Equality and Human Rights Commission says BNP leader is refusing to obey orders to remove 'non-white' clause
Nick Griffin, the leader of the British National Party, was accused of lying in the high court today during a showdown with the equality and human rights watchdog over the party's potentially discriminatory constitution.
The leader of the BNP had been due in court for the latest instalment of a legal battle that began last year when the party was ordered to remove from its constitution a clause banning non-white members. However, Griffin failed to show up for the hearing in central London because he was suffering from kidney stones and was in "extreme pain".
"This is a short-term health problem, and I expect to be fighting fit again soon," said Griffin from his hospital bed.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) accuses Griffin, Simon Darby, the BNP deputy, and party officer Tanya Lumby of failing to comply with a county court judgment earlier this year ordering the removal of potentially racist clauses from the BNP's constitution. The party faces a fine, hefty costs or possibly the sequestration of its assets if the court finds in favour of the EHRC.
Robin Allen QC, appearing for the watchdog, accused the BNP of "playing with" the commission and its officials instead of obeying the judgment. He added: "Our principle position is: [Griffin] is simply lying [when he says] he did not know the terms of the order."
Allen described Griffin as a "persistent offender" who had repeatedly failed to comply with various orders to change the constitution.
The BNP was forced to remove a "non-white" clause from its constitution last year after the courts ruled it breached discrimination laws. Then, in March, Judge Paul Collins found that the revised constitution was indirectly discriminatory because it required applicants to oppose "any form of integration or assimilation of ... the indigenous British", which the Equality and Human Rights Commission argued could not be endorsed by those in mixed-race relationships.
In addition, the revised document also required prospective members to submit to a two-hour vetting visit at their home by BNP officials, a clause that Collins ruled could be seen as intimidating for non-white applicants. He ordered both offending sections to be removed.
Griffin redrafted the BNP constitution once more, but the new version showed that the offending clauses had been slightly amended rather than removed. Today, the court heard that the passages had been "suspended" at the end of August, but still not deleted.
The hearing, which is expected to finish tomorrow, comes amid a series of setbacks for the BNP, which has been beset by infighting and resignations since its poor performance in May's general and local elections.
In September, its sole representative on the London assembly, Richard Barnbrook, became the latest figure to split publicly with Griffin when he was expelled by the party. There have also been growing concerns about the party's finances, after the BNP failed to comment on reports it was over £500,000 in debt.
The Guardian
Showing posts with label BNP. British National Party. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BNP. British National Party. Show all posts
November 08, 2010
October 20, 2010
Tell us more, say police as BNP chooses secret venue for conference
Police have asked for more details of a British National Party conference coming to Derbyshire so that they can plan the security operation. The party, which held its Red, White and Blue festival in Denby for three years, has announced that its annual conference will take place in South Derbyshire in December.
Anti-fascist groups are planning protests during the three-day event. Security at the Red, White and Blue festival cost police £500,000 a year but Superintendent Gary Parkin said he expected the conference bill to be lower.
He said: "We have had no confirmation of where the conference will take place or how many people are expected to attend. We are pressing the BNP for these details. We do not anticipate that the policing operation will be as large as the occasions when the Red, White and Blue Festival was held in the county."
The BNP said it would not reveal the exact location of the conference "because it is usually threatened by the left". But it confirmed that leader Nick Griffin would be the keynote speaker.
Last year's conference was held near Wigan and attracted protests from groups such as Unite Against Fascism. Protesters gathered outside the conference venue, chanting "Black and white unite and fight" and "Smash the BNP". Dozens of police were called to separate rival factions.
Graham Lewis, secretary of Derby Campaign Against Racism and Fascism, said: "We will definitely be holding a protest, although we do not expect to be facing large numbers of supporters, because of the current division in the BNP. We would aim to keep it peaceful. We have no intention of turning it into a fist fight."
He said he would be "trying everything possible" to discover where the conference was being held.
Mr Griffin has written to BNP supporters, urging them to book a place at the 2010 conference. He wrote: "We are pleased to announce the BNP's Annual Conference 2010, which will take place at a first-class venue in the South Derbyshire area on December 10 to 12. This year's conference, unlike previous events, is going to be a spectacular combination of political speeches, audio-visual displays, training, policy debates, stalls and entertainment."
It would be at a "four-star venue complete with restaurant, bar and a whole range of suitable accommodation to fit your needs", he said.
This is Derbyshire
Anti-fascist groups are planning protests during the three-day event. Security at the Red, White and Blue festival cost police £500,000 a year but Superintendent Gary Parkin said he expected the conference bill to be lower.
He said: "We have had no confirmation of where the conference will take place or how many people are expected to attend. We are pressing the BNP for these details. We do not anticipate that the policing operation will be as large as the occasions when the Red, White and Blue Festival was held in the county."
The BNP said it would not reveal the exact location of the conference "because it is usually threatened by the left". But it confirmed that leader Nick Griffin would be the keynote speaker.
Last year's conference was held near Wigan and attracted protests from groups such as Unite Against Fascism. Protesters gathered outside the conference venue, chanting "Black and white unite and fight" and "Smash the BNP". Dozens of police were called to separate rival factions.
Graham Lewis, secretary of Derby Campaign Against Racism and Fascism, said: "We will definitely be holding a protest, although we do not expect to be facing large numbers of supporters, because of the current division in the BNP. We would aim to keep it peaceful. We have no intention of turning it into a fist fight."
He said he would be "trying everything possible" to discover where the conference was being held.
Mr Griffin has written to BNP supporters, urging them to book a place at the 2010 conference. He wrote: "We are pleased to announce the BNP's Annual Conference 2010, which will take place at a first-class venue in the South Derbyshire area on December 10 to 12. This year's conference, unlike previous events, is going to be a spectacular combination of political speeches, audio-visual displays, training, policy debates, stalls and entertainment."
It would be at a "four-star venue complete with restaurant, bar and a whole range of suitable accommodation to fit your needs", he said.
This is Derbyshire
October 18, 2010
BNP leaves creditors in the lurch
Any remaining pretence that the BNP is not on the verge of insolvency was blown away when a document headed OFFER OF DEBT COMPROMISE sent by Jim Dowson to the BNP's lengthy list of unpaid creditors surfaced over the weekend.
Dated October 6th (a Wednesday), the document gives the BNP's "preferred" creditors just a few days - until Thursday October 14th - to accept a 20p in the pound settlement, and warns: "Thereafter there is no prospect of your invoices being paid at any time in the forseeable future."
Nakedly attempting to bluff creditors tempted to use the courts to enforce payment, the heavy-handed Dowson claims: "Additionally, the lawyers who have reviewed the underlying contracts to most of the outstanding invoices have advised that most are not enforceable."
This is almost certainly untrue, but it is an admission that the BNP considers any contract entered into with itself is not worth the paper it is written on.
Dowson falsely claims that the "economic downturn" is the cause of the BNP's financial troubles in terminology indicative of how he and Nick Griffin see the party - "The biting economic downturn has made a shipwreck of the financial projections of many businesses, including, it is a regret to say, those of the British National Party."
Later there is a tale (and we suspect that is all it is) of a creditor who took advantage of Dowson's generous offer and then negotiated the same deal with his own creditor, which allegedly "made the difference between his business surviving and going to the wall".
The contents of Dowson's letter are reproduced below (our emphasis added), and a copy of the original may be seen here.
Despite what is for it "good news", the Eddy Butler-led reformist wing of the party is in disarray. The Reform Group itself lost momentum some time ago, Butler being criticised for his apparent inertia (and for the unwise decision to take a holiday as the crisis rumbled on). The decision of some reformers to form what will almost certainly prove a short-lived new party has served only to fragment further opposition to Nick Griffin and Jim Dowson, though Butler cannot be too unhappy at the loss of hysterics like Simon Bennett or foul-mouthed friend-losers like Lee Barnes.
Butler soldiers on for all the world as if he had never been expelled from the BNP and as if he were certain that his proposed constitutional reforms will be carried and Nick Griffin toppled.
On the surface his confidence seems misplaced, but Eddy Butler has many friends among apparent Griffin loyalists, and is clearly privy to more information sourced directly from within Griffin's inner circle than he reveals. As Butler himself likes to imply, he has a few tricks in his bag yet, and Butler watchers have a strong sense that he is waiting for something to happen.
Whether or not Butler and his allies ever do wrest control of the BNP from Nick Griffin and Jim Dowson, the party now has a reputation for being financially unsound and utterly untrustworthy, a reputation that will only grow as the Dowson document disseminates ever more widely, as it is certain to do. It is a reputation that will never be easily shaken off, and we do question why Butler - who has put forward no debt repayment plans of his own - would want to take control of a broke and shrunken BNP.
In fact, is that really Eddy's game at all?
Dated October 6th (a Wednesday), the document gives the BNP's "preferred" creditors just a few days - until Thursday October 14th - to accept a 20p in the pound settlement, and warns: "Thereafter there is no prospect of your invoices being paid at any time in the forseeable future."
Nakedly attempting to bluff creditors tempted to use the courts to enforce payment, the heavy-handed Dowson claims: "Additionally, the lawyers who have reviewed the underlying contracts to most of the outstanding invoices have advised that most are not enforceable."
This is almost certainly untrue, but it is an admission that the BNP considers any contract entered into with itself is not worth the paper it is written on.
Dowson falsely claims that the "economic downturn" is the cause of the BNP's financial troubles in terminology indicative of how he and Nick Griffin see the party - "The biting economic downturn has made a shipwreck of the financial projections of many businesses, including, it is a regret to say, those of the British National Party."
Later there is a tale (and we suspect that is all it is) of a creditor who took advantage of Dowson's generous offer and then negotiated the same deal with his own creditor, which allegedly "made the difference between his business surviving and going to the wall".
The contents of Dowson's letter are reproduced below (our emphasis added), and a copy of the original may be seen here.
Dear Sir/MadamDowson's tactless missive may well prove the prompt needed for one of the BNP's more substantial creditors to begin legal action against the party, which is clearly not a viable financial entity. The endless appeals fronted by Nick Griffin are falling on deaf ears, hundreds have already failed to renew their memberships, and it is expected that several thousand will fail to renew as the old annual cycle looms.
OFFER OF DEBT COMPROMISE
Strictly private and confidential,
Not for publication.
Copyright and property title remains with sender
Without prejudice
Subject to contract
I write regarding the matter of payments due on outstanding invoices rendered by you in respect of goods and services utilised in connection with the British National Party.
As you know, today we all find ourselves in an increasingly difficult commercial climate. It is no secret that cash is not only in very short supply for all political parties including the British National Party but in short supply in the wider economy. The British National Party has had to close offices and lay off staff; this is not an easy time for the Party.
The biting economic downturn has made a shipwreck of the financial projections of many businesses, including, it is a regret to say, those of the British National Party. Combined with a massive and still ongoing wave of hugely expensive politically motivated High Court actions by the Commission for Equalities and Human Rights, this makes it simply impossible for the BNP or operations and persons associated with it to pay its outstanding bills in anything like a normal timescale - if indeed at all.
Additionally, the lawyers who have reviewed the underlying contracts to most of the outstanding invoices have advised that most are not enforceable. These two factors combined means that many creditors who have supplied good [sic] and services and which were used in connection with the activities of the British National Party may never be paid.
The situation is very grave, and it is a matter of deep regret to us, but I would rather be very open and honest with you than leave you under the illusion either that money will be forthcoming or that legal action will achieve anything other for you than to throw good money after bad in the shape of futile lawyers' costs.
As you are a highly valued supplier and a creditor with a previous track record of commitment to the British National Party, there is a desire to ensure that you are not one of the unfortunate creditors who are inevitably going to end up with nothing at all.
With this in mind I am authorised to do as much as is humanly possible to resolve the matter of your outstanding invoices.
I am in a position, for a very limited period of time, to offer you, by way of debt compromise and in full and final payment of all your outstanding invoices relating to the supply of goods and services in connection with the British National Party the sum of 20p in every pound (20%) due. The offer remains open until 14th October 2010 and is subject to a short written compromise agreement being entered into by you to formally agree and record the settlement.
I know that this is not what you want to hear, and I am very sorry indeed but this genuinely is the best that can be offered you. In the case of one of three creditors who have already concluded such a deal, the receipt of this one-off immediate payment enabled him to make a similar arrangement with a creditor in turn and actually made the difference between his business surviving and going to the wall.
As a 'preferred' supplier I have written to you first in order that you have first claim on this very limited offer. The funds available are limited and will be allocated among creditors on a first come first agreed basis.
Please feel free to call me on 020 7078 8838 or 079 3466 6831 to discuss this at your convenience. Please be reminded that this offer is for a limited time only. Thereafter there is no prospect of your invoices being paid at any time in the forseeable future.
Yours for and on behalf
[PP'd signature]
James Dowson B.T.h. M.A.
Despite what is for it "good news", the Eddy Butler-led reformist wing of the party is in disarray. The Reform Group itself lost momentum some time ago, Butler being criticised for his apparent inertia (and for the unwise decision to take a holiday as the crisis rumbled on). The decision of some reformers to form what will almost certainly prove a short-lived new party has served only to fragment further opposition to Nick Griffin and Jim Dowson, though Butler cannot be too unhappy at the loss of hysterics like Simon Bennett or foul-mouthed friend-losers like Lee Barnes.
Butler soldiers on for all the world as if he had never been expelled from the BNP and as if he were certain that his proposed constitutional reforms will be carried and Nick Griffin toppled.
On the surface his confidence seems misplaced, but Eddy Butler has many friends among apparent Griffin loyalists, and is clearly privy to more information sourced directly from within Griffin's inner circle than he reveals. As Butler himself likes to imply, he has a few tricks in his bag yet, and Butler watchers have a strong sense that he is waiting for something to happen.
Whether or not Butler and his allies ever do wrest control of the BNP from Nick Griffin and Jim Dowson, the party now has a reputation for being financially unsound and utterly untrustworthy, a reputation that will only grow as the Dowson document disseminates ever more widely, as it is certain to do. It is a reputation that will never be easily shaken off, and we do question why Butler - who has put forward no debt repayment plans of his own - would want to take control of a broke and shrunken BNP.
In fact, is that really Eddy's game at all?
September 22, 2010
Say No to BNP in Stroud meeting organised
Community groups, trade union activists and political representatives are to stage a meeting called Say No To The BNP in Stroud following news that the party is moving its national media department to the Five Valleys.
The meeting will be held at The Space in Lansdown and organisers say they want to send out a message that the party is not welcome here.
Speakers will include former MP David Drew and district councillor John Marjoram (Green, Trinity), who has gathered more than 100 signatures on a letter protesting against the decision to open the publicity department at Unit 13 on the Salmon Springs Trading Estate between Stroud and Painswick.
Chris Moore, a member of the Stroud branch of the Socialist Party, who recently co-ordinated the town's Save Our Post Offices campaign, is organising the meeting.
"I was shocked and disgusted to hear the BNP was proposing to set up a national propaganda centre in Stroud," he said. "Maybe the party thinks it can get away with it, thinking Stroud is just a little town. But we have a long history of organising demonstrations and protesting."
British National Party leader Nick Griffin recently sent an email to supporters, which is available on the party's website, announcing details about the new centre for media and communications, which will also run party's website.
In a statement sent to the SNJ, a spokesman for the BNP said the party had been using space on the industrial estate as an office for the last two years.
"We have had departments or staff working out of our Stroud office for several years now with no fuss, hassle or grief at any time," he said. "We are utilising an existing office unit, refurbishing it and relaunching it as a campaigns and communications hub.
"Stroud is a beautiful location and we are happy with the surrounding area and amenities."
The Say No To The BNP in Stroud meeting is on Wednesday, September 29 at 7.30pm. All are welcome.
Stroud News and Journal
The meeting will be held at The Space in Lansdown and organisers say they want to send out a message that the party is not welcome here.
Speakers will include former MP David Drew and district councillor John Marjoram (Green, Trinity), who has gathered more than 100 signatures on a letter protesting against the decision to open the publicity department at Unit 13 on the Salmon Springs Trading Estate between Stroud and Painswick.
Chris Moore, a member of the Stroud branch of the Socialist Party, who recently co-ordinated the town's Save Our Post Offices campaign, is organising the meeting.
"I was shocked and disgusted to hear the BNP was proposing to set up a national propaganda centre in Stroud," he said. "Maybe the party thinks it can get away with it, thinking Stroud is just a little town. But we have a long history of organising demonstrations and protesting."
British National Party leader Nick Griffin recently sent an email to supporters, which is available on the party's website, announcing details about the new centre for media and communications, which will also run party's website.
In a statement sent to the SNJ, a spokesman for the BNP said the party had been using space on the industrial estate as an office for the last two years.
"We have had departments or staff working out of our Stroud office for several years now with no fuss, hassle or grief at any time," he said. "We are utilising an existing office unit, refurbishing it and relaunching it as a campaigns and communications hub.
"Stroud is a beautiful location and we are happy with the surrounding area and amenities."
The Say No To The BNP in Stroud meeting is on Wednesday, September 29 at 7.30pm. All are welcome.
Stroud News and Journal
September 17, 2010
A waiting game?
Several days on from the BNP "Reform Group" conference, from which much was expected by grass roots Reform supporters, it seems that not much has changed at all.
Following an apparently divine "gala dinner" at a Rotherham hotel, the reformers largely rehashed what they have been rehashing for the better part of four months. Speaker after speaker had little new to say, and even Richard Edmonds, endlessly fiddling with his ubiquitous bits of paper, could only repeat that which has been said a hundred times before - basically that the BNP is bust.
What was conspicuous by its absence was any idea of how the reformers are to move themselves out of the rut in which they have been stuck ever since Eddy Butler meekly accepted his failure in the Griffin-devised and rigged leadership nomination process.
The only real fruit of the reformers' weekend of restatement and repetition to come to light so far is an almost meaningless "Proposed Mission Statement and Objectives" that could be adopted by almost every extreme-right party that ever was. Unfortunately, the reformers are not a political party but a faction within one. The "Proposed Mission Statement and Objectives" has no relevance at all to the struggle in which they are engaged - or allegedly engaged, - which is primarily to topple Nick Griffin.
How this is to be done - if it can be done at all - remains stubbornly opaque. However, if the reformers' accusations of financial wrong-doing at the top of the BNP are true then they cannot seriously expect that Nick Griffin will ever permit any leadership challenge to go ahead if that challenge had even the remotest chance of success. It would either be quashed or effectively deconstitutionalised (to mint a word). Griffin has already mooted the possibility of raising the number of nomination signatures required to 25% of the voting membership.
Quite simply, if there is fraud at the heart of the BNP then its alleged instigator is hardly likely to hand over the accounting books that could see him go to gaol. That will never happen and the reformers must know it.
And if they know it, then the "Proposed Mission Statement and Objectives" take on a very different hue.
They have every appearance of being the founding principles of a new right-wing party, and it is very likely that whichever personalities among the reformers pushed them at the weekend conference intend that this is exactly what they become.
It is known that leading reformer Peter Mullins is among those who believe that the BNP cannot be redeemed and, with its impossible debts, is hardly worth saving. He is clearly sympathetic to the view that a new party is the Reform Group's best and probably only option. How that would sit in the Tyndallite heart of BNP founder member Richard Edmonds, incongruously allied with many who would show him the door tomorrow, is unclear. What is certain is that those of the dominant "moderate" nationalist and minority Tyndallite/hardline strands, no matter how united they may be against Nicholas Griffin, will not for very long enjoy harmony once the object of their antipathy has been removed or left behind.
No matter how often the protestation is made that things are going on "behind the scenes", sooner or later the all too apparent lack of visible and constructive activity will lead to loss of interest, which is evidently beginning to afflict the reformers. To hold a "gala dinner" and a conference at which nothing much at all happened and no real plans were announced was something of a folly, rather like hyping up a sales force and then sending them out into the world without an idea of what it is they are expected to sell.
Is the Reform Group clinging on to the BNP to maximise its numbers when the time comes to break away, or do enough of them remain convinced that a leadership challenge next summer can be mounted successfully? Or are they, as some Griffinites assert, remaining in situ to keep the BNP paralysed over much of the country - which is effectively the case at the moment - for reasons either spiteful or sinister, depending on the level of paranoia afflicting those making the assertion?
Nobody seems any the wiser.
If the Reform Group gives any appearance at all of doing well then the fact that the mainstream BNP is doing so badly probably accounts for it. As we have noted previously, such BNP activity as there is seems to be concentrated in the Griffin-controlled (via Clive Jefferson) north west, and to involve very small numbers of people (often the same people).
The BNP claims that 60 people attended a meeting in Bolton addressed by Nick Griffin on the same day as the Reform Group conference, a dubious figure not supported by video and audio evidence. Later the BNP attempted to pass the meeting off as a quite ordinary branch gathering, failing to mention the feverish 'phone calls, text messages and emails that had gone out in a desperate effort to increase attendance.
And of course there were the derisory 60-ish who, in answer to a national call to arms, turned up outside the High Court to support Griffin, Simon Darby and Tanya Lumby, all allegedly in danger of going to gaol. That turnout alone tells us what a parlous state the BNP is in and how corroded support for Griffin is - but never fear, the badly over-worked BNP excuse machine was soon in action and some members seemed to believe, in all seriousness, that Bob Crow had deliberately timed the London Tube strike to scotch the plans of BNP members who would otherwise have arrived outside the High Court in their thousands to support their beloved leader.
The reformers received a much needed fillip on Thursday when veteran racist and wiggist John Bean, editor of the currently missing Identity magazine, permitted Eddy Butler to publish the contents of a letter sent by Bean to Griffin on August 28th calling upon Griffin to stand down as party leader.
Bean, who only joined the BNP following the overthrow of John Tyndall, is at 83 possibly the longest serving active British fascist still alive. He later clarified his position, saying that Griffin should remain as BNP chairman, but as part of an elected executive committee - an idea rejected as unrealistic by Butler.
Butler is hopeful that Bean's intervention will prove a "real breakthrough", since "I know that other people, who still retain senior positions in the party fully support John’s stance."
Griffin himself has taken no further action against the suspended reformers, who continue to await their tribunals. I am told by a seasoned anti-fascist that Griffin is terribly unsure of those who surround him, and fears that precipitate action will set in train a further breaking of ranks that would prove fatal, especially if Andrew Brons were to be provoked enough to publicly endorse the reformers. Butler, who is on the best of terms with Brons (he is employed by Brons, after all), and who continues to enjoy friendly relations with many apparent Griffin loyalists, may well be playing a waiting game, fairly certain that as funds dry up, debts mount, votes evaporate and patience with the Griffin-Dowson nexus drains away, the last remants of meaningful support for Griffin will crumble, John Bean's letter to Griffin being the first tangible sign that the process is underway.
On Saturday the BNP begins its Griffin devised “Support Our Troops, Bring Our Boys Home” campaign, which, allegedly, the "Establishment" fears. Equally allegedly "90 units" of the BNP will be taking part - note that: not 90 branches or 90 groups (which the BNP no longer has), but 90 conveniently undefined "units". The campaign has less to do with bringing the troops home than it does with giving an illusion of widespread BNP activity to help shore up Griffin's grass roots support. There will be glowing reports, photographs, ridiculous claims of huge public support and large numbers of new members signed up.
Since the BNP made no headway at all using the same theme during the general election it seems almost perverse that Nick Griffin should expend time and precious resources staging a re-run when the stand out issues of the day are those of swingeing government cuts and an attendant looming huge rise in unemployment. Griffin appears determined to miss another obvious political boat.
So, while the Reform half of the BNP does whatever it is the reformers are, or are not doing, the mainstream half intends to waste its time bothering the public with a cock-eyed campaign that has no real purpose beyond that of demonstrating the sterling leadership qualities of Nicholas Griffin to his shrinking band of followers.
Or so he hopes.
Following an apparently divine "gala dinner" at a Rotherham hotel, the reformers largely rehashed what they have been rehashing for the better part of four months. Speaker after speaker had little new to say, and even Richard Edmonds, endlessly fiddling with his ubiquitous bits of paper, could only repeat that which has been said a hundred times before - basically that the BNP is bust.
What was conspicuous by its absence was any idea of how the reformers are to move themselves out of the rut in which they have been stuck ever since Eddy Butler meekly accepted his failure in the Griffin-devised and rigged leadership nomination process.
The only real fruit of the reformers' weekend of restatement and repetition to come to light so far is an almost meaningless "Proposed Mission Statement and Objectives" that could be adopted by almost every extreme-right party that ever was. Unfortunately, the reformers are not a political party but a faction within one. The "Proposed Mission Statement and Objectives" has no relevance at all to the struggle in which they are engaged - or allegedly engaged, - which is primarily to topple Nick Griffin.
How this is to be done - if it can be done at all - remains stubbornly opaque. However, if the reformers' accusations of financial wrong-doing at the top of the BNP are true then they cannot seriously expect that Nick Griffin will ever permit any leadership challenge to go ahead if that challenge had even the remotest chance of success. It would either be quashed or effectively deconstitutionalised (to mint a word). Griffin has already mooted the possibility of raising the number of nomination signatures required to 25% of the voting membership.
Quite simply, if there is fraud at the heart of the BNP then its alleged instigator is hardly likely to hand over the accounting books that could see him go to gaol. That will never happen and the reformers must know it.
And if they know it, then the "Proposed Mission Statement and Objectives" take on a very different hue.
They have every appearance of being the founding principles of a new right-wing party, and it is very likely that whichever personalities among the reformers pushed them at the weekend conference intend that this is exactly what they become.
It is known that leading reformer Peter Mullins is among those who believe that the BNP cannot be redeemed and, with its impossible debts, is hardly worth saving. He is clearly sympathetic to the view that a new party is the Reform Group's best and probably only option. How that would sit in the Tyndallite heart of BNP founder member Richard Edmonds, incongruously allied with many who would show him the door tomorrow, is unclear. What is certain is that those of the dominant "moderate" nationalist and minority Tyndallite/hardline strands, no matter how united they may be against Nicholas Griffin, will not for very long enjoy harmony once the object of their antipathy has been removed or left behind.
No matter how often the protestation is made that things are going on "behind the scenes", sooner or later the all too apparent lack of visible and constructive activity will lead to loss of interest, which is evidently beginning to afflict the reformers. To hold a "gala dinner" and a conference at which nothing much at all happened and no real plans were announced was something of a folly, rather like hyping up a sales force and then sending them out into the world without an idea of what it is they are expected to sell.
Is the Reform Group clinging on to the BNP to maximise its numbers when the time comes to break away, or do enough of them remain convinced that a leadership challenge next summer can be mounted successfully? Or are they, as some Griffinites assert, remaining in situ to keep the BNP paralysed over much of the country - which is effectively the case at the moment - for reasons either spiteful or sinister, depending on the level of paranoia afflicting those making the assertion?
Nobody seems any the wiser.
If the Reform Group gives any appearance at all of doing well then the fact that the mainstream BNP is doing so badly probably accounts for it. As we have noted previously, such BNP activity as there is seems to be concentrated in the Griffin-controlled (via Clive Jefferson) north west, and to involve very small numbers of people (often the same people).
The BNP claims that 60 people attended a meeting in Bolton addressed by Nick Griffin on the same day as the Reform Group conference, a dubious figure not supported by video and audio evidence. Later the BNP attempted to pass the meeting off as a quite ordinary branch gathering, failing to mention the feverish 'phone calls, text messages and emails that had gone out in a desperate effort to increase attendance.
And of course there were the derisory 60-ish who, in answer to a national call to arms, turned up outside the High Court to support Griffin, Simon Darby and Tanya Lumby, all allegedly in danger of going to gaol. That turnout alone tells us what a parlous state the BNP is in and how corroded support for Griffin is - but never fear, the badly over-worked BNP excuse machine was soon in action and some members seemed to believe, in all seriousness, that Bob Crow had deliberately timed the London Tube strike to scotch the plans of BNP members who would otherwise have arrived outside the High Court in their thousands to support their beloved leader.
The reformers received a much needed fillip on Thursday when veteran racist and wiggist John Bean, editor of the currently missing Identity magazine, permitted Eddy Butler to publish the contents of a letter sent by Bean to Griffin on August 28th calling upon Griffin to stand down as party leader.
Bean, who only joined the BNP following the overthrow of John Tyndall, is at 83 possibly the longest serving active British fascist still alive. He later clarified his position, saying that Griffin should remain as BNP chairman, but as part of an elected executive committee - an idea rejected as unrealistic by Butler.
Butler is hopeful that Bean's intervention will prove a "real breakthrough", since "I know that other people, who still retain senior positions in the party fully support John’s stance."
Griffin himself has taken no further action against the suspended reformers, who continue to await their tribunals. I am told by a seasoned anti-fascist that Griffin is terribly unsure of those who surround him, and fears that precipitate action will set in train a further breaking of ranks that would prove fatal, especially if Andrew Brons were to be provoked enough to publicly endorse the reformers. Butler, who is on the best of terms with Brons (he is employed by Brons, after all), and who continues to enjoy friendly relations with many apparent Griffin loyalists, may well be playing a waiting game, fairly certain that as funds dry up, debts mount, votes evaporate and patience with the Griffin-Dowson nexus drains away, the last remants of meaningful support for Griffin will crumble, John Bean's letter to Griffin being the first tangible sign that the process is underway.
On Saturday the BNP begins its Griffin devised “Support Our Troops, Bring Our Boys Home” campaign, which, allegedly, the "Establishment" fears. Equally allegedly "90 units" of the BNP will be taking part - note that: not 90 branches or 90 groups (which the BNP no longer has), but 90 conveniently undefined "units". The campaign has less to do with bringing the troops home than it does with giving an illusion of widespread BNP activity to help shore up Griffin's grass roots support. There will be glowing reports, photographs, ridiculous claims of huge public support and large numbers of new members signed up.
Since the BNP made no headway at all using the same theme during the general election it seems almost perverse that Nick Griffin should expend time and precious resources staging a re-run when the stand out issues of the day are those of swingeing government cuts and an attendant looming huge rise in unemployment. Griffin appears determined to miss another obvious political boat.
So, while the Reform half of the BNP does whatever it is the reformers are, or are not doing, the mainstream half intends to waste its time bothering the public with a cock-eyed campaign that has no real purpose beyond that of demonstrating the sterling leadership qualities of Nicholas Griffin to his shrinking band of followers.
Or so he hopes.
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