according to Deputy Chief Executive Bobby Banes, Brown’s comments have ‘set the movement back’.

Brown, whose announcement caused angry scenes within the Leicester dressing room, was told to stay away from the club after reporting for duty before Leicester’s play-off semi final clashes with Cardiff, and was urged to make a public apology.

The player’s future is now shrouded in doubt and when asked whether it would be hard for Brown to stay at Leicester, or even find a new club, Bobby Barnes said: “I would like to think so. We have a zero tolerance policy on issues like this.

“Football has worked hard over the years to really be a beacon in the fight against racism and it is very discouraging to hear these comments when you think of the tireless work so many people, and so many organisations, have put in to get to where we are today.

“In my day as a player you had to contend with racist comments coming from the terraces, so for this to come from within a dressing room is very, very disappointing and our members are angry that Wayne Brown was not prepared to abide by our mission statement.”

Give Me Football

BNP man sentenced after shoving two women at East Croydon station

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Dave Clarke

A BNP thug who ran for council has been given a year's community service for assaulting two female pacifist campaigners.

David Clarke, who got 518 votes when he stood in Heathfield for this year's local elections, was sentenced on four counts of assaulting anti-racism campaigners.

Clarke, of Dunley Drive, New Addington, pushed and shoved Lorna Nelson-Homian, James Cox, Nigel Green and Silvia Beckett in two separate attacks last May outside East Croydon train station.

Croydon Magistrates' Court handed the 41-year-old a 12-month community order last week and ordered him to pay costs of £650.

Clarke denied attacking the Hope Not Hate campaigners but was found guilty on April 30.

Giving evidence in relation to the first incident on May 27, campaigner Nigel Green said: "I saw him [Clarke] walking towards me.

"He was walking right towards me and I could see there would be problems. I decided to stop and put the leaflets behind my back.

"But he gestured for me to give him a leaflet and he basically snatched them out of my hand. They were thrown down on the street and that was quite a shock to me.

"Then he sort of pushed me and grabbed my arm and twirled me around. I was very shaken because I had done nothing to provoke him."

Prosecutor Daniel Irving told the court how after the first assault Clarke left, only to return to repeatedly shove Ms Beckett to get to Mr Green.

The court heard Clarke almost knocked the woman off her feet.

Mr Irving told the court that when Clarke spotted other Hope Not Hate campaigners two days later he screamed at them: "F****** scumbags, filth on our streets, taking all our jobs."

Then Clarke again snatched leaflets, threw them on the floor and shoved Ms Nelson-Homian and Mr Cox.

This is Croydon

Crime and offence

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Kieron Trent and Matt Tait, part of the BNP mob that brought violence to the streets of Barking and Dagenham

The wheels of justice often grind very slowly. A few days before polling day, David Clarke, a thuggish BNP activist, failed election fraudster and would-be Croydon councillor, was convicted on four counts of assault on anti-fascist leafleters in May last year. He had repeatedly pushed and grabbed at two campaigners and then returned two days later to swear at two others, push them and grab their leaflets.

Released on bail awaiting sentencing, he made the local press again when a female companion allegedly performed a sex act on him in full view in The George pub in Croydon, a regular BNP watering hole.

An eyewitness also connected him to a threat by a gang of local BNP activists earlier this year to cut the throat of an anti-fascist campaigner.

Election fraud is a habitual weapon in the BNP armoury. The Sunday Telegraph revealed that a number of BNP candidates for Barking and Dagenham council had placed themselves on the Electoral Register at “front” addresses in the borough when they were really living elsewhere. They included Jeffrey Marshall, the BNP’s central London organiser, Eddy Butler, a key organiser of the party’s local campaign, and Chris Roberts, a paid aide to the BNP’s London Assembly member. All three also stood in the general election, Marshall in Bethnal Green and Bow, Butler in Harlow and Roberts in Basildon South and Thurrock East.

HOPE not hate has produced many leaflets quoting the vile remarks by Marshall, who welcomed the death of David Cameron’s disabled son. That did not stop Tony Gladwin, the BNP’s parliamentary candidate in Southend West and a council candidate in Basildon. Gladwin, a regular on the East of England BNP security team, posted offensive jokes on his Facebook page ridiculing victims of the thalidomide tragedy, who suffered severe birth defects as a result of the drug.

The election campaign brought reports from several parts of the country of BNP thugs trying to run off HOPE not hate activists. Mostly they failed either because of a police presence or because trade unionists and others on the HOPE not hate teams refused to be intimidated.

The most serious incident took place in Barking the day before the election. Nick Griffin, the BNP leader and Barking parliamentary candidate, protected by car loads of Essex “BNP Security” and other thugs from further afield, clashed with local people in front of a BBC film crew. Young black and white kids shouted down the would-be MP and some Asian lads were more explicit in their threats but limited their action to lobbing a few tomatoes in his direction.

The BNP heavies responded by bundling Griffin out of the line of fruity fire and then piling into two cars to hunt the Asian youths.

BBC video footage shows the well known foulmouthed drunk and failed BNP councillor Robert Bailey leading the confrontation. They tracked down the three Asian youngsters, called them over and shouted abuse. The smallest youth faced down Bailey at which point it is clear that Bailey’s touched him twice with his hands and the youth backed away. After more shouting and Bailey telling them to get on their f***ing way, the smallest youth spat at Bailey.

At this Bailey went berserk, threw him to the ground and aimed a series of kicks at him. Bailey is a former Royal Marine commando, but has clearly lost his fighting skills, probably as a result of his predilection for strong drink. He fell backwards to the ground after tripping over his victim and the kerb and his BNP colleagues rushed into battle as the two other Asian youths tried to protect their friend.

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(above) BNP former councillor Robert Bailey confronts Asian youths just before viciously assaulting one of the men. (below) Questioned by Searchlight editor Nick Lowles, Nick Griffin defends Bailey’s conduct

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Among the BNP group were Matt Tait, the BNP’s rich brat parliamentary candidate in Milton Keynes South, and Kieron Trent, the BNP’s only candidate for Milton Keynes council and a keen kick boxer. Both had been imported for the rough stuff and Trent is clearly visible landing blows and kicks to someone on the ground joined by a fourth BNP heavy.

As Searchlight went to press two Asian youths have been charged with assault and affray and Bailey only with assault. All have been released on police bail. It is unclear why only the Asian youths attracted the more serious charge.

There were at least two independent witnesses on the BBC film, who could help identify Trent and Tait, whose photographs we reproduce here. We will be happy to pass on their addresses if the police ask us.

At the local election count, Searchlight’s editor Nick Lowles asked Griffin whether he was happy with Bailey kicking the lad in the head. Griffin, surrounded by some of his thugs including one of those who seriously assaulted a reporter from The Times in February, tried to evade the issue, saying the young man had threatened to kill him earlier in the day. Put on the spot and in front of the media, Griffin eventually admitted that in his view kicking a man in the head while on the ground was acceptable self-defence.

In south London Cormac Hollingsworth, a HOPE not hate activist and Labour Party council candidate was leafleting when he was assaulted by a man screaming “f***ing Labour bastard”. As the thug, well known from National Front marches, rained blows on Cormac and kicked him while on the ground, Cormac captured a photo of his attacker on his mobile phone, enabling us to find a better photo of the same man. The matter is in the hands of the police.

Like rats with their backs to the wall, BNP activists, in-between fighting each other, are likely to seek more revenge for their abject failure at the ballot box.

Searchlight Magazine

Race hate boss porkies to PCC exposed

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GOTCHA: Jim Dowson delivered right wing speech to BNP gathering two months ago

Racist leader whinges that he is not in the BNP then is filmed at party fundraiser!

THIS is the footage that proves BNP big wig Jim Dowson has been telling porkies!

Barefaced race hate Glaswegian Dowson has asked the Press Complaints Commission to rule that the Sunday World was wrong to say he was a member of the BNP – he told them had never been a member, yet here he is delivering a rousing right-wing speech – proving he’s up to his neck in the far right party.

Last year we revealed Dowson was behind the secret fundraising centre which is tucked away in east Belfast.

But after our first story he appeared on UTV and gave an interview to say he was not connected with the political side of the BNP and was just a businessman running a call centre.

He even said he didn’t agree with the BNP’s politics!

And he has complained to the Press Complaints Commission because we said he was a life member.

Poor affronted Jim told the PCC in an indignant letter: “They also allege that I am a BNP life member when I have never been a member of the party ever in my life!”

But a video passed to us by anti-fascist magazine Searchlight shows Jim praising the racist party and urging people to join up. And he’s even captioned North West Fundraiser.

Rambles

And we’ve since discovered that Jim may not have paid his member-ship to the BNP – because according to sources he owns it!

He has been BNP leader Nick Griffin’s right-hand man – to such an extent he has caused angry rumblings within the party.

During the seven minute video, which was taken during a fundraising event in Blackburn, Lancashire two months ago, Dowson repeatedly uses the phrases ‘we’ and ‘us’ when talking about the BNP.

We’ve picked out some of his most ‘rousing’ rants so you can make up your own mind if convicted criminal Dowson is in the BNP.

“We’re living with the Chinese and the Koreans,” says BNP Jim with a BNP backdrop, as the title BNP North West fundraiser is put on the screen of the BNP internet TV channel.

“They’re now the top of the tree. They’re going to be the ones who dominate the world. But it doesn’t matter how many cheap radios they build or cheap cars they build – they’ll never have what we have and that’s British blood.”

He then rambles on about soldiers and famous wars and battles including Waterloo, Agincourt, The Falklands and Afghanistan.

He tells the crowd: “The same blood is in you as they had. You are the sum total of your ancestors. Think what they suffered; think what they gave to build this Great Britain.

“How can Trevor Phillips (black head of the Equality and Human Rights Commission) ever hope to destroy us? I’ll tell you how, by destroying the British National Party.

“The only bulwark against tyranny is the BNP – you people have joined, given, you’ve campaigned, you’ve leafleted.

“We are the frontline. We are the thin red line against total destruction, annihilation and oblivion. We are the people who are standing in guard.”

He then babbles on about the film Zulu, which he thinks is called Rourke’s Drift, and likens the BNP to the British soldiers who repelled wave after wave of Zulu warriors during the Boer War.

He then slags off the British people who he says have run away because they are too scared to join the BNP in case they lose their job or get into trouble.

He then says of the BNP: “We will turn this country round.”

“People like (Trevor) Phillips and (Jack) Straw have mistaken us for being soft. There’s nothing soft about Blackburn and if Trevor Phillips and any of his cronies came here they would soon find out.”

He says he has helped turn the party around from being an amateurish party with no offices to having five UK offices, two MEP’s and are now bigger than UKIP.

“This party is going places – think what we have achieved,” says BNP Jim.

He talks about the leaked BNP list and tells anyone in the audience that if they weren’t on it, why weren’t they on it.

“When the list came out they thought we’d all run and hide. I was manning the phones that week and all week we got people in their 70s phoning saying ‘sign me up’ – they were joining in their 100s.”

The speech was part of a fundraiser in Blackburn which took place just before the election.

Boasted

But sadly for Jim the election was an unmitigated disaster.

The party hoped to get four MP’s elected to Westminster but failed to secure a single seat.

They had boasted about taking control of Barking and Dagenham council but were wiped out 51-0 by Labour.

Furthermore BNP sources are blaming Jim Dowson.

As revealed last week he, and the Belfast office, were being held responsible for the election blunder. Anti-fascist magazine Searchlight ran a ‘Hope not Hate’ campaign against the BNP during the election and Irish correspondent Matthew Collins hailed it a total success.

“Jim Dowson and his operation of shadow companies has as good as bought the BNP,” says Matthew.

“From our point of view, he’s the best thing to ever happen to the BNP.

“We’ve already begun to drive his party out of our council chambers and I’m sure the people of Northern Ireland will follow suit and chose hope over hate.”

Hope not Hate via The Sunday World

Griffin tries to buy time with resignation ploy

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Griffin: Worried

Under pressure from a series of revelations by the British National Party’s former webmaster Simon Bennett and calls for new leadership by party activists and organisers stung by their disastrous election results, Nick Griffin has announced that he will step down as leader “by the end of 2013”.

His declaration, made to a meeting of the party’s Advisory Council and key organisers on 22 May, is unlikely to satisfy those who have been contributing to Bennett’s website trying to win support for a leadership challenge this year. Many will consider that three and a half years is too long for the party to stagnate under Griffin, and will be all too well aware of Griffin’s past form at wriggling out of awkward situations and commitments.

According to a statement on the BNP website, Griffin intends to concentrate on getting re-elected to the European Parliament in 2014. He then intends “to help the other European nationalist parties to achieve the level of sophistication which the BNP has been able to build up, because a victory for any one of these parties is a victory to all of us”.

These “European nationalist parties” are likely to include some of Europe’s most hardline racist and fascist organisations. Griffin and his fellow BNP MEP Andrew Brons are members of the Alliance of European National Movements, a far-right group in the European Parliament formed in Budapest last October. Its other members are the three MEPs from Hungary’s fascist Jobbik party and the three French National Front MEPs.

The group is also supported by Italy’s Fiamma Tricolore, the Belgian National Front and the Swedish National Democrats, none of which have MEPs.

Griffin’s announcement shows that he remains more an internationalist fascist than a British nationalist, true to the politics he learned from his mentor, the convicted Italian terrorist Roberto Fiore. No doubt he has also become accustomed to the European Parliament’s generous salary and expenses regime.

Between now and 2013, Griffin intends to concentrate on “putting into place of the last ‘building blocks’ of the BNP’s administrative and political machine”. This is a more buoyant description than in his e-newsletters since the election in which he said that the party’s “underdeveloped elections department” had to be overhauled and restructured.

Griffin would then make way for “a younger person who does not have any baggage which can be used against the party,” a recognition that his presence is a liability for the party. Finding a person without “baggage”, who “will be able to drive support up to where it [the BNP] can be a serious contender for power” may be hard. Until now, any person fitting that description has left the party either in one of Griffin’s “purges” or because they have discovered that the party is not what they expected it to be.

The extended Advisory Council meeting also heard “consultant” Jim Dowson claim that “contrary to internet rumour-mongers”, the BNP owns the “Truth Truck” advertising vehicle for which Dowson raised a reported £80,000 or more in 2008. This was apparently confirmed in person by Jennie Noble, “the BNP treasurer who paid for the vehicle”.

If that is true then why did the BNP’s solicitors tell bailiffs trying to seize the vehicle to meet a debt that it was owned by an unconnected third party?

Dowson also stated that he did not take a commission on transactions through the BNP’s Belfast call centre. However he was silent on whether his call centre staff, who include friends and relations of Dowson and Griffin, were paid commission on party memberships and other sales, as evidenced by Bennett.

He did however reveal that he, under the guise of his “Midas Consultancy” business, was paid £165,000 for raising £2.6 million in donations for the party since January 2008.

Whether Dowson really has raised £2.6 million cannot be verified at present. The 2008 accounts showed an increase in donations of £662,000 over 2007, but the 2009 accounts will not be available until the end of July, provided the party manages to submit them on time. The BNP claimed to have raised over £500,000 for its European election campaign and there have been some fundraising appeals since then, such as to fight the legal action by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) over the BNP’s “whites only” membership criterion, but central party fundraising for this year’s elections seemed to have stalled. Much of the money to pay for general election deposits and leaflets was raised locally by party branches, with no input from Dowson.

Even if Dowson has raised a seven-figure sum, BNP members might raise eyebrows at the amount paid to a consultant who is always keen to point out that he is not a party member.

The meeting was told that BNP membership now stands at “just under 14,000 … increasing by several hundred every month” and that the rate at which BNP members fail to renew has decreased from over 70% to less 20%, now doubt testament to the harassment several members have reported from Dowson’s call centre – people rejoin just to stop the constant phone calls. The BNP has past form in exaggerating its membership and we can only wait to see how these claims compare with the audited figures in the party’s 2009 and 2010 accounts.

Missing from the announcements was any response to the numerous members who are calling for greater transparency in the BNP’s finances.

Griffin concluded by claiming that the party had “emerged from the meeting re-energised and ready for the ongoing struggle to save our nation from destruction at the hands of the old parties”, which is a rather creative way of describing the widespread disillusionment following the twin blows of the party’s capitulation over admitting “non-white” members and its rout in the general and local elections.

Hope not Hate

Leeds racism row singer loses unfair dismissal claim against police

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Gary Marsden I'Anson

A racism row singer fired from his day job with West Yorkshire Police has lost his claim for unfair dismissal.

Gary Marsden I'Anson, of Morley, was arrested and sacked over his alleged association with the British National Party and for using work time to compile right-wing CDs and DVDs for his rock band Anglo Saxon.

The police imaging officer of 23 years claimed West Yorkshire Police unfairly dismissed and discriminated against him.

But an employment tribunal in Leeds has ruled against Mr I'Anson.

Deputy Chief Constable David Crompton said: "This case was significantly aggravated by the fact that force computers were being used in order to generate material which was clearly supportive of the BNP and which had content that was unquestionably contrary to the aims and values of the force."

Now jobless Mr I'Anson, 48, said: "It's a sad day for freedom of speech, artistic expression, liberty, democracy and human rights. It is a good day for political correctness."

Mr I'Anson denies any political links to the BNP and says he is not racist but an 'anti-terrorist patriot.'

He said police were "talking nonsense" over claims he is associated with the BNP.

In 2007 Mr I'Anson was arrested on suspicion of possession of written material with intent to incite racial hatred. He denied any wrongdoing and no charges were brought.

After being suspended on full pay he was eventually sacked in February 2009, after a two-year investigation.

Yorkshire Evening Post

BNP supporter in court today over election assault charge

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A supporter of the British National Party is due to appear in court today after allegedly attacking a gay Conservative candidate at the UK's local elections, earlier this month.

Desmond OFlynn, 45, is said to have attacked the openly-homosexual Tory candidate on the evening of 6 May.

A spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police Service told PinkPaper.com: "We can confirm that a 45-year-old man f.rom Mitcham Park, Mitcham has been charged with a section 4A public order offence.

"He will appear on bail at Wimbledon Magistrates' Court today, 18 May. This follows an incident at Canons Leisure Centre in Mitcham on 6 May."

Pink Paper

Stoke BNP Councillor claims only 300,000 Jews died in World War 2

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Steve Batkin

THE BNP will take no action against one of its councillors after he was photographed alongside two men performing the Nazi salute.

Anti-BNP website Nothing British has published a picture, dating back to 2003, showing Bentilee and Townsend councillor Steve Batkin standing by the war memorial in Stone with a group of neo-fascists.

Although Mr Batkin is not seen making the salute, Nothing British claims the picture shows his true beliefs and the real nature of the BNP.

Maurice Cousins, deputy editor of Nothing British, said: "If Nick Griffin does not take action against Mr Batkin it will show the leadership of the BNP is still attached to the Nazism of the 1930s and 40s."

Michael Coleman, leader of Stoke-on-Trent City Council BNP group, said the photo did not reflect the modern BNP.

He said: "This is an unpleasant and regrettable picture. A lot has happened in the last seven years, and we are now distancing ourselves from that kind of behaviour.

"I will be speaking to Steve about the company he keeps but he will not be expelled."

The picture was supplied to Nothing British by former BNP group leader Alby Walker, who claims Mr Batkin is a Holocaust denier.

Mr Batkin said the other men in the photo were members of the Blood and Honour neo-fascist group.

He said: "I have never agreed with the strategy of the Blood and Honour group."

Mr Batkin rejected the claim he was a Holocaust denier, but he said he believes only 300,000 Jews died in the Second World War.

Stoke Sentinel

BNP husband avoids jail after growing cannabis

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Clifford Baddeley

THE husband of BNP city councillor Melanie Baddeley and his nephew have avoided being sent to prison after admitting growing cannabis in rooms concealed in a lock-up garage.

Four mature and 20 young plants were found by police executing a search warrant at the premises at the back of Park Avenue, Wolstanton.

The street value of the potential yield of the drugs grown by Clifford Mark Baddeley and Simon Peters was estimated to be between £5,540 and £23,740.

Yesterday North Staffordshire Magistrates' Court heard that when officers went to the lock-up they noticed a strong smell of the Class B drug.

Lynn Warrington, prosecuting, told the court: "During the search officers found a door inside the lock-up cleverly concealed behind a bookcase.

"When the door was opened they discovered three rooms, including a growing room and a drying room.

"Also there were fans, filters, plant food and transformers."

The premises had been used originally by Baddeley to fix washing machines to sell on, but that came to an end following a burglary there.

Baddeley told police both he and Peters liked to smoke cannabis but had recently been receiving poor quality drugs.

Both defendants told officers that they never intended to sell any of the drugs.

Baddeley, aged 49, of Holehouse Road, Abbey Hulton, and Peters, aged 36, of Aegean Close, Trentham, both pleaded guilty to producing four mature and 20 young plants between November 1 last year and January 21.

They were both given a 12-week prison sentence suspended for 12 months, with a six month curfew order from 9pm to 6am. Magistrates ordered the forfeiture and destruction of the plants and equipment and told each defendant to pay £85 costs.

Andrew Bennett, defending both men, said: "The defendants are uncle and nephew.

"They grew cannabis for their own use. Baddeley had arthritis, he could not work and used the drug for pain relief."

Mr Bennett said as a result of this matter and a previous conviction of cultivating cannabis in 2002 his client had now stopped taking cannabis and was being prescribed pain relief.

Mr Bennett added: "He (Baddeley) said the case was of concern to him because his wife was a parliamentary candidate. Peters used the drug primarily as a relaxant. They both now wish to move on without it."

After the hearing Baddeley's wife, BNP city councillor Melanie - who contested the Stoke North seat - in the General Election, told The Sentinel she had no comment to make.

Stoke Sentinel

How Many ?

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Nick Griffin explains to his wife Jackie how many seats they have left on Barking & Dagenham council









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Leicester City star Wayne Brown forced into grovelling apology over BNP stance

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Apology: Wayne Brown, who helped Hull to promotion, admitted to voting for the BNP

Wayne Brown has been forced into making a grovelling apology to his Leicester City team-mates after admitting that he voted BNP in the general election.

The Foxes defender sparked fury among several of his colleagues last week during a dressing-room debate turned sour and now he has been forced to ask for forgiveness.

A number of his team-mates — principally winger Lloyd Dyer and veteran defender Chris Powell — were particularly upset and rounded upon the former Hull City man.

Reports of a dressing-room punch-up appear wide of the mark but several of the Foxes’ squad were unhappy and told him so.

Matters became so heated that when Brown reported for duty ahead of the weekend’s play-off game against Cardiff City he was told to leave the club, having been suspended for the two fixtures against the Bluebirds.

Brown was told that he needed to apologise on Thursday after Leicester’s season effectively ended following a penalty shoot-out defeat at the City of Cardiff Stadium on Wednesday night.

It is unknown as yet whether he has had the opportunity to do so as the Foxes’ squad were allowed a day off following their heartache in south Wales.

A Leicester source said: ‘There was no punch-up. But Wayne has been asked to apologise to anyone he may have offended.

‘It seems as though there was a discussion and he disclosed how he had voted.’

Daily Mail

General election 2010: the defeat of the BNP

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The BNP had promised a 'political earthquake' in east London. Instead, unexpectedly, it was wiped out. Matthew Taylor and Hugh Muir report on the forces that came together to defeat it, and ask: is this the end for Nick Griffin's party?

At two minutes past six last Friday morning, Nick Griffin walked to the front of the makeshift stage at the Goresbrook leisure centre in Barking, east London, and tried to make his voice heard above a braying crowd. The BNP leader had just suffered a humiliating defeat, beaten into third place by Labour MP Margaret Hodge in the constituency where he had promised to create a "political earthquake".

But as he began a flustered and angry speech, Griffin already knew that worse was to come. Rumours had been circulating round the east London count for more than an hour that the party had not only failed to get its first MP, it was on the verge of an electoral disaster in the area Griffin had once described as the party's "jewel in the crown".

"Within the next five years, the indigenous people of London will be a minority," barked Griffin, as jubilant Labour supporters taunted him with shouts of "Out, out, out!" "It is going to be too late for Barking, but it is not too late for Britain." By then, though, no one was listening.

In the next 12 hours, Griffin's worst fears were realised – and even exceeded. The party was thrashed in its two key parliamentary constituencies of Barking and Stoke Central. Its record number of council and parliamentary candidates failed to make a single breakthrough; and of the 28 BNP councillors standing for re-election, all but two were beaten.

But the Barking and Dagenham council election result was the most dramatic. The BNP had plans to take control of the authority – instead, it lost every one of its councillors there. Twelve elected in 2006. Twelve thrown out in 2010. A ruthless purge, more shocking because they didn't see it coming. Neither, for that matter, did their opponents. It was the miracle of Barking.

"This really was a disastrous result for the BNP," said Nick Lowles, who led the anti-BNP campaign Hope Not Hate. "It will have long-term consequences – particularly for Nick Griffin."

This week, those predictions are beginning to be realised, as senior BNP figures break ranks to question Griffin's leadership and, again, raise concerns about the party's finances. Griffin has been all but untouchable since he took control of the party in 1999, but now he seems increasingly isolated: mocked on far-right internet forums, forced to defend himself from the criticism of one his chief lieutenants.

"The BNP looks set to implode," says Matthew Goodwin, a specialist in far-right politics at the University of Manchester. "Griffin may hang on but, if he does, it will only be because there is no easy way to oust him and no obvious successor. He had plans to expand his reach. Now he is fighting to survive."

Walking amid the shops and bustle of central Barking this week, Zain Achtar, a 19-year-old student, could hardly stop smiling as he basked in a borough free of the BNP. "It feels like something has been lifted from the place. We can get on and go forward again."

Karena Johnson, who works in Barking's Broadway Theatre, agreed: "Having them here was an embarrassment. What happened last week means the story of Barking has changed."

Or perhaps the story of the BNP has changed. Twelve months ago, the party was celebrating its big breakthrough after winning two seats in the Euro elections. So why did that momentum stall in Barking?

The answer is a tale of determined activism by Griffin's opponents, aided by the antics of his self-harming party. That activism began to develop a sharp focus two weeks after those Euro elections, when Lowles chaired a meeting of MPs, anti-BNP campaigners, church groups and trade unionists. He gave them a detailed breakdown of the BNP's support. The message was stark.

"A decision was made to draw a line in the sand," says one Labour party figure who was at the meeting. "The coming general election was going to be the defining moment. Everyone knew that if they won then, it would be almost impossible to remove them in the future."

There was never a single anti-BNP campaign in Barking. There were meetings, events, leafleting initiatives run by Hope Not Hate – which coordinated much of the activity – and also by Labour and Unite Against Fascism. Hope Not Hate set up a base in derelict premises, and volunteers travelled across the country to prepare it for the coming battle; putting up a new ceiling, plumbing in toilets and setting up a print room. Some slept on the floors.

"The response was truly overwhelming," says Lowles. "On one day of action, we had 541 people; on another, 385; and even on election day itself, 176 people came out to help get the vote out." Many of the volunteers had not been involved in political activity before. "We had teenagers travelling up from Kent, old ladies from the other side of London turning out. It felt like a liberating experience for people who felt like we were doing something politically important."

The Hope Not Hate campaign was supported by Joe Rospars, chief digital strategist for Barack Obama from 2007 until his inauguration, who said it was the "best example" of a British organisation applying the lessons of the US presidential elections. "We are seeing a genuine community-based organisation, with people coming together around a common purpose," he said.

Campaigners were able to identify the key groups least likely to vote for the BNP – women, pensioners and people from ethnic minorities. They built up an online volunteer force of 140,000 people, and Rospars advised on how to use them for maximum impact. In the month before election day, Lowles says more than 1,000 volunteers descended on Barking, delivering 350,000 specially tailored leaflets and newsletters.

At the same time, the Dagenham MP John Cruddas, and his neighbour who seemed most under threat, Barking MP Margaret Hodge, were fighting a parallel ground war against the BNP. Hodge escalated the effort she had begun some four years earlier to reconnect with voters Labour had lost to the BNP. Their rise in Barking had seen the then culture secretary heavily criticised by many inside her own party. For her, this election result represents a triumph for decency, and personal redemption.

"When Griffin announced in September that he would stand, that gave me a real scare," Hodge says. "My husband had not long died, and I was still in grief. It was a tough period. I was quietly confident that I would win, but I really wanted to smash him. And I was really concerned about the prospects for the council."

Hodge, with the help of volunteers from Unite Against Fascism, turned to the politics of shoe leather, knocking on doors and listening to people's concerns. "'What do you want to talk about?' I would ask. It was up to them."

Most talked about street cleaning, wheelie bins and antisocial behaviour, but inevitably many raised the BNP trump card of immigration. Even black residents raised the issue with Hodge. "I would say to them: 'I can't turn the clock back, but this is why the borough has changed, and we must make it work for all of us.' Some people hated that. Some would understand. But they came to feel I was listening."

The more so, perhaps, because the BNP was itself struggling to cope under a harsher spotlight. Griffin's Question Time appearance last October, with its gurning and yammering, shocked his supporters within the BNP and appeared to weaken his authority. The decision by the Equalities Commission to challenge the party's racist membership rules occupied too much of his attention, and drained the party's meagre resources. Indiscipline, heightened by personal rivalries, created a string of difficulties for the party and its leader.

At the beginning of the campaign, the BNP's publicity director Mark Collett – once a firm ally of Griffin – was arrested on suspicion of threatening to kill him. In Stoke, Alby Walker, a senior BNP councillor, said he would stand as an independent because of a "vein of Holocaust-denying" within the party. Then, a few days before the election, the party's website was closed. It was replaced with a posting from Simon Bennett, the website manager, who accused Griffin and James Dowson, the BNP election fundraiser, of being "pathetic, desperate and incompetent".

But the incident that might have had most impact on the voters of Barking concerned Bob Bailey, the BNP's London organiser and one of Griffin's closest confidants. On the eve of the election, Bailey was caught on camera throwing punches and kicks at a group of teenagers. Earlier this week, he was arrested and bailed on suspicion of assaulting two men (an 18-year-old man and a 19-year-old man have also been arrested and bailed, on suspicion of assault and affray).

"That caught the attention of voters," says Hodge. "One of the fears many people had was that a BNP win would result in violence on the street. That seemed to confirm it."

It is impossible to say how much of the Barking miracle can be explained by the efforts of the forces ranged against the BNP, and how much of the wound was self-inflicted, but after a shaky start at the Goresbrook leisure centre – before postal votes confirmed the landslide – the outcome was certainly decisive. Each confirmed result elicited whoops and backslapping, and by the end of the purge, only Richard Barnbrook, one of Griffin's senior lieutenants and himself a casualty of the wipeout, remained. He smiled a smile that at first seemed defiant, but eventually gave the impression that he was feeling queasy.

Around Barnbrook, officials – joyous at having the stain on the authority so ruthlessly removed – were quick to share the good news with friends and loved ones. One texted as each far-righter was shown the door. The last text read: "Bye bye, Nazis."

A widely shared thought is that the BNP was overwhelmed by the sort of grassroots activism that must now become a template if there is to be resurgence for the Labour party. In fact, Tony Travers, of the London School of Economics, says it was all about Labour.

"It would appear that the vote for the BNP in 2006 was some kind of political cry of anguish, based on the perception that the Labour party simply didn't understand the concerns of that part of the electorate. The fact that the BNP has been dropped in 2010 heavily suggests this section of the electorate now believes it has got the attention of the Labour party." Back in 2006, the morality of supporting an intrinsically racist party wasn't an issue, says Travers. "The voters simply used the most shocking mechanism they could to get Labour's attention."

But there is good and bad in that conclusion. Good because it suggests people in Barking voted BNP for reasons other than racism and antisemitism. Bad because if it was all a means to an end, did no one consider the impact on community relations of voting for the far right?

In any event, Dan Hodges, a strategist and spokesman for Hope Not Hate, says the safest conclusion to draw is that wider society should never again be so complacent. "We were lucky this time. People realised the threat just in time, we mobilised just in time. But we may not be so lucky next."

What is the future for the BNP now? Griffin doesn't know. He can point to the fact that the BNP won more than half a million votes, but his mood is changeable. Yesterday he sent another email, brimming with anger. "The old east London is dead," he wrote.

His party is at a crossroads. A Tory-led administration may worsen social divisions, providing the far right with new opportunities. But it might also clamp down on immigration, rendering the BNP irrelevant. Even if opportunities come his way, Griffin's party has so many problems that he may not be able to take advantage. The BNP is not dead, but it took a mortal blow in Barking. It will be hard-pushed to find its feet again.

Guardian

BNP Councillor admits Blood & Honour association

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Councillor in Nazi salute picture

A photograph has emerged of a BNP councillor pictured with three men giving a Nazi salute standing next to a war memorial.

Steve Batkin is a councillor at Stoke-on-Trent City Council and is also a governor at two secondary schools.

The image, taken in 2002 in Stone, shows Mr Batkin and saluting far-right activists with a Union Jack flag.

Mr Batkin said the men were expressing their "rebelliousness" but admitted the image was "regrettable".

The BNP said it rejected fascists and the "fascist cultists" who for many years had tried to take over control of the party.

The photograph was recently given to the BBC.

“ I do understand why they did it, because they feel they need to rebel against the British establishment who they see as very left wing and liberal ”
BNP councillor Steve Batkin

The National Union of Teachers (NUT) has called for Mr Batkin to resign his school governorships and stand down from his council post.

South Staffordshire Royal British Legion manager Peter Smith said he viewed the photograph with "revulsion".

"Three hundred and twenty six thousand servicemen and women died in World War II so that we wouldn't have Nazi salutes on the streets of Britain."

The picture was taken while Mr Batkin was campaigning to win a seat on the city council.

Smiling pose

Mr Batkin told the BBC the men were members of a "blood and honour" group sympathetic to the BNP but not officially linked.

Two of the men are now dead, he added.

He said: "When the picture was shot, I don't know exactly whether they're going to do a fascist salute or not.

"It would have been better they didn't. But the fact is they did express their rebelliousness."

Asked about his smiling pose, Mr Batkin added: "Yes, they are good, sound patriotic people.

"I do understand why they did it, because they feel they need to rebel against the British establishment who they see as very left wing and liberal."

Mr Batkin is a governor at Edensor Technology College and Mitchell High School, both in Stoke-on-Trent.

A council spokesman said: "Schools have their own code of conduct for their governors, and the decision whether or not to suspend a governor rests with the school."

Michael Coleman, a spokesman for the Stoke-On-Trent BNP branch said: "Membership conditions of the BNP bar association with people who behave in a way that our people, the British people, would find offensive, this includes wearing fascist emblems or behaving in a way that would harm the reputation of the party."

He added due to the age of the photograph, he thought it would be sufficient to remind members at the next meeting that fascist associations were unwelcome, but to take no further action.

BBC

Ricin proved neo-Nazi Ian Davison 'was serious'

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The amount of ricin Ian Davison produced could have killed thousands

The discovery of ricin at the home of Ian Davison convinced detectives that the white supremacist was a "serious terrorist".

Found in a jam jar, the cloudy liquid had been extracted from castor beans.

An amount roughly equivalent to a grain of salt is enough to kill an adult, making it 1,000 times more poisonous than cyanide.

Experts admit the toxin is relatively easy to produce, but police are unsure exactly how Davison intended to use it.

The ricin discovered at his house in Burnopfield, County Durham, could theoretically have been used to kill thousands.

However, the poison is most deadly when inhaled or injected directly into the bloodstream, so the quantity found at Myrtle Grove would seem unsuitable for a terrorist planning to unleash widespread mayhem.

If added to food, for example, it is far less dangerous because the toxins are broken down by the stomach.

Ricin was notoriously used in London during the Cold War to assassinate the Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov.

A specially-equipped umbrella was used to inject a pellet coated with 450 micrograms of ricin into his calf. He died several days later.

The poison works by disrupting the machinery that the body's cells use to renew themselves.

Dr John Gatehouse from Durham University's School of Biological and Biomedical Sciences said: "What the ricin does is it stops that machinery working and it doesn't just stop it in an inert way, it's actually an active toxin.

"So a single molecule of ricin will shut down the entire cellular machinery from renewing itself and when that happens the cell dies."

He added: "It's really difficult to deal with because it starts to kill cells anywhere the bloodstream can reach and it's very effective because such a small amount of it is enough to kill a cell."

An antidote has been developed, but Dr Gatehouse said: "If you can block it from binding to cells you can stop it but you have to get that antidote in pretty quick. Once it's started to work then you're done for basically".

'Planning attack'

Davison, the founder of neo-Nazi group the Aryan Strike Force, has been jailed for terrorism offences, along with his 19-year-old son Nicky, who was also a leading member of the group.

The 41-year-old was initially arrested when another force made Durham Police aware of the online activities of the ASF.

Only afterwards did detectives discover the ricin, along with terror manuals and pipe bombs.

Police have admitted they do not know who Ian Davison intended to target, but are convinced an act of terrorism was in the planning stages.

Det Supt Neil Malkin, who led the investigation, said: "What we uncovered was the fact that he was preparing himself in terms of pipe bombs and purchasing castor beans which are clearly a constituent part of ricin.

"We know he had these very extreme views. We know he was the centre of an extreme right wing group that certainly espoused these views.

"He was purchasing the ricin, we know he had the pipe bomb, he was downloading material that was of use to a terrorist.

"He was very much in the planning stage and we had to take action very quickly to stop it from coming to fruition."

He added: "Certainly this man for me is a terrorist - one of the extreme right wing terrorists. He was well capable of a terrorist act. Yes, it could have led to carnage."

BBC

Terror plot father and son jailed

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Ian & Nicky Davison

A neo-Nazi who made the poison ricin and plotted to overthrow the government has been jailed for 10 years.

Police found the deadly chemical when they raided Ian Davison's home in Burnopfield, County Durham, last June.

The 41-year-old admitted producing a chemical weapon, preparing for acts of terrorism and having terror handbooks.

His son Nicky, 19, who was convicted of possessing material useful for acts of terror, was detained for two years at a young offenders' institution.

Easily-sourced ingredients

The pair, who had earlier been tried separately at Newcastle Crown Court, set up and ran the Aryan Strike Force (ASF) website.

Ian Davison created ricin at his home in 2006 or early 2007, Andrew Edis QC, prosecuting, said.

It was found when police raided the property in June last year and is now stored at the UK's Porton Down chemical weapons centre.

The court heard how he researched how to make the killer chemical and then followed instructions, having bought its easily-sourced ingredients.

Passing sentence, Judge Milford told the father: "A particularly unpleasant aggravating feature of this case is that you corrupted your son."

Mr Edis said: "He was a leading member of the ASF which was a neo-Nazi organisation dedicated to using violence. Its slogan was 'Whatever it takes'.

"The purpose of the violence was the creation of an international Aryan group who would establish white supremacy in white countries.

"They were followers of the ideology of Adolf Hitler, who they revered, and whose work Mein Kampf was among many available on their website."

Mr Edis said the ASF had about 350 members recruited via the internet, though not all were active.

Other alleged members will face trial later this year.

Mr Edis said: "This defendant intended to perpetrate acts of terrorism.

"The ricin which he made would be used in pursuit in the cause espoused by the group."

BBC

Stoke-on-Trent BNP councillor in Nazi salute row

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A BNP councillor has appeared on an anti-BNP website holding a Union Jack flag – standing next to three men doing a Nazi salute on a War Memorial in Stone.

Cllr Steve Batkin, who has served the Bentilee ward since 2003, has said he was attending a funeral and he has not had contact with the men since.

Maurice Cousins is the Deputy Editor of ‘Nothing British’, where the image is currently appearing:

“We thought this was disgraceful considering the British National Party dresses itself up in the flag and in the honour of those who have given their lives in this country.

“This man was elected in 2003, what is this man still doing there?”

Cllr Batkin defended his actions – saying it was down to the other men’s “drunken youth.”

“You’ve got a few seconds to think and when someone just puts their hands up in a few seconds and a fascist salute, basically you’re trapped.

“We’ve all said things in the past, including Nick Griffin himself, where we regret some of the things we’ve said and some of the situations we’ve been in.

“Nevertheless I do not condone right wing people doing right wing salutes and dressing in a cult. It’s counter-productive and it doesn’t help the BNP one bit.

“That’s how drunken youth react at times when they’re rebellious, they might do silly things.”

Stoke BNP leader Michael Coleman does not condone Batkin’s actions and doubts that the matter will be taken further within the party.

“I’d like to denounce it, it’s not part of the BNPs philosophy. I don’t want to represent those ideas, but it was 8 years ago and it was a different world back then.

Ex-BNP councillor Alby Walker, who left the BNP to stand as Independent, said that Cllr Batkin is not an exception and this is why he left the BNP:

“I shall make it my job now to expose to the public what the true face of the BNP is, what’s behind the scenes rather than the public persona they’re putting on at the moment.

“The true face of the BNP behind closed doors is quite different to what you will see publicly and that’s coming from the horses mouth.

“These are some of the reasons I had to move away from the BNP. I did try to change the image but obviously it’s still lurking in the background.”

Staffs Live

BNP kicked off the council by electorate

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On Friday Labour ousted the British National Party's remaining seat on Kirklees Council with Viv Kendrick's win in Heckmondwike.

Seven years ago things were very different for the party as David Exley became the first BNP councillor in Kirklees's history. Mr Exley was joined on the council by Roger Roberts who won the party's second Heckmondwike seat in the 2006 local elections.

Since then Mr Exley lost out to Labour's Steve Hall in 2008 and now Mr Roberts has now been beaten by the same party, meaning the BNP faces at least 12 months in the political wilderness.

Mr Exley, who stood in Cleckheaton for the local election and for Batley and Spen in the general election, is bullish about his party's long term future in Kirklees.

"I see this as kick up the backside for us, to make sure this doesn't happen again," he said.

"We have to up the ante. We need to put this behind us and fight hard for another council seat next year.

"We knew that the defeat was on the cards beforehand because people vote differently on local and general election days."

BNP votes were down in both Cleckheaton and Heckmondwike compared to 2006 and Mr Exley was also beaten into fourth place in the general election results for Batley and Spen.

While the increase in voter turn-out this year had an effect, Mr Exley believes it was tactical voting that turned the tide against the BNP.

He added: "I want to show people that despite what people are saying about the BNP, we are not down and out.

"We are still there fighting and we will carry on. We have to take the knocks as much as the victories."

Spenborough Guardian

BNP wipe out - THANK YOU

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It is almost unbelievable. But the stain of far-right politics has been wiped off the face of Barking and Dagenham. Not only was the BNP thoroughly beaten in the general election, the council lost 12 councillors. This means the number of councillors left on Barking & Dagenham council went from 12 to 0 overnight.

We cannot thank those who made this possible enough. Huge respect goes to Nick Lowles, Matthew Collins, Sam Tarry, Caroline Alabi and all those who have worked so tirelessly organising activists against the BNP in the Borough for many months. And huge thanks to almost 1,300 people who have volunteered valuable time over the course of the election - in Barking & Dagenham (where we put out 130,000 pieces of literature), and in Stoke-on-Trent - where the BNP were also humiliated.

We have had brilliant support from pensioners, black and Asian voters, white voters, young voters, women and men. On Monday 385 people delivered 55,000 leaflets and even on polling day we had 175 people out knocking up the vote. We also had huge moral and financial support from hundreds of thousands of people across the country, and fantastic support from the Mirror which kept us all going.

As ever our celebrity supporters have been magnificent, from Billy Bragg, Eddie Izzard and Speech Debelle, to the casts of The Bill, Hollyoaks and Emmerdale, plus too many more to mention. Thank you one and all - you've done a wonderful thing.

Mirror

BNP faces legal threat amid new racism claims over redrafted constitution

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Nick Griffin could be in in contempt of court for allegedly breaching court order to amend party rules

The British National party faces the prospect of renewed legal action from the government's equalities watchdog over allegations that it has failed to remove potentially racist clauses from its constitution. The court case could potentially see the BNP's leader, Nick Griffin, jailed or fined for contempt of court, or see party assets seized, lawyers believe.

It caps a miserable couple of weeks for the BNP. Griffin came third in the parliamentary vote for Barking, a constituency the BNP had targeted heavily, while his party lost all 12 of its seats on Barking and Dagenham council. That followed a disastrous election campaign in which the BNP website was taken down by its designer, the party's publicity director was arrested on suspicion of threatening to kill Griffin and a London candidate was caught on camera fighting in the street with a group of Asian teenagers.

The BNP constitution was challenged in court last year by the government's Equalities and Human Rights Commission. In March, Judge Paul Collins ruled that even after the BNP lifted a direct ban on non-white members, the revised document was indirectly discriminatory because it required applicants to oppose "any form of integration or assimilation of ... the indigenous British", something the EHRC argued could not be endorsed by those in mixed-race relationships.

The constitution additionally required new members to submit to a two-hour vetting visit at their home by a pair of BNP officials, a clause Collins ruled could be seen as intimidating for non-white applicants. He ordered both offending sections be removed.

Following the ruling, Griffin redrafted the BNP constitution, something the party's rules allow him to do without consulting members. However, copies of the new version – officially known as draft 12.2 – show that both clauses have not been removed but moved and slightly amended. The home interview clause returns in near-identical wording as the "annual visit criteria", without which new members cannot attend meetings or vote on party matters.

"This seems like a slightly hapless attempt to get round the injunction by moving the offending section to a different part of the constitution," said Paul Epstein QC from Cloisters Chambers in London, a specialist in discrimination law. "There seems to be no doubt that what they have done goes against the spirit of Judge Collins's ruling at the very least. They're taking a real risk of being found in contempt of court. This is particularly the case for Griffin, given this role he has in changing the constitution."

The section relating to the "indigenous British" remains in the new constitution, under the heading "Temporary amendment". Gavin Millar QC, a specialist in election and discrimination law from Doughty Street chambers, said this appeared to breach the court decision. "The ruling made it quite clear that the reference to 'indigenous British' was discriminatory and had to be removed but the BNP has included it, saying it is only being temporarily removed pending a successful appeal, at which point it will be reinstated. This is a clear breach," he said.

The home visit clause had been slightly reworded but "it is in substance the same", he said, adding: "The approach they have taken is both a civil and criminal breach of the order and I think in the end, unless the courts or the commission give up, which I don't think they will, the BNP and Griffin will in the end face contempt proceedings and possible imprisonment."

Any EHRC action will have to wait until a government is formed, as until then its activities remain constrained by Cabinet Office guidelines on the behaviour of public bodies during election campaigns. An EHRC spokesman said: "At the time of the court ruling, we said that the commission would monitor the BNP's compliance with the ruling. We are currently looking into this matter."

The EHRC is understood to have written to the BNP outlining its concerns about the new constitution and is awaiting a reply. The BNP did not respond to a request for comment.

Guardian