BNP Parish Councillor Faces The Crunch

Deacon (facing camera, to the left of the person giving salute)
on a National Front activity before his election

Bedfordshire campaigners are organising to confront the racist politics of British National Party Parish Councillor Simon Deacon and will be scrutinising his response to the Equal Opportunities Policy being laid before the Parish Council meeting on Tuesday 1st July.

On Tuesday 1st July Simon Deacon, British National Party (BNP) councillor for Markyate Parish Council, will be asked to give his assent to the body’s Equal Opportunities Policy. This will create an impossible situation for Deacon, the former leading National Front activist who told the St Albans Observer (25.4.07) on his election

'England was a white country – we think it should be returned to that.'

The Equal Opportunities Policy contains many statements that stand totally opposed to his racist ideology, particularly the clause on cultural diversity that states:

'the council recognises that we live in a multicultural society and believes that cultural diversity should be viewed positively.'

Apart from Deacon’s personal prejudice, this very mild and reasonable statement stands against the policy of the national BNP, which calls for “an immediate halt to all further immigration...and the introduction of a system of voluntary resettlement whereby those immigrants who are legally here.”

You can hardly value another culture if you want it moved out of town.

The Policy sets very high standards for councillors, stating that “the principle behind the statement must be reflected in all of our behaviours and practices.” Three Counties UAF feel that belonging to a Party that undermines a policy in its everyday business is a practice that is incompatible with being a Parish Councillor.

It is Deacon’s declared intent to get the BNP active in Hemel Hempstead and campaigners feel that his activity on the parish council is merely a smokescreen to further his wider electoral ambitions.

Markyate has shown itself to be a village free of prejudice in the manner that it returned an Asian woman, Jayshree Patel, onto the Parish Council long before Deacon walked into the post last May.

Three Counties UAF say that if Deacon agrees to the Policy then he should resign from the BNP, but if he disagrees then he should resign from the Parish Council. This action is the first in a campaign of action by Three Counties UAF to raise awareness of the threat posed by the BNP to the well-being of the village.

Notes:

1. The attached photo shows Deacon (facing camera, to the left of the person giving salute) on a National Front activity before his election. The person doing the salute is Stuart Hollingsdale, an NF member who was jailed in 1998 for smashing up the Stephen Lawrence memorial plaque in Eltham, South London.

2. Deacon was elected unopposed to the seat in May 2007 when only 9 nominations were made for the 10 vacancies on the parish council.

Three Counties UAF