November 17, 2010

Bolton anti-EDL demo charges dropped

News reaches us that all charges against anti-EDL protestors that were made when the English Defence League invaded Bolton back in March of this year have been dropped.

Rumour has it that ALL outstanding charges against anti-EDL demonstrators have been dropped (though I'm sure our readers will update us on that if necessary) but what is certain is that the ludicrous 'conspiracy to incite violent disorder' charge against UAF's Weyman Bennett and Rhetta Moran has been dumped.

Conspiracy - a catch-all charge much used by the police when they couldn't think of a real charge against animal rights protestors in the past - can carry a substantial jail term if proven. Anti-fascists have argued that the unprecedented use of conspiracy laws was a threat not just to the right to protest against fascism, but could curtail the right to any public protest.

19 comments:

  1. Hope it's not the same lot of pro-EDL Keystone Arrest-Happy cops who will be on-force in Preston.

    What time is the antifash protest in Preston by the way? Don't see much on the net about it.

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  2. 12 noon. More details here: http://uaf.org.uk/2010/11/oppose-the-racist-english-defence-league-in-preston/

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  3. Splendid news! :)

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  4. Cheers for the info re Preston

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  5. As well as a boycott of wetherspoons i think its time we concentrate some energy in contacting the coach companies who are transporting the violent edl scumbags around the country.

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  6. News reaches us that all charges against anti-EDL protestors that were made when the English Defence League invaded Bolton back in March of this year have been dropped

    Now theres a surprise NOT. How much do you get paid now to protest. The going rate was £25 when my mate use to do it.

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  7. PETERBOROUGH SHOPKEEPERS FEAR EDL MARCH: -

    http://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/news/local/peterborough_shopkeepers_on_edl_route_fear_for_march_1_1637723

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  8. 'How much do you get paid now to protest. The going rate was £25 when my mate use to do it.'

    It's £500 a day now, with lunch and petrol on top.

    Idiot.

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  9. The EDL really do have shit for brains.

    Why else could someone of sane mind join them?

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  10. Britain: The far right’s strategic failures leave anti-migrant feeling untapped

    By James Boxell, Financial Times, Tuesday 16th November 2010

    http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/fd54377c-f104-11df-bb17-00144feab49a.html#ixzz15XBoGt9v

    Before the 2009 European parliamentary elections, the head of the far-right British National party acknowledged that the UK public would never accept “jackboots marching down Whitehall”, writesJames Boxell.

    In a pub garden in Birkenhead, a blighted post-industrial suburb in England’s north-west, Nick Griffin told the Financial Times that his party had a “once in a lifetime” chance to escape its white supremacist roots and emerge as an alternative for millions scorned by the London elite.

    Less than 18 months later – following this year’s disastrous national election campaign, a savage internal power struggle and a court battle with the country’s equality watchdog that threatens to bankrupt the party – his dream is over.

    The failure is largely of Mr Griffin’s making. The Cambridge-educated son of a Tory councillor believed he had the intellect and electoral savvy to transform the BNP’s image. But his performances – notably on the BBC current affairs programme Question Time last year – bolstered the impression of an extremist unable to give up links with the Ku Klux Klan.

    Strategic errors, such as concentrating much of the party’s firepower on the all but unwinnable seat of Barking in England’s south-east and taking on the equality watchdog rather than allowing non-whites to join the party, compounded the crisis.

    Some observers ascribe the BNP’s failure to a UK strain of anti-extremism harking back to the second world war fight against fascism. But James Bethell of Nothing British, a group campaigning against the BNP, says a large section of society still feels its fears on immigration and Islam are being ignored. “These are people left behind by globalisation,” he says. “They don’t understand the country any more. All the things they love and champion have been vilified.”

    The BNP won about 1m votes in last year’s European vote. If you add this to 2.5m votes for the europhobic UK Independence party, it means British populists won more than a fifth of the European election votes.

    Even allowing for the fact that voters often use such elections to protest, that is still a big group. Should Ukip decide to branch out from its heartlands in the Conservative shires to pursue an explicit anti-immigration agenda, that rump of discontent may yet be exploited.

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  11. I've just seen this on the far-right Democracy Forum written by that horrible woman Sharon Ebanks, it sounds interesting?

    "All were due in court on November 29th and my very reliable source has just confirmed that Griffin has withdrawn and will now face costs in the High Court in Newcastle on the 29th instead. Those costs are currently estimated at between £56,000 and £85,000 and that is surely the final nail in the BNP coffin..."

    http://www.democracyforum.co.uk/bnp/84323-griffin-bottles.html

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  12. "Now theres a surprise NOT." A fine example of far right english. It is great to see the fash are looking in and being affected by the truths we speak. Well done LU.

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  13. The Preston NE Online football fans forum has recently been contaminated by EDL nazis posting fake support from fake Preston fans.

    http://www.pne-online.net/forum/showthread.php?57858-EDL-March-in-Preston-27th-November/page7

    Football forums should be banned for they are easily perverted by m*therf*cking racists

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  14. Fuck The EDL to Hell!!!!!!

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  15. Most British people will reject the hate politics of the BNP/EDL, thank goodness.

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  16. Fascist thugs on the EDL forum tonight were boasting about England thugs beating up Irish republicans in 1995: -

    http://s1.zetaboards.com/EDL_The_Forum/topic/3939305/1/

    The EDL loathe Catholics as much as Muslims.

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  17. From Corporate Watch,

    Coach companies providing services to EDL November 10, 2010

    home >> LATEST NEWS >> Coach companies providing services to EDL

    The (we're not fascists, honest guv!) English Defence League (EDL) descended on Leicester on 10th October, 2010, for a day of racist taunts and attacks on anti-fascists and Asian residents of the town. Despite a rout in Bradford in August, the EDL were out in force and a crowd of over a thousand soon proceeded to hurl beer cans, rocks and fireworks at police and counter-demonstrators.

    The EDL are a new strain of re-branded fascism. Portraying themselves through their glitzy new website as a single-issue campaign against 'Islamic extremism', they are, in fact, a campaign dedicated to injecting racist street violence back into the forefront of the fascist movement.

    The police saw the demo as a significant threat, banning all marches in Leicester and bringing out in excess of 2,000 police who, nevertheless, failed to contain the fascist demonstrators. A group of EDL broke out of the police kettle, damaged an international centre and clashed with locals.

    As usual, the EDL used a range of private coach companies to ferry them in for a day of racist violence. New names caught by Corporate Watch this time include Marshalls, Confidence's Coaches and Ribble Valley Coaches. As the EDL were leaving town several fascists were videoed jumping off a Marshalls coach to attack counter-demonstrators (see here).

    Last month, Ausden Clark, the official coach company for Leicester City football club, confirmed that they would no longer provide services to the EDL after Corporate Watch revealed they had transported EDL fanatics to Bradford (see here).

    Confidence Bus & Coach Hire Ltd
    30 Spalding Street
    Leicester LE5 4PH.
    Tel: (0116) 2762171
    Email: confidencebus@btclick.com
    www.confidencebus.co.uk

    Ribble Valley Coaches
    Slaters Farm
    Whittingham Lane
    Preston, PR3 2JJ
    Tel: (01772) 865575
    Fax: (01772) 865242

    Marshalls Coaches
    Firbank Way
    Leighton Buzzard
    Bedfordshire, LU7 4YP
    Tel: (01525) 376077
    www.marshalls-coaches.co.uk

    Andrews of Tideswell
    Anchor Garage
    Tideswell, Buxton,
    Derbyshire, SK17 8RB
    www.andrews-of-tideswell.co.uk
    Andrews is a member of Coach Tourism Council and the Confederation of
    Passenger Transport (CPT).

    Airshuttle
    The Old Foundry, Tat Bank Road
    Oldbury, West Midlands B69 4NB
    www.airshuttlecoaches.co.uk
    Airshuttle is a member of the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB).

    Watersons
    21 Market Street, Hemsworth
    Pontefract, West Yorkshire WF9 4JY
    and
    1 Station Lane, Featherstone,
    West Yorkshire, WF7 5BE
    and
    68 Highfield Road, Hemsworth, Pontefract
    West Yorkshire WF9 4EA
    www.watersonholidays.co.uk

    Johnsons coaches have been seen providing transport for
    the EDL at several other events:
    Johnsons Coaches, Liveridge House
    Liveridge Hill, Henley in Arden
    Warwickshire, West Mids, B95 5QS.

    http://www.corporatewatch.org.uk/?lid=3833

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  18. There has been recent fascist activity in St Helens where the EDL have been leafleting shoppers.

    Is there no anti-fascists in ST Helens to stop them?

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  19. The EDL loathe Catholics as much as Muslims.

    True. During the Pope's recent visit there were EDL'ers stating that Catholicism is "The European Version of Islam".

    (Obviously these morons don't care or know that their beloved Crusades were lauched by Pope Urban II and the EDL's crusader cross is a Catholic symbol).

    And to think their are 2nd and 3rd generation Irish in the EDL!

    EDL leaders Kevin Carroll and Steve Lennon probably have Irish roots going back not too far.

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