Anti-fascists are concerned that the British National Party (BNP) could control Stoke-on-Trent City Council within the next three years, following its gains in last month’s elections.
The party’s most notorious success in May’s local and London elections was Richard Barnbrook’s seat on the London Assembly, but it also made substantial gains elsewhere. In Stoke, the BNP increased its presence from six councillors to nine, making it the joint second-largest party on the council, along with the Conservative and Independent Alliance. In two of the city’s wards, the party holds all three council seats. The BNP is also the second-largest party on Barking and Dagenham Council.
Locals fear that within two or three years the party could control Stoke Council, and possibly win next year’s mayoral vote. Many in the city have blamed the rise of the BNP on the last Labour council, which they claim did not address the concerns of the local population.
Sydney Morris, president of the Stoke-on-Trent and North Staffordshire Synagogue, said: “The previous council didn’t do a lot to prove itself, and now it is feasible that the BNP might become the majority party. It could certainly happen.”
Although the Jewish community in the city is small, with only 22 synagogue members, Mr Morris said the rise of the BNP in Stoke was still of huge concern.
“It does worry me,” he said. “People must not be apathetic. It must be brought to people’s notice, so that we stand a chance of combatting them.”
Barbara Goldstone, president of the Manchester Jewish Representative Council, which looks after the Stoke community, also expressed her fear over the BNP’s increased popularity in the city.
“We are very concerned with it and will do all we can,” she said.
A spokesman for the Community Security Trust said: “The fact that the BNP has recently switched targets from Jews and blacks to Muslims and asylum-seekers merely shows that they threaten all of our society.”
Stoke has traditionally been a Labour stronghold. In the mid-1990s, Labour held all 60 seats on the council. This time, however, Labour has only 16 councillors, who include the elected mayor. One of the main reasons cited for Labour’s decline in the city and the increased popularity of the BNP is the decrease of the manufacturing and pottery industries, which previously employed around 50,000 people. Now just 6,000 are left working in the mines and pottery industries, and Stoke-on-Trent has one of the lowest proportions of people in employment in the country.
In 2007, the city was ranked as the second most deprived borough in the West Midlands, and the 16th most deprived in the country. At the turn of the century, it had been the 34th most deprived. Thirty-three per cent of areas in the city are in the top 10 per cent of most deprived areas nationally.
But Stoke-on-Trent is not the only area concerning anti-BNP activists. The anti-fascist magazine Searchlight this week called on people to vote in upcoming council by-elections in East London, in order to prevent the BNP making gains. On Thursday, July 3, by-elections will be held in Chadwell Heath (Barking and Dagenham) and South Hornchurch (Havering).
Nick Lowles, Searchlight editor, said: “It is vitally important that we stop the BNP from winning either.”
Jewish Chronicle
June 13, 2008
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From:
http://weloveleebarnes.blogspot.com/
It’s all Sodom and Gomorrah! Lee Barnes (LLB Hons) on why the BNP’s ‘Red, White and Blue’ festival is like a Roman orgy
With mixed emotions over Amber Valley Borough Council's refusal to allow the BNP to hold its annual shindig in Denby, Derbyshire, we can’t help but feel that we all might be missing out on something special. Based upon Lee Barnes (LLB Hons)’s latest article, The Fall of the American Empire (12 June 2008), the BNP’s annual ‘Red, White and Blue’ (RWB) festival seems to be a fun fusion of Woodstock, the Nuremberg rally, and Sodom and Gomorrah.
Under the paragraph ‘Decline in Morals and Values’, Lee Barnes (LLB Hons) provides a description of what can only be the BNP’s RWB festival via analogical reference to the moral degeneration that typified the end days of Rome:
“Those morals and values that kept together the Roman legions and thus the empire could not be maintained towards the end of the empire. Crimes of violence made the streets of the larger cities unsafe. Even during PaxRomana there were 32,000 prostitutes in Rome. Emperors like Nero and Caligula became infamous for wasting money on lavish parties where guests ate and drank until they became ill. The most popular amusement was watching the gladiatorial combats in the Colosseum. These were attended by the poor, the rich, and frequently the emperor himself. As gladiators fought, vicious cries and curses were heard from the audience. One contest after another was staged in the course of a single day. Should the ground become too soaked with blood, it was covered over with a fresh layer of sand and the performance went on”
This is a remarkable description of the BNP’s RWB festival as seen through the eyes of Odinist insider Lee Barnes (LLB Hons). We can only hope that Lee Barnes (LLB Hons) braves his Zionist-Marxist critics within the BNP who wish to silence his pen of impending doom and catastrophe to bring us more depictions and exposés of BNP meetings.
er, not sure what Lee Barnes and Sodom & Gomorrah have to do with Stoke !
Anyway, to turn to Stoke, would it not be wise to avoid talking up the BNP's prospects.
A few points to ponder:
1. A few years ago the story was "Burnley could be run by the BNP" - it didn't happen!
2. Yes, the BNP has some strength in Stoke-on-Trent, but I think you'll find it's concentrated in one part of the authority area. Across most of the City they have yet to make any progress.
3. As the BNP grows (if it grows - a mighty big if !) their groups usually split. The same is likely to happen in Stoke.
I'm not arguing for complacancy, but let's not talk up their influence.
In their dreams, will neo-nazis run stoke.
Yes, it's in no-one's interests to talk up the minority bnp, as a means of fighting compacency.
They have got 9 councillors. 9 out of how many? They will never run Stoke. Nor any other local council. All this talking up the bnp is getting on my nerves.
Yes Stoke was a bad result with 3 more bnp elected but lets get it into proportion. How many councillors in total are there in Stoke and how many do the bnp have precisely?
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