Bush Hill Park Q&A scrapped after objections to BNP and Christian candidates

A hustings meeting ahead of a by-election has been axed amid objections to some candidates being invited.

The nine candidates standing for the vacant Enfield Council seat in Bush Hill Park had been invited to a question and answer session next week ahead of the poll. But the Bush Hill Park Residents Association, which was organising the session, has pulled the plug amid fears of protests and political bias.

The British National Party have entered a candidate – London organiser Steve Squire – for the first time in Bush Hill Park, but Labour candidate Ivor Wiggett is understood to have refused to share the platform with him under party policy. Objections were also raised to Christian Party representative Clive Morrison being invited, owing to alleged inflammatory comments made during his bid for the Edmonton Parliamentary seat last year.

Tony Kingsnorth, chairman of the association, said they were worried about the event being beset by protests outside and decided to call it off. The issue has been further complicated as Mr Kingsnorth is a candidate himself, standing as an independent, with vice chairman John Jewson running his campaign. This meant organising the debate would have to fall to other members of the committee, and the association did not want to risk being political by holding the event.

Paul Smith, the Lib Dem candidate, expressed his disappointment at the debate's cancellation on his blog, saying: “To be clear, the Lib Dems will appear at such events regardless of who else is on the platform because we believe that voters are drawn to fringe and extreme parties primarily because the major parties are seen as ignoring them. Get out onto the doorstep, meet these voters at hustings and they are given the voice they want and deserve and they can see how false the arguments from the extremists are.”

The BNP has never contested Bush Hill Park before, but Mr Squire is believed to have entered as a test in Enfield ahead of next year's London Assembly elections to see how the party fares.

Polling day is Thursday, July 28, with the result expected the day after.

Enfield Independent

Archbishop backs Lancaster BNP debate ban

The Archbishop of Canterbury has backed a decision to ban the British National Party (BNP) from a hustings in a Lancaster church

All candidates in the Lancaster and Fleetwood constituency - except the BNP - have been invited to the event at St Thomas's Church on Tuesday. A party spokesman described the snub as an "affront to democracy". But Dr Rowan Williams said the party had often exploited events "to say inflammatory and silly things".

The archbishop said bishops all over the country were writing letters to their congregation urging people to organise such events.

Asked whether he supported the decision to ban the BNP, the archbishop told BBC Radio Lancashire: "Personally, I think if that's the decision I'd be happy to go with it. I find it very difficult to see the BNP as part of a serious political discussion and very often people will exploit the platform to say inflammatory and silly things. So I can understand why people don't want to see the BNP as part of that discussion, as if they were to be taken as seriously as the other parties."

The debate in Lancaster has been arranged by Lancaster Churches Together, an organisation representing a number of Christian denominations. But organisers declined to invited BNP candidate Debra Kent, saying that a church was not the place to allow what they described as "racist views" to be promoted.

Steve Greenhalgh, a spokesman for the BNP, questioned the validity of the debate without his party's candidate.

"I think if you are going to hold a debate you have all the democratically put forward candidates - or none at all," he said. "I would say the church should be really more concerned with the falling numbers of their congregations and not the views of the British National Party. It's pointless challenging it because if you challenge it then you become an extremist, and you become a person who is trying to cause hassle."

Candidates standing in Lancaster and Fleetwood are: Gina Dowding: Green; Clive Grunshaw: Labour; Debra Kent: British National Party; Stuart Langhorn: Liberal Democrat; Fred McGlade: UK Independence Party; Eric Ollerenshaw: Conservative; Keith Riley: Independent.

BBC

Lessons from Wanstead

The excellent and hard-hitting 'Wanstead Matters' leaflet

The British National Party’s decision to fight a Redbridge Council by-election in Wanstead threw a huge rock into the local political pool. John Evans, who is also on the BNP’s list for the European election in London, came a poor fifth out of six candidates, with only 4.9% of the vote. There are important lessons to be learned from the campaign in this east London borough, where the BNP has one councillor.

Two issues caused controversy even among anti-fascists. The first was whether it was right to oppose the BNP’s participation in a local hustings meeting, where the other five candidates would have had to share a platform with the BNP. The second was how tough anti-BNP leaflets should be.

There is a well established principle that goes beyond the anti-fascist movement that decent people do not share platforms or debate with fascists, racists and nazis, whether at universities, during elections or elsewhere. The main reasons are that one cannot debate with people of such abhorrent views, and one cannot have a sensible debate with liars. Most of the democratic parties would not be seen dead with the BNP.

Labour has been largely solid on the issue. The Conservatives have been less certain but in recent years leading Conservatives, including members of the Shadow Cabinet, have taken a firm and very public anti-BNP line. Lib Dem views vary and some people in the Green Party seem to have difficulty making up their minds.

The Churches have taken a more vigorous line against the BNP and thrown them out of hustings held in church buildings. Recently church officers had the BNP removed from church property in Brentwood and the Cathedral grounds in Lichfield.

Three local organisations – the Wanstead Society, Counties Residents’ Association and Counties Neighbourhood Watch – had organised a hustings for the week before polling day. All six candidates were invited.

Searchlight contacted people in the local political parties to establish that they would refuse to share a platform with the BNP. The young Labour candidate, Ross Hatfull, responded quickly by calling for the other candidates to join him in stopping the BNP from taking part.

The Liberal Democrat told us that she was reluctant to share a platform with the BNP, especially after she had personally seen the BNP’s aggressive behaviour while out leafleting, The Conservative candidate stated he was prepared to sit down with the BNP and, perhaps most shockingly, the Green candidate who has been active in local anti-racist politics took the view that he could win any debate against Evans, which is not the point.

Ross’s brave stance caused the hustings to collapse, as the organisers were unwilling to exclude the BNP. Even within the Labour Party opinions were divided. One member I spoke to appeared to be more concerned about finding himself in an embarrassing position when he next attended a Wanstead Society meeting. Others were worried that there might be far-right infiltration in the society.

As all this was going on, BNP activists clashed with a local black resident, who wanted to hand back a BNP leaflet pushed through her door. In front of the resident’s five-year-old son, the BNP leafleter told her to “come to me because I don’t come to niggers” and other racist abuse.

The abusive fascist was arrested and interviewed, but no charges have been brought as the only witnesses were the victim and three BNP members.

Within hours the victim was being abused on BNP and other far-right websites, which also posted a photo and her details. Among other things she was called a benefits cheat, when in fact she works as a nurse at a local maternity unit. The police are back on the case.

The Wanstead and Woodford Guardian reported the attack and published a letter vigorously attacking the BNP bullies. But Chris Carter, the editor of the Ilford Recorder, disgracefully attacked Ross Hatfull and the Labour Party. He also set up an online poll on whether Labour was right to refuse to attend the hustings, apparently unaware of the BNP’s policy of rigging such polls by getting members all over the country to vote.

Carter knows well what a bunch of yobs the BNP are. Last year Councillor Bob Bailey, BNP group leader in Barking and Dagenham, launched a foul-mouthed verbal assault on the Recorder’s news editor. After a phone call, peppered with four-letter words in which Bailey called her a “jobsworth” and a Nazi, he turned up at the newspaper’s offices with a group of party colleagues. After spending 20 minutes shouting abuse through a megaphone, they were moved on by the police.

The other issue is how to pitch anti-BNP leaflets. Local anti-BNP activists distributed a leaflet with a very strong message headed “Don’t vote for scum”, which told the full and unpleasant truth about the BNP. It highlighted a BNP organiser’s statement that there was little point in keeping disabled people alive.

It may go some way to explain why the BNP candidate polled so badly, falling far short of the percentage the BNP would need to gain a London MEP on 4 June.

Evans’s final leaflet, distributed just before polling day, was partly about law and order. Perhaps he should remember the person who encouraged him to join the BNP in the first place, a man with a criminal record for his part in BNP-inspired rioting in the North West a few years ago. It is likely the electorate in London will be hearing more about that in the course of the European election campaign.

The “don’t vote for scum” leaflet can be read here.

Hope not hate

Today's cancelled BNP meetings

Tonight's by-election hustings cancelled

A debate between the candidates in the upcoming Wanstead by-election has been cancelled. The news comes in the wake of the police arresting a British National Party (BNP) canvasser last night for allegedly launching a racist tirade against a black woman.

However the hustings was called off before the news of the attack became public, due to fears that there "might be trouble" if it went ahead.

According to a list of BNP members that was leaked last year, only two people are registered supporters of the party in Wanstead out of a population of over 20,000. But organisers and speakers at the planned debate feared other BNP members from across the country may have turned up at the meeting to "hijack" it.

Tory nominee Alex Wilson said: "It's a great shame it has been cancelled, I was really looking forward to it. But the event has appeared on a number of unsavoury websites and many are worried the meeting could have turned nasty."

Labour candidate Ross Hatfull said: "The party line of the Labour group is not to share a platform with the BNP, but also there are a lot of people concerned there could be trouble if it went ahead."

Liberal Democrat nominee Kate Garrett said: "I think it's quite unfortunate it was cancelled. But if it had gone ahead there was a risk it might go the wrong way and end up being counter-productive."

Hope not hate

BNP meeting cancelled

A meeting of the BNP in Winsford has been cancelled. The controversial political party was due to meet at Winsford United FC tonight, Wednesday, but police confirmed this has now been cancelled.

Club secretary Bob Astles said: "One of our members asked if he could bring a few friends in for a meeting but we didn't know what it was. We are not a political club, we never have been. It's certainly not going ahead."

It is likely the meeting will now be moved to another location.

Winsford Guardian