BNP - the disastrous war of the roses

A ferocious "war of the roses" over the leadership of the far-right British National Party has left it badly split and potentially mortally wounded.

Nick Griffin squeaked home by just nine votes in this week's national ballot of party members to retain the chairmanship he has held since 1999.

Griffin, who sits as Member of the European Parliament for the North West region, faced a strong challenge from the other side of the Pennines.

His only rival in the contest was the party's other MEP - Yorkshire and the Humber's Andrew Brons.

"Probably, this was the worst mandate the Chairman could win," Brons wrote to his supporters on his BNP Ideas website shortly after the result was announced.

"In effect, the party is split from head to toe and there remain grave questions of doubt over the fitness of many existing officers of the party to exercise control over its operations."

It is a far cry from the high point of the 2009 European Parliamentary elections when Griffin and Brons shocked the political establishment by mustering enough popular support to take the party's first seats in a UK national election.

Their European seats were both won by the narrowest of margins, but it raised expectations that the self-proclaimed defenders of the "British indigenous population" could be on the verge of further breakthroughs.

Griffin defiant

Instead, Griffin's disastrous appearance on the BBC's Question Time a few months later and an embarrassing result in the 2010 general election has led to vicious infighting which could yet see the BNP implode.

In his own statement issued shortly after the election Nick Griffin said: "The time for division and disruption is over; now is the time to heal. Now is the time to move on. Now is the time to get back to work.

"We have a party to build and a nation to save. Let us go forward together!"

Griffin's rallying call might be too late.

In an online video election webcast recorded at the start of the campaign, Andrew Brons said members and activists had been voting with their feet for at least and year and leaving the party.

'Civil war'

At one stage he claimed a third of the membership and two thirds of its activists had left because of what he called Griffin's "unnecessary civil war" to stifle opposition.

The BNP has always been cagey about its total membership but this election for its national leader reveals just how small it has become. The number of ballot papers returned was just 2,316.

In fact, across every council in Yorkshire, the party could muster just 50 candidates at the 2011 elections earlier this year. Not a single one mustered enough votes to become a councillor.

The nightmare is not over for Nick Griffin or the BNP.

In his latest blog "Reply to Dissatisfied Supporters" Andrew Brons issues a clear warning: "If the leadership wants peace, he can have peace and we can get on with work that will contribute towards our substantive aims.

"If on the other hand if he were to choose war, he would meet an equal and opposite force."

BBC News

BNP gets ready to rumble

The gloves are well and truly off in the BNP’s leadership election battle.

The two heavyweights of British fascism, the MEPs’ Nick Griffin in the right corner and Andrew Brons also from the ultra right corner, have come out punching at each other and their corners are pretty feisty too.

On their mirrored BNP website, challenger Brons’s team has described the proposed amendments to the British National Party’s constitution as proposed by the Griffin corner as “a shocking and gross perversion”. For the first time in his charmed life as a BNP leader, Griffin knows he is well and truly up against a heavyweight challenger with the pedigree to deliver some quite cutting blows against his rocky leadership.

Having been involved in Nazi politics since the 1960’s, unlike Griffin’s predecessor John Tyndall who founded the BNP, Brons has managed to not be photographed wearing Nazi uniforms, so this time old Nick is up against a suited and presentable former politics lecturer who managed to put Griffin on his backside more than once when they last went head to head in the 1980’s when they were in the NF, and Brons grew tired of Griffin’s antics then too.

This contest appears to have finally brought the BNP to life. After a good couple of years of diminishing resources and returns for all of the begging letters and smears that Griffin and his team have invested in, Brons is somewhat of an ogre of considerable intellect in comparison to Griffin. With Brons is one Arthur Kemp, a south African who once worked for the South African security services there and another former trusted ally of Griffin.

Kemp points out that “the amendments which have now been distributed to members are NOT the proposals which were submitted online”.

The challengers to Griffin’s twelve years of rule have been calling for a totally new constitution, while Griffin is accused of trying to amend the constitution to ensure him five more years in power, which would take him up to a respectable early retirement age. Elections are currently fought and won by Griffin by virtue of an almost impossible list of hurdles set for challengers and their supporters to be able to even vote. Members at first agreed to these bizarre terms when it was suggested as a good way to stop black and ethnic minority members launching a coup against the party. Having suggested an entirely new constitution, Kemp has due reason to be bitter; the former web editor and ideological guru drafted the new constitution that was approved at a previous conference but never implemented. Now Griffin has called an EGM to make amendments to the old constitution further ensuring his tenure until such a time it seems likely, that his daughter can take over the role as party leader.

At the wedding of a Liverpool BNP sycophant recently, Griffin held court this very idea, convinced that it was what the vast majority of party members wanted.

But Brons is fighting back. In his corner are a weighty load of BNP members and former members, who have been expelled or suspended for not endorsing the idea that Griffin is God like and brilliant.

It looks like this going to rumble on for quite a while until the magical date of June 26th when I hope to be able to bring you an up to date blow by blow account of what is happening inside the BNP’s EGM when all of those still standing, will get to slug it out for the future of the BNP.

As I’m not an independent referee over this fight, I’m firmly in the Griffin corner. After a shaky start, his service to antifascism over the last two years have been commendable.

Thanks to Nick Lowles at HOPE not Hate / Searchlight

Breaking News-Game on!

Griffin and Brons: No longer singing from the same hymn sheet

News just in- BNP MEP Andrew Brons, another former chair of the NF like Griffin, has decided he will stand against Nick Griffin for the leadership of the party.

This could be a major setback for Griffin. Although Brons has little chance of winning (due to the way the party's electoral processes have been stitched up), the BNP's lie and smear machine that it unleashes against dissenters will struggle against the popular Yorks and Humberside MEP.

Brons's supporters have already clashed with Griffin after Griffin turned on Brons during a Q&A session held for BNP members at the European parliament.

Brons and Griffin fell out previously in the 80's for control of the National Front. It seems history has a habit of repeating itself.

Nick Lowles at Hope not hate

Incompetents reign as BNP staggers into the new year

An influential far-right activist has called for union between the UK Independence Party and British National Party in an attempt to whitewash the BNP’s racism and nazi past by hiding behind its larger, anti-EU rival.

Eddy Butler, who was expelled from the BNP after trying to challenge Nick Griffin to a leadership election last summer but remains an important figure on the extreme right, said in a message for the new year that a party that united the UKIP, BNP and the various smaller groups “on the patriotic, nationalistic, ‘right-wing’, populist, non-politically correct, identity-related side of the spectrum” would “have over 30,000 members” and “instantly be a major force in British politics”.

He recognises, however, that “it would take compromise” and “putting aside preconceived ideas about each other” – a reference to the BNP’s violence and extremism and the image of the UKIP as “Tory types” – and that “jealous personalities”, the biggest of whom is Griffin, will not let it happen.

Butler believes such a union would benefit the UKIP as it “would give them relevance” between European elections. For the BNP “it would provide respectability and distance form a more violent and hard-line past”.

According to Butler only a “tiny minority” in the UKIP “hate everything to do with the BNP”. However a spokesman for the UKIP told Searchlight “[Unity] is not going to happen. We reject the whole concept completely out of hand”.

The BNP meanwhile continues to demonstrate its incompetence and dictatorial nature. When Butler appealed against his expulsion, which he considers was “irregular” under the terms of the party constitution, he was told an appeal tribunal would be arranged for January.

This has now been denied. Knowing that Butler probably had a strong case, Andy McBride, the BNP’s South East regional organiser, decided that Butler was not entitled to a tribunal because he was only a “probationary member” with less than two years’ membership, despite the party’s earlier acceptance that he had the required five years’ continuous membership to stand for the leadership!

The basis for the decision by McBride, whom Butler describes as “ineffective and semi-literate” – so no different from most other party officers – is that Butler was 18 days late in renewing his membership in 2009. However he retained the same membership number and renewal date.

Griffin law

“I can recall a time in history, in another country, during the last days of a (ahem) controversial regime, when all sorts of decrees were sent forth from ‘ze bunker’ pronouncing severe punishments on those who were deemed to have transgressed”, wrote Butler. “The last twitches of a dying organism.”

Commenting on the way Griffin and the BNP keep changing the rules to suit themselves, Butler continued: I think Mr McBride believes in Griffin Law – that parallel legal system, a bit like Sharia Law. It would seem that I am to be further punished by ‘political admin’ (as opposed to a Sharia court).”

Mark Walker, described as the BNP’s political administration officer, clearly comes from the same stable. Responding to a letter of resignation from the party from Chris Francis, Walker wrote: “Clearly you have very negative feelings towards the Party and our membership and this would, in any case, likely have resulted in actions leading to disciplinary proceedings. Best to jump before you were pushed.”

Francis had done no more than express the widespread view that the party is “a cult dedicated to Nick Griffin … The BNP has lost very many decent people over the last couple of years and there are very few decent people left in the party now. The party is now festering with **** & yes men and I for one am glad to be gone,” he added.

Another demoralised former activist is Roy Jones, who was the party’s North East Scotland organiser until he resigned last month over “King Nick and his rotten corrupt regime”. Among his complaints are Griffin’s waste of hundreds of thousands of pounds in dragging the party through the courts and the party’s inability to conduct a leadership action “without resorting to hatefull [sic] smear campaings [sic] against the challenger (Eddy Butler) and suspending /expelling anyone who supported a challenge (myself included)”.

Jones claims that the BNP in Scotland “has been wrecked by the Sycophantic Mentally unstable liar” Gary Raikes, the party’s Scotland regional organiser. Like Butler, Jones points out that the party has still not produced its 2009 accounts, which were due six months ago. On 31 December Griffin wrote on Twitter: “Just finished my report to go with 2009 accounts which auditor says are now virtually ready”.

As Butler commented: “This person is congratulating himself on almost having the 2009 accounts ready when they should have been handed in before 7th July”. If the national and regional accounts are submitted after 7 January 2011, the party will be liable to £2,500 in fines. The record delay follows several declarations by Griffin and the party’s succession of treasurers that all the party’s financial functions were being run in a professional way with the sort of controls one would find in a multinational company.

Griffin’s statement contrasts with Butler’s revelation that the party’s independent auditors, Silver and Co, were still trying to verify with branch treasurers that the bank and cash balances in their local records were the same as the figures provided by the regional treasurer. Butler claims “they are massively out” and local treasurers are refusing to confirm the figures.

Staff not paid

The accounts are unlikely to reveal the full extent of the BNP’s current dire financial straits as much of Griffin’s reckless spending on legal actions and employment tribunals has occurred since 31 December 2009. The BNP is reported to have closed most of its offices and not paid party staff for two months, apart from Patrick Harrington, Griffin’s comrade from his National Front political soldier days, who now works for the party while still heading a rival group.

Life members are calling for a refund as they did not receive their four free copies of the party’s Identity magazine, which it cannot afford to print. A bequest of £65,000 received in September in the will of a supporter who appeared to have no family and friends probably went straight to lawyers to cover the BNP’s huge legal bills. Unfortunately a further £109,000 was due to follow from the same source.

Last month the Electoral Commission pronounced the BNP guilty of breaching electoral legislation by “failing to keep accounting records sufficient to explain, with reasonable accuracy, the financial position of the party at the time”. The verdict followed a long investigation into the party’s 2008 accounts. However the BNP will suffer no penalty as the legislation, which has since been amended, did not allow for anything less than criminal proceedings against the treasurer at the time, who no longer holds the post.

Butler is calling for members not to fund Griffin by renewing, a turnaround from his previous position. Griffin is clearly feeling the pinch. At the party’s annual conference in December he admitted that the party had made mistakes and lost members. He appealed for them to return, claiming the party had moved on. Where the party has moved was revealed in Griffin’s speech at a dinner on the eve of the conference, in which he called for “increased militancy” against Islam. In attempt to revitalise the beleaguered party he promised it would “start acting as well as talking about protecting Britain”. The party is currently targeting a mosque planned for Bletchley.

The just over 100 people at the conference were also the first to see the BNP’s new logo, a heart-shaped cut-out from the Union flag. “This logo will illustrate exactly what this party is about,” said Griffin, incongruously describing it later as a “combination of innocence and love”. Others pointed out the similarities with a Conservative party emblem and Searchlight dubbed it the “broken heart”.

Some party members felt it was too soft and conflicted with Griffin’s call for street militancy. Griffin’s replied that the party still wanted to win elections and needed an image that would not “frighten the horses”.

© Searchlight Magazine 2011

Barnbrook announces a new leadership challenge.

No, not Little Dicky, the other one.

The BNP's very own super dooper sleazebuster Michael Barnbrook has announced his intention to run for the BNP leadership next year in this statement published on another forum:-

Leadership Challenge

I am very concerned at all this talk of starting up a new political party. It will not work. Eddy Butler would be the first person to tell you that. The British National Party is a brand name and with the right leader, who knows what might happen. There are hundreds of thousands of voters out there who would vote for the British National Party if it had a leader who carried no baggage. In just over one year I will be able to put myself forward as a leadership challenger. I carry no baggage and with the support of commited nationalists such as Nick Cass and Eddy Butler I am prepared to put myself forward as a leadership challenger. I urge you all to hang on in there. I am no spring chicken but totally committed saving the British National Party.

Michael Barnbrook
BNP Sleazebuster


Now my first impressions of the statement are that he isn't aware of the BNP's current rules about their leadership challenges as "In just over one year I will be able to put myself forward as a leadership challenger" really means he won't be able to challenge Griffin until the summer of 2012. Unless of cause it's a cock up on his part and that really won't inspire confidence in his campaign.
After looking closely at how Eddy Butler has operated in his leadership challenge over these last few months there is no way that post went anywhere near Butler unless he was pissed up in a brothel.

BNP expels Richard Barnbrook as bitter feud threatens to tear apart party

Richard Barnbrook, one of the British National party's most senior figures, has been expelled as part of an increasingly bitter feud threatening to engulf the far-right organisation.

The London Assembly member, who was one of a group of rebels who tried to wrest control of the BNP from party leader Nick Griffin last month, was informed via an internal memo this week that he was no longer a party member.

"Sadly we have concluded that we are left with no alternative but to expel Richard Barnbrook from membership of the British National party," it reads. "I have written to him informing him that I have taken that action today and he is no longer a member of our party."

Barnbrook, who was the party's sole representative on the London Assembly, is one of the BNP's most high-profile officials and his expulsion comes as the party faces a growing political and financial crisis.

Since its poor showing in May's general and council elections, several senior figures have come out against Griffin, at least three local councillors have resigned the party whip and many key activists have been suspended.

The prospect of a permanent split has been heightened by the party's dire financial plight and the formation of a new faction – the BNP reform group – which is openly discussing forming a new party.

"Even by its own vicious standards this has been a bloody episode for the BNP," said Nick Lowles from anti-racist organisation Searchlight. "The relentless infighting has done serious damage to Griffin and the party's organisational ability."

Griffin's opponents have rallied around another leadership challenger, Eddie Butler, who has run the BNP's election machine in recent years. Their anger is focused on Griffin's leadership style and concern about the party's debts.

"You may think I should have little reason to have sympathy for Richard Barnbrook's plight," Butler wrote on his blog this week. "But I can see that they used and abused him … watch and observe. This is the way Nick Griffin's British National party treats its members."

Concern about the BNP's finances has been exacerbated by news that the Electoral Commission is investigating the party's 2008 accounts and that its 2009 accounts are already late. The BNP faces further legal action from the Equality and Human Rights Commission over allegations that it has failed to remove potentially racist clauses from its constitution. Lawyers say the case, due to go before the courts again in November, could see Griffin landed with a fine or even imprisonment for contempt of court.

The BNP refused to comment on reports that the party is more than £500,000 in debt or to confirm how many members had been suspended or had resigned. But Griffin has sent members increasingly desperate appeals for donations to "keep the wolves at bay and to ensure our survival". In one email he admitted that the party was "cash-struck" and needed money to fight the case being brought by the EHRC. "Be clear on this, if you don't give, we can't fight … and if we don't fight we will be shut down and killed off."

Griffin's position has been under attack since the party's poor showing in May's general election when it saw a small increase in its vote but failed to make its promised breakthrough. It also performed badly in the council elections where all but two of its 28 sitting councillors standing for re-election were beaten and it was wiped out in its east London stronghold of Barking and Dagenham. However, last month he managed to see off a leadership challenge when Barnbrook and Eddie Butler both failed to secure enough support to trigger a leadership ballot.

Barnbrook, who lost his Barking and Dagenham council seat earlier this year, resigned the party whip last month calling for an investigation into allegations of wrongdoing by party officials, although he remained a member of the party.

The memo from Clive Jefferson, the BNP's national organiser, said Barnbrook had had time to understand that his actions were "disloyal and unacceptable"

Barnbrook said yesterday that he would launch an appeal against his expulsion and that he would remain an assembly member as an independent.

The Guardian

A Special Offer from Lancaster Unity

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BNP leadership challenge fails

Eddy Butler has failed to obtain enough nominations to challenge Nick Griffin for the leadership of the British National Party this year. After several weeks of campaigning he says he collected 500 signatures from activists and officers around the country on his own forms, which the party does not recognise. He would have needed the support of 840 party members of at least two years’ standing.

Butler says he will not take legal action against the BNP over the unconstitutional rules that Griffin imposed for the challenge because “it would be very costly for us and for the party”. Butler is no doubt influenced by the fact that the BNP is insolvent and already has many unpaid legal bills, so even if he won he would be unable to recover his costs.

Urging his supporters to stay in the BNP, Butler writes: “Rather than get embroiled in legal action we will continue our battle to save our party from destruction at Griffin’s hands through other means”. He also hopes that his supporters will stay in their party positions if they can square it with their conscience.

Butler says that the requirement to obtain the support of 20% of long-standing members was “an impossibly high total”, which is why Griffin imposed it. He also claims that many members did not receive their nomination forms because the BNP’s membership database is “incompetently run” and that Griffin’s action in persuading two “stooges” to stand for the leadership as well complicated matters.

Griffin also used “political intimidation” by suspending many supporters of Butler. For that reason he has not handed in his forms as he does “not wish to compromise anyone”.

On the official forms, which members had to complete and send individually to the party’s official scrutineer, Andrew Brons MEP, Butler only obtained 214 signatures. The stooge candidates, Richard Barnbrook and Derek Adams, got 23 and four signatures respectively, while 971 people ticked the box indicating that they were satisfied with Griffin’s leadership.

The failure is testament to the fact that most BNP members do not go to party meetings or follow the various blogs that have exposed the gross mismanagement in the party and the way in which Griffin and his consiglieri, Jim Dowson, are using it as a cash generating machine for themselves. Griffin’s main interest now is in securing re-election to the European Parliament in 2014 so that he qualifies for a pension when he eventually leaves office.

Whether Griffin will allow any Butler supporters to remain in official party positions is unclear at this stage; likewise whether Butler’s supporters will want to stay in a party in which Griffin and Dowson are now even stronger than before.

Many activists, though not the bulk of the ordinary members, are now well aware that Dowson owns the BNP, that the party is insolvent and has been managed incompetently, and that Griffin never hesitates to lie blatantly to preserve his position. Many have already said that if Butler’s challenge fails they will leave, though most are undecided whether to join one of the tiny opponents of the BNP on the far right or to form a new party. Neither option is attractive for them.

Lee Barnes, the BNP’s former legal officer who resigned yesterday, can be expected to reveal more about what has been going on in the BNP, now that he has seen the truth about Dowson, whom he has described as the “Gollum” of the BNP and Griffin’s “cut price Rasputin”.

Most recently Barnes has described Arthur Kemp’s March of the Titans, a huge tome much praised by Griffin’s BNP, as “a regurgitated sub-SS handbook” and its author as a “Rhodesian Nazi terrorist” who “hates everyone and everything and believes everyone on the planet is below him”. According to Barnes, Kemp was known in the party as Napoleon. We look forward to further insights such as these.

Searchlight / HOPE not Hate by Sonia Gable

A damp squib.

After everything that has gone on over the last few months the nomination process for the BNP leadership is over with the official result thus:-

Griffin 971
Butler 214
Barnbrook 23
Adams 4
Spoilt 7

On his blog Butler goes on to say that he received over 500 nominations on his own forms and he is ruling out legal action.
On the face of it this is a much worse result than figures hilariously leaked to the Green Arrow mob last night. 1219 members voted which is about 29% of the eligible members and Butler received about 17%.

The Patented Lancaster Unity All-Purpose Post-Nomination Analysis

(Delete Where Applicable)

So the Nominations are (a) in (b) lost (c) in a shredder somewhere, and it has been announced that (a) Nick Griffin will continue unopposed as Party Leader (b) Eddy Butler will be allowed to challenge for the Party Leadership (c) Richard Barnbrook will be allowed to challenge for the Party Leadership (d) Someone Who's Name Escapes Me At Present will be allowed to challenge for the Party Leadership.

Following his (a) successful (b) unsuccessful bid to make the ballot, Eddy Butler will be (a) celebrating with a fancy new haircut and a bottle of vintage Lambrini (b) thrown out of the Party with immediate effect, stricken entirely from Party History and burned in effigy each year as a stark warning to others.

Mr Griffin, meanwhile, will (a) prepare to launch an election campaign of such vituperative ferocity and inherent putrescence as to make the latter days of the Borgia Popes resemble a group of Quakers deciding Who's Going to Make Us All a Lovely Pot of Tea at the Friends' Meeting House (b) celebrate by asking his Members for an Especially Big Donation by way of giving thanks for his deliverance.

(Note: If Richard Barnbrook has been (a) successful (b) unsuccessful, he is likely to (a) celebrate with a drink or two (b) celebrate with a drink or two.)

As the BNP Membership prepare themselves for (a) their historic Leadership Election (b) another round of desperate appeals, (a) Party Staff (b) Griffin's Family at (a) HQ (b) Welshpool will be preparing for the forthcoming activities by (a) becoming acquainted with every aspect of electoral law (b) re-reading Machiavelli's “The Prince” (Ladybird edition) (c) wondering if four days is a long enough interval between Appeals For Donations.

Whether or not there is to be a Leadership Election, of one thing we can, at least, be certain: That Griffin will (a) accept the result with good grace (and launch a new wave of Urgent Appeals for Donations) (b) fight the dirtiest campaign since the days of Tammany Hall and quickly come to resemble a one-eyed rottweiller crossed with a poison-throwing machine (before launching a new wave of Urgent Appeals for Donations) (c) go on holiday (and launch a new wave of Urgent Appeals for Donations).

Of one thing, we can be sure. The BNP, as an effective political force for the Far-Right, are (a) doomed (b) doomed (c) doomed.

Breakfast of the Long Knives

“Someone must have been spreading lies about Josef K., for without having done anything wrong he was arrested one morning.”

Oh dear. Things continue to look bad for the Band of Brothers. This morning, the latest round of suspensions began, with Clive “Beria” Jefferson's latest legally dubious letter landing on the doormats of various BNP Members.

Names mentioned so far include Chris Roberts (London Organiser), Rowena Savage (Bromley Organiser), Bob Gertner (London elections officer), John Savage (South West fundholder), Julian Leppert and the fragrant Charlotte “I wish that Derrick Bird could have come down to London & shot dead some illegal immigrants” Lewis, along with “at least 20 others”.

Interestingly, all of those suspended are well-known activists and organisers, rather than Rank-and-File Members (or “plebs” as they're allegedly referred to by the Party Leadership).

Oh, and they share one other thing in common: It's the strangest coincidence, but they're all supporting Eddy Butler in the Leadership Contest!

Given that the letter and the resulting suspensions seem not only to run counter to natural law, but even the BNP's own ramshackle Constitution, it can surely only be a matter of time before someone decides to challenge the Kafkaesque goings-on at Head Office.

Although, the way things are going, the Party will have shut up shop and gone out of business long before it ever gets to court.

The Story is Developing...

A most uncivil war.

The last three months since the General Election have been a fascinating insight into how the BNP functions and it seems like each day since then there has been a major cock up, calamity or act committed under the BNPs and Griffins "interesting" idea of internal democracy.

Todays latest news is that Julian Leppert (former councillor), John Savage (S.W. Fundholder) and Chris Roberts (London Organiser) are amongst about 20 BNP activists at the latest count suspended today. They are being investigated for "serious breaches of the BNP code of conduct" after supporting Eddy Butlers leadership nomination.

With the nominations for leadership closing tomorrow one has to ask if Griffin is so worried about Butler getting close to the amount that he needs, is he purging the people who are Butlers most vocal supporters that can be identified from the various websites and fora?

The timing of the letters is a bit of a surprise with it being the day before the nominations close unless of course this is a total cock up by Griffin & Dowson enterprises and they should have arrived tomorrow.

Edit
This is the full list of the various suspensions including the members suspended over the last few weeks:-
Bob Gertner (London)
Charlotte Lewis (London)
Rowena Savage (London)
John Savage (South West)
Charlie Baillie (Scotland)
Simon Bennett (South West)
Mark Collett - expelled (Yorkshire)
Max Dunbar – resigned (Scotland)
Andrew Emerson (South East)
James Fitton (South West)
Robert Lassen – expelled (West Midlands))
Peter Lucas (South West)
Peter Mullins (South West)
Frank O’Brian - expelled (West Midlands)
Peter Phillips (South East)
Peter Squire (North West)
Peter Stafford (North West)
Richard Trower (South East)
Anthony Ward (North West)
Jeffrey Marshall (London)
Christine Mitchell (Eastern)
Simon Deacon – resigned (Eastern)
Chris Roberts (London)
Bob Gertner (London)
John Savage (South West)
Carl Whelpdale (North East)
Roy Jones (Scotland)
Shelley Rose (Eastern)
Julian Leppert (Eastern)
Lawrence Rustem (London)
Tony Avery (London)
Dennis Boater

Democracy's Great Pageant: BNP Nominations About to close in the Great Free & Fair Leadership Contest.

As the deadline for the close of nominations in the BNP's Leadership Challenge draws near, I thought it may be helpful – for the benefit of any passing trolls – to give a quick run-down of the pro's and cons of your various contenders.

Nick Griffin

Con:
Past Baggage: Holocaust denial, a history of making inflammatory, racist statements and the small matter of once having made a speech in which he outlines how the BNP are just going to “pretend” to not be racist bigots, but they are really. No matter how Griffin tries to squirm his way out of this one, it'll always be there, both in print and on video. This alone should bar the man from ever gaining the public trust. In much the same way as my once collecting every album recorded by Donovan should automatically wreck my own chances of ever running for public office.

A Divisive, Dictatorial Party Leader: No leader of a modern political party has ever run his or her outfit in the way Griffin conducts his. Concentrating all power to his own diktat and sacking, suspending and excluding perceived opponents at will, Griffin has alienated so many people in his Party that the result was inevitable.

Choice of Friends: Jim Dowson, Clive Jefferson and Arthur Kemp. Not exactly the Bloomsbury Set of politics.

No Grasp of Media Presentation: From the downright idiocy of the Marmite episode to his bizarre appearance on Question Time – an hour spent wriggling, giggling, propounding his bizarre racial theories and generally demonstrating the kind of incisive grasp of human history we haven't seen since the days of Eric Von Daniken – Griffin may see himself (and be admired by his followers) as a seasoned old TV pro', but to the rest of the Nation he's got all the charisma, presence and easygoing charm of Peter Sutcliffe guest-presenting Loose Women.

Financial Dealings and Allegations of Nepotism: Look. There might be a perfectly innocent explanation for all of the allegations. It could be that everything Griffin and Dowson do is open, honest and above board. It could be. No, it really could. Honest.

Pro:
Owns a suit.

Richard Barnbrook

Con:
Owns a suit. Several suits. All the same. Assuming he's trying for a Martin Bell, Man-In-The-White-Suit-Saviour-Of-British-Politics shtick, the choice of a muddy beige is unfortunate, in that it merely comes across as second-division. It's like Superman couldn't be bothered one day and decided to wear trackies and a polo shirt instead.

An Obvious Spoiler Candidate.

Loose Cannon: Allegedly suffers from a drink problem. Although no-one outside of his close circle will ever know for sure, Barnbrook's appearances at Mayoral Questions and various episodes captured on video in the past certainly point to a man with – how best to say this? - some eccentric ways about him. The very fact that he can share the same room as Boris Johnson and, by comparison, make the Mayor look a model of coherence and gentlemanly decorum speaks volumes.

Pro:
You've got me there.

Eddy Butler

Con:
Lack of Personality: Such a lack in fact, as to constitute a potentially dangerous “Personality Vacuum”, as proposed by scientists a CERN. If, the theory goes, he were to come into contact with another such Personality Vacuum – say, an Orlando Bloom or Michael Gove – the resultant Personality Black Hole could suck in all charisma for miles around. Also, he's the spitting image of Patrick Malahide, who I don't think I've ever seen playing a Good Guy.

Past Baggage: Butler, although he attempts to portray himself as the Fresh Start Candidate, carries much the same baggage as Griffin: The NF past, several less-than-sensitive articles and pieces of writing under his name and a seeming complicity in everything the Leadership got up to until he lost his BNP job. It has been easy for the Griffin Camp to portray Butler as a Man With A Grudge.

Pro:
A level of support among senior Party Figures and influential characters of the far-Right. Richard Edmonds, Jonathan Bowden, Michael Barnbrook, Nick Cass, Scott McLean, etc. Unfortunately, the sad truth for Butler is that while these people might be well-know to anoraks like us, they're probably a mystery to the lumpen majority of Members, whose limited grasp of their own party is that Nick Griffin IS the BNP (and they've never heard or read a bad word said against him, at that).

Derek Adams:

Con:
Who?

Pro:
Who?

So that's it. Not much of a choice. Saying that the BNP tends to attract the Confused, Antisocial and downright Sleazy is a little like saying that the Nobel Prizewinner's Club appeals to fairly bright people, or that there are a surprising number of young, single men at a sci-fi convention. The truth is, of course, that Griffin has so rigged the entire process as to virtually ensure his own continued stewardship of the rapidly sinking enterprise.

A change of Leadership would make little difference to us – they're all cut from the same grubby cloth. The Press and the undemanding Membership may be fooled for a while, but the damage, this time, runs so deep that it's hard to see how they can ever pull back from the brink.

Whatever the next step is, come Tuesday, things look bad for “The REAL Opposition Party”™. Talk of bankruptcy, sex scandals, shady financial dealings, splits, expulsions... What next? The tragic disappearance of Griffin from a French Beach, leaving behind only an extra-large, neatly-folded cummerbund?

The Far-Right will always be riven with factional infighting: It's the one thing they share in common with the Far-Left (as a student I once shared a flat with another Socialist. Within a fortnight the two of us had split into five opposing factions). This time, though, they've decided to take the whole, tottering edifice down with them.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the race is underway.

The runners and riders for the BNP Leadership Challenge Cup 2010 are as follows:-

Derek Adams

Unlike Mr. Butler I don't seek to be a disposable chairman or a stalking horse for undeclared and shadowy third parties. I seek election for a full-term. I love this Party and despise those who seek to sow dissent and demoralise our activists. They have provided propaganda for our enemies to throw at our candidates on the doorstep. Real grievances must be dealt with by people with true hearts, not those whose main purpose is to seek position or jobs.

Our vote increased at the General Election and we have more enquiries and a larger membership than ever. But some people still think it’s time for a change. If you feel that change is indeed needed, then nominate me, a clean-hands candidate who will be a fresh face but who, unlike Mr. Butler, has not sought to advance my candidacy by working with supporters who spread lies and black propaganda.



Richard Barnbrook

Famed as ‘the man in the beige suit’, dyslexic and partial to the occasional drink, I know my limitations! But I have never wavered from the strength of my convictions and I’ve always spoken direct from the heart.

Nick has achieved miracles in modernising the Party; Eddy has electioneering, strategic experience, - but the Party is divided. There’s a real desire for change but we also need time to take stock, and plan how to move forward together with renewed energy. If we act in haste we risk losing all we have built.

Our success and unity is more important than the ambitions of any individual. I offer integrity, impartiality and lack of self-interest that will command the loyalty and solidarity of all the membership. I will act as a caretaker leader till elections and end the strife caused by this destructive, divisive and bitter campaign. Choose stability and unity.


Eddy Butler:

I believe we need a complete re-launch in order to survive as a Party.

I seek a year’s term as Chairman in order to bring in the necessary changes and hold free elections next year than will result in a fresh face.

I will bring in measures to ensure financial transparency to restore confidence in the Party’s finances.

I will bring in constitutional changes to make the Party more democratically accountable and have a separation of powers between the political Chairman and the administration.

I would bring all functions such as the call centre back to the mainland and close the Belfast office.

I would terminate the contract of our fundraising consultant and we would become self sufficient.

I would ensure that our resources are focussed on the front line and not wasted on bureaucracy.

I would ensure that the Party stays together with no recriminations after this leadership election.



Nick Griffin MEP:

Our tremendous record speaks for itself, which is why our enemies try every trick in their grubby book to smear me and key members of my winning team.

To break contracts, sack our young team in the highly popular and successful call centre, and go back to amateurism, would be organisational and financial suicide. The experience and technology we’ve acquired must be used to modernise our election-fighting machine, not thrown away out of spite and personal ambition.

We’ve spent time and money modernising our central administration, now we’re going to professionalise our regional and local organisation.

In ten years, our activists and I have turned this party from a bad political joke into a major factor in British politics. There is still much to be done, and it is best done under proven, principled and visionary leadership, without futile, time-wasting elections. We’ve come this far, let us go forward together!


Your referee for this winner takes all contest will be Mr Andrew Brons.

Andrew Brons MEP has consented to be the scrutineer of the nomination papers and the address on the ballot papers to return them, at an address submitted by himself.

It is vital that this process is seen to be fair and totally impartial and that the appointment of Mr Brons as official scrutineer is beyond any doubt the fairest way to proceed in this matter.

Mr Brons has also worked with the election department in drawing up the procedures and guidelines to the nomination process and as scrutineer he has declared them fair to all potential challengers.

One Flew Over The Pig Farm: the BNP and us in 2008 - July

Even the meanest of the BNP's councillors conform to the party's petty racisms, as was shown in early July when Simon Deacon, a Markyate Parish Councillor and former leading National Front activist, voted against the council's Equal Opportunities Policy, describing it as a waste of time. No great surprise there.

Another non-surprise, was the complete collapse of Colin Auty's leadership challenge: Auty didn't even manage to get the required number of nominating signatures for the challenge to go ahead.

Griffin, clearly nervous of Auty's popularity (not something that the pig farmer has ever experienced), enlisted the help of the big battalions in the dubious forms of fruitcake Lee Barnes and 'election guru' Eddie Butler, both of whom wrote possibly illegal letters to the entire membership warning it to avoid Auty like the plague, Butler referring to Auty as a 'joke candidate' while Barnes stated that anyone who supported the challenge would be 'tried for conspiracy and treason'. Such power.

Meanwhile, Dicky Barnbrook, who takes his politics very seriously indeed, learns to ride a bike with fruit on it...

Dukinfield Labour councillor John Taylor apparently earned the ire of the BNP's Andrew Gatward, the party's West Lindsey organiser, and promptly found himself on Redwatch complete with death threat.

'Congratulations, you're on Redwatch. I am going to take you out. Six .22 rounds in the back of your head should do the trick. I would bring my .38 special but it makes one hell of a mess. I'll be seeing you.'

Whether it was Gatward who put Taylor on Redwatch is impossible to know but the fact that the former writes the occasional hate mail to the latter should give us a clue. As should Hexapla's article about the bizarre and violent fantasy world that Andrew Gatward seems to inhabit.

July saw us asking questions about how closely Nick Griffin and the BNP were working with Patrick Harrington and his micro-party, the National Liberal Party. Certainly there's a strongly incestuous relationship between them which becomes even more intimately entangled when the BNP's fake union Solidarity, its fake PR company Accentuate and Third Way are factored in. More investigation needed, if anyone wants to take it on board.

To no-one's surprise at all, Dewsbury East's BNP councillor Colin Auty quit the party (and eventually his seat) after his failure to get a leadership challenge going, moaning about the lack of democracy in the BNP. Odd how it hadn't bothered him up to this point. His campaign manager Roger Robertson also bit the dust, though in his case he was expelled for bringing the party into disrepute by setting up the challenge to the leadership and having the audacity to talk to the press. Bringing the BNP into disrepute? You couldn't make this stuff up, could you.

Racists and anti-semites Simon Sheppard and Stephen Whittle are convicted of publishing racially inflammatory material on a website. Both face further charges though mid-July saw them in the news again, this time for not turning up in court. It emerged that the pair had run off to the US, seeking political asylum across the pond.

An old friend reappears in court (albeit briefly), to answer a charge of attacking a pub landlord. Football hooligan, violent thug and former Burnley BNP councillor Luke Smith, hits the news again by doing what he does best - creating havoc. A couple of days later, Smith is found dead, having hanged himself.

Clive Jefferson, who desperately wants to run the BNP's security because he's a tough guy, brought some of his more idiotic pals down from Cumbria to Lancaster just to irritate shoppers by illegally setting up a stall in Market Square and getting in everyone's way. After a kicked-over table, numerous leaflets covered in spilled fizzy and a very noisy spontaneous demo, Jefferson and his morons buggered off - though not before the police nicked him for driving around in a car with an illegal numberplate (for which he was done the statutory £80).

Drifting towards the end of July and we see Nick Griffin writing to the December rebels trying to get them to back off from the forthcoming court case. In his letter, Griffin appears to libel the rebel's barrister Adrian Davies in a number of ways - though Mr Davies doesn't seem too keen to take the pig farmer to court on his own behalf. What Griffin is trying to avoid, of course, is showing the world that he can no longer afford to pay for decent legal representation and may have instead to rely on his own quick wits and those of the party's legal lunatic Lee Barnes. Gawd, I almost feel sorry for him. But not quite.

Too late to make any difference and presumably in angry response to Griffin's letter, Sadie Graham suddenly pops her head over the parapet to declare that

'I truly believe that there has never been a political leader in this country so hated by his own people.'

Her statement, posted on the Voice of Challenge blog, rips into Griffin, calling him a liar and a coward, but the overall effect is that it is too little, too late. Had she issued such a statement six months before, she would have got a massive and positive response. In fact, it comes across as the death knell of the rebellion - which in fact it turns out to be.

Yet another financial scandal within the BNP is uncovered by Searchlight - this one centering on the much-vaunted 'Truth Truck' or Lie Lorry. BNP members were asked to donate towards the purchase of a brand new advertising vehicle, effectively a mobile hoarding, which would help spread the BNP's lies even further. Members were asked to donate a staggering £40,000 to this appeal and many responded though BNP members on its own forum sounded a note of caution, wondering what had happened to the battle bus, a similar idea that was used to obtain donations a few years back.

Eventually, it was discovered that the BNP had conned its membership - again - and that the truck was actually being shared between the UK LifeLeague, an anti-abortion outfit based in Belfast, and the party.

We'll let the late Luke Smith round off July. His funeral seems to have followed the pattern of his life, being marred by vandalism and violence. Around forty drunken so-called 'mourners' were dispersed by police after they were found hurling bricks off a bridge on to a road below, presumably in tribute to Smith being a well-known thug and hooligan throughout his life.

Steve Smith, uncle of Luke, former member of the BNP and now leader of the utterly insignificant England First Party, said of his nephew;

'He was a lovely, lovely lad who, like a lot of people, was just too sensitive to exist in what is effectively an extremely cruel world...'

Whatever.

One Flew Over The Pig Farm: the BNP and us in 2008 - May

If the plans we have in place to prevent electoral fraud via the spoiling of ballot boxes works then I expect three BNP officials to be elected in London. If their is fraud then only Richard will get elected.

Around the country I expect 40 new councillors to be elected and us to come second in about 120 other places.

So wrote political genius and legal mastermind Lee John Barnes as polling for the local and GLA elections began on May 1st.

Mocked by many as the BNP's most suitable case for treatment, Barnes's remarks were derided for being hopelessly optimistic and quite in keeping with his usual predictive extravagance, but what shouldn't be forgotten is that - demented though he may be - Barnes is close to the core of the BNP leadership, and would have had a good idea of the party's private expectations.

Keeping their expectations secret was part of the BNP's game in the run up to the elections, but we have a fair idea that Barnes (himself possessing all the political acumen of a brick) was merely passing on what the leadership believed it could achieve in near perfect political and social circumstances for the racist party. The leadership wasn't alone: the BNP's keyboard army continually referred to 2008 as "the year of the BNP" and their hopes at times verged on the stratospheric.

Opinion amongst anti-fascists was divided as to how well (or badly) the BNP would do. As discontent with the Labour government reached new heights, as migration scares broke almost daily in the press, and as the BBC's infamous "White" season climaxed, it did seem to some that May 2008 really could see the BNP make its long-predicted breakthrough. At Lancaster Unity we exercised restraint, keeping in mind the BNP's failure of the previous year (also prematurely hailed as "the year of the BNP"), and having reported on a mostly uninspiring series of BNP local by-election results during the course of 2007 and early 2008. It wasn't that we didn't harbour concerns, but our experience told us not to expect a political earthquake on May 1st.

Following the dud that was the BNP's 2007 local election performance, and coming as another bout of internal feuding rumbled on, Nick Griffin and his inner circle were deeply concerned that another bad BNP performance would see the end of his leadership as the more astute among the membership tired of Griffin's endless "jam tomorrow" promises. Their plan to circumvent dissention and bolster morale was tried, tested, simple - and guaranteed to work on a party membership remarkable for its gullibility and lack of political perception: everything, no matter how trivial, would be claimed as a BNP victory, even if the polar opposite were true.

To that end members were encouraged to stand in the most paltry of parish and town council elections, and especially to stand in obscure parishes where the BNP's candidate could expect to be returned unopposed. This gave the party the opportunity to brag that it had so many councillors "elected" here or there even before a ballot had been cast on May 1st. That these parish councillors had little or no power was never highlighted, and the party was always careful to omit the all-important word "parish" before that of "councillor".

It was simple trickery, mostly designed to fool the BNP membership, and it worked handsomely.

On election day we experimented with "live" blogging, and the Lancaster Unity community rallied round to support us in what proved to be a long and interesting night.

May 1st 2008 represented the culmination of the BNP's biggest push to date, but as the results began to come in it was obvious that all their effort and bluster was bringing in but scant reward. Searchlight later reported:

On election day the BNP predicted it would win 40 new councillors and three seats on the London Assembly. However, when the first results came in, it quickly became clear that this was too optimistic. As the night continued the size of the BNP failure became apparent.

The BNP won three seats in Stoke-on-Trent and two each in Amber Valley, Rotherham and Nuneaton & Bedworth. It also took one seat in Thurrock, Three Rivers, Pendle and Calderdale. It also successfully defended seats in Epping and Burnley. This takes the number of BNP councillors to 55, up from 45 before these elections.

However, it also lost two seats it was defending in Epping and one in Kirklees.

In most areas the BNP share of the vote was well down on last year, which in itself was down on the previous election, particularly in its traditional heartlands.

An increase of ten councillors and a falling vote was hardly a glittering success and certainly not what a nervy Nick Griffin wanted to hear. Barnes quickly backtracked on his "40 new BNP councillors" statement, claiming that he had in fact meant 40 new parish and district councillors, and that was enough to satisfy the majority of BNP troops, who convinced themselves that they had somehow made an historic advance, with one of their better known but more moronic bloggers postulating that in future May 1st might be renamed "BNP Day".

Knowing that the more savvy and rebellious of his members would see straight through the hype, a threatened Griffin desperately hoped to pull a Barnbrook out of the hat in the GLA elections, which were counted on May 2nd.

The BNP could only win seats on the GLA (which, for their purposes, they elevated to something close to the fount of all power) through the party top-up system, and initially believed they were on course to take three GLA seats through these back-door means. As it became increasingly obvious that the party would be lucky to break the 5% barrier necessary to give them a single seat, so the expansive predictions were reined in and an anxious day began for Nick Griffin.

Lancaster Unity again "live blogged" the results with the help of our own loyal community (and as large an audience of BNP lurkers). For much of the night it seemed that the BNP's Richard Barnbrook would not pass the 5% threshold, and while we waited the BNP contented itself with euphoric celebrations on the news that Conservative Boris Johnson had ousted Labour's Ken Livingstone in the mayoral race. Lee Barnes commented incisively:

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA

I AM LAUGHING AT YOU

AND I AM GOING TO BE LAUGHING ALL NIGHT YOU PRICK

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA

RED KEN GONE

BNP IN THE GLA

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA

Barnes was more than premature in believing that the BNP had secured a GLA seat, since it was by no means certain at that hour that they had. Richard Barnbrook's appalling performance in the mayoral contest, where he had picked up a derisory 2.9% (not something Barnes dwelled on), suggested caution.

At one in the morning, however, it became clear that Barnbrook had crept into the London Assembly on 5.4%, and the online element of the BNP erupted with jubilation at their victory, egged on by Griffinites determined to gloss over the uncomfortable fact that in the most ideal circumstances possible the party had stalled in the local election polls and failed by a long way to achieve its GLA targets.

Naturally we weren't delighted with Barnbrook's election, but it wasn't the end of the world, given the pre-poll fears of many that London's PR system might provide the BNP with the electoral breakthrough it craved. We were also happy that the BNP's man on the Assembly was Barnbrook, who immediately demonstrated why in an incoherent slurry-shouty (not to say lonely) speech that set the tone for his GLA tenure.


Barnbrook's election was almost certainly the single most important factor in saving Nick Griffin's leadership bacon. The man had, after all, yet again presided over what were a generally uninspiring set of election results, the only real high point being Barnbrook's GLA seat. In consequence, the hyping of Barnbrook continued apace, but just in case any awkward BNP members of rebellious bent should point out that 5.4% wasn't really very good at all, the party came up with a tale of “massive and organised ballot box tampering”, claiming 400,000 votes went west, a lie quickly nailed by Searchlight.

It was at this moment that the most unlikely (and ill-timed) challenge to Nick Griffin's leadership was announced by disaffected Kirklees BNP councillor Colin Auty. Soon after that, an email of disputed provenance was passed on to Lancaster Unity. Allegedly from the irrepressible Lee Barnes in his capacity as Director of the BNP's Legal Department, the missive certainly hit all the usual Barnsian notes:

I have been instructed to inform you of a bogus and illegal leadership challenge and the disciplinary measures we are now putting in place to squash this diversionary and divisive activity in the bud. This is a deceitful and cynical attempt to divert the party’s attention away from the historical victory last week in London and to derail the activist’s attention away from the all important European Elections next June.

This is a sham nothing and more than a forged challenge devised by the liars, thieves and splitters who tried to wreck the party in December 2007 before their unsuccessful coup was successfully thwarted by quick action from the Party’s own security, legal and intelligence departments. The challenger claims is to be Councilor Colin Autty from Kirkless in Yorkshire, a decent man who is known to many of you but he is being used as a puupet by the gang of malcontents who stole party emails, stole party property, stole thousand of pounds of party monies, spread malicious rumours about the Chairman, myself and other senior party officers on bogus Blogs and through a series of bogus bulletins which they prepared using stolen membership lists which they then passed on to our enemies in MI5, The Special Branch, The Labour Party and the Searchlight organisation. They then tried unsuccessfully to set up a rival political party. It is a cylical attempt by our enemies to try and derail the Party and to stop activities to get BNP members electd to the European Parliament.

The dust had hardly settled after the local elections when three of the BNP's newly elected (unopposed) town councillors in Colwyn Bay resigned from the party for reasons not entirely clear, but protestations on the part of one of them, John Oddy, that "I have never been a racist" indicated a belated opening of eyes to what the BNP is really all about. That, however, proved not to be the case. Oddy had just been fined £100 for using a mobile telephone while driving his car, but later still he told the North Wales Daily Post:

“I feel as I have become more high profile I have clashed with the hierarchy in the party and this has now come to a head and led to my resignation. I am at odds with the opinions of the Welsh branch of the BNP, although I have no quarrel with the party nationally.”

Paul Harley, who resigned with Oddy, said: "I have found out more about the party and I am not happy with what I have found out."

Better late than never, but was that the whole truth? Antifascist wasn't convinced:

All three remain members of the local golf club, a place where the Colwyn Bay glitterati meet, confer and make deals which, in the words of one of our correspondents, is full of BNP sympathisers, covert supporters and party members, and none of the three protagonists have showed any sign of feeling the need to disassociate from the club - which leads one to believe that this evolution from BNP to Independent is nothing but a cosmetic change, designed simply to allay the fears of the locals that the Colwyn Bay trio may be too close to the BNP and thus they might get grubby by association.

The BNP met with a humiliating rebuff in Stoke-on-Trent, where Lord Kamlesh Patel was to discuss violent extremism with local community leaders. Refusing to speak to Alby Walker, BNP group leader on Stoke City Council, Lord Patel said:

"I make no apology for refusing to meet with the BNP during my visit to Stoke. My work is focused on looking at what positive actions local communities can take to prevent extremism. I do not believe that any party with extremist views has anything constructive to contribute to this agenda."

With a leadership challenge pending, Griffinite spin on the BNP's election performance reached new heights (or depths, as you will), with the party's website grandstanding the headline: "Tories, Plaid Cymru and Lib Dems trounced in Swansea". The problem was that the BNP had also been trounced, not winning a single seat. A spokesman for the Welsh Tories told the Swansea Evening Post: "These absurd claims fly in the face of the facts. The BNP's divisive, extremist views were rejected by voters in Swansea and every other part of Wales."

At Stafford Crown Court the trial of Stoke-on-Trent man Habib Khan opened. Khan was charged with the murder of Keith Brown, a BNP activist who had subjected the Khan family to "years of racial taunts, threats and violence", as The Times reported:

Mr Brown and his family, none of whom worked, were said to have been jealous of their industrious Pakistani neighbours and to have inflicted a spiral of abuse on them. Habib Khan is accused of stabbing Mr Brown to death with an eight-inch kitchen knife.

Keith Brown's tragic death the previous June was the culmination of a series of violent incidents between the neighbouring Brown and Khan families, one the BNP spun for all it was worth. Nick Griffin, who appears never to have met Keith Brown, cynically turned up at his funeral, which became little more than a BNP propaganda exercise as its leader gave a tearful interview to the risible "BNPtv News". The party shamelessly ignored sub-judice as it "reported" its version of events, which cast Brown in the light of a martyr to Muslim violence.


This was very far from the truth, as Stafford Crown Court heard. Habib Khan, described as a "mild and calm-mannered family man", had taken a knife to threaten Brown, who had hold of one of his sons. The trial judge said that Khan had acted "in the honest belief that he needed to protect his son" but in doing so had killed Mr Brown.

Khan was cleared of murder but found guilty of manslaughter and wounding, and later received an eight-year prison sentence.

Nick Griffin and Colin Auty

Meanwhile, alleged BNP elections "guru" and erstwhile Griffinite Eddy Butler waded into Colin Auty's leadership challenge in a strange, hectoring email that spoke in one moment of "our Parties [sic] openness and commitment to democracy" then talked of "anyone who has the temerity to wish to stand for leadership". The "temerity to wish"?

Butler gave out strong hints that the BNP's rules might need to be changed to preserve Nick Griffin's position: "There will be pressure, perhaps unstoppable pressure, to change the rules so that leadership challenges can only take place every four years." No prizes for guessing where the "unstoppable pressure" would originate.

As it later turned out, the Griffin-inspired notion of allowing challenges only every four years was a con being worked on the BNP membership, who would be got - through a bogus compromise - to give Griffin what he really wanted.

Butler, possessed of a very Stalinist idea of "democracy", called on members not to sign Colin Auty's nomination forms, referred to the councillor as a "joke candidate" and recommended that the leadership election "should be carried out in the most rapid manner possible with zero publicity allowed" to Auty.

Paranoic Griffinite attrition on Auty was relentless. The BNP's own secret forum banned any pro-Auty discussion, while its dirty tricks department marched around the internet spreading black propaganda. BNP branches were instructed not to invite Auty to speak at their meetings, and branches which had booked troubadour Auty to sing cancelled.

Auty's campaign manager, Roger Robertson, the BNP's former South-East Regional Organiser, was told that he faced disciplinary proceedings, much as Mike Easter (Chris Jackson's manager the previous year) found himself subject to a Griffinite fit-up.

The intention was clearly to dissuade BNP members from signing Auty's nomination papers, the implied threat being that they, too, would face expulsion. It was a telling measure of the febricity infecting the top of the BNP that this vicious overkill was deployed to protect Nick Griffin from a challenge everybody knew he would walk.

In the meantime Richard Barnbrook made an utter fool of himself when he threatened to stampede into London mayor Boris Johnson's office with "100 young people". The brown-suited one had been to Sidcup, hoping to exploit the murder of Robert Knox. In a since deleted blog post he wrote:

I have invited all of the young people there to come down to City Hall this Tuesday for 9:30 in the morning. This knife crime has to be stopped. If I have to bring a 100 young people into Boris's office then that is what I will do.

Barnbrook and his aides stood waiting outside City Hall at the appointed time, ready to greet the throngs of incensed young militants rallying to his call. He waited, and waited, and waited, vainly scanning the horizon for signs of massed greasy hair and acne on the march, but saw only the familiar face of self-inflicted humiliation grinning directly back at him.

To be continued...

Nine years of vision and vermin

It's been nine long years since Nick Griffin unseated John Tyndall as BNP leader in what can fairly be described as the only relatively honest leadership election (in purely mechanical terms) the BNP ever held. And it's only ever held two.

Naturally, neither man was entirely honest in how they conducted their campaigns, and still less honest with their respective supporters as to their future intentions - but of the two only Nicholas Griffin was presented with the opportunity to demonstrate the fact, and upon winning lost very little time in giving the BNP a hefty dose of the control freakery and paranoia he had once administered to the National Front, the same which sent that organisation into terminal decline.

What is striking at this remove is John Tyndall's magnaminity in allowing the then recently arrived Griffin's 1999 challenge, to the point of permitting Griffin the full use of BNP structures and mechanisms even as the six-month campaign quickly descended into a long series of visceral dog-fights. It is, after all, John Tyndall who we see pictured in Nazi uniform, not the alleged "moderniser" Nick Griffin.

In 1999 Griffin claimed to be running an "open and honest" leadership challenge based on "positive ideas for the future", calling himself the candidate with "flair and vision". This certainly struck a chord with the BNP's newer members, and even appealed to some hardline BNP veterans all too aware of Tyndall's advancing years and of the tiredness of his leadership.

It did, however, obscure Griffin's woeful record in the National Front, where he spent much of his time engaged in factional activities, seemed to view political positions as expendable commodities, and was even then the subject of much disquiet in the matter of finance.

Griffin passed himself off as the BNP's "unity candidate", threatening that a Tyndall win would "lead inevitably to a most disastrous split" (presumably Griffin would be the leader of this putative split) - words that would earn anybody in today's Griffinite BNP instant expulsion. There were also dire warnings of purges ahead at the hands of Tyndall, while, "in happy contrast", Nick's "mature, level-headed and fundamentally decent approach" would restore unity and stability to the BNP. There would be "not one single expulsion" if Nick were to assume the leadership - "No cronysim, no favouritism, no grudges" he promised.

History tells a very different story.

One of Nick's first "positive ideas" as leader was to ensure that no challenger would ever again have the scope or freedom to campaign as he had done, and there began the first of a series of changes to the BNP constitution that should have rung loud alarm bells among those who had taken Griffin at his word

People like convinced Griffin supporters Steve and Sharron Edwards, who, within a year of Griffin's assumption of the leadership found themselves asking some searching questions about the new man's financial probity and as a result became victims of paranoic accusations that were the pretext for expelling them from the party.

They were among the first, and many legally dubious expulsions have passed under the BNP bridge since then.

That first proof that Griffin the BNP leader preserved exactly the same frame of mind as Griffin the National Front chairman (and author of the insane and infamous "Attempted Murder" pamphlet), gave wider currency to Tyndallite grumbling and opened the eyes of many early Griffin loyalists, few of whom have remained in place, due either to being cast aside as their usefulness to Griffin came to an end, were purged, or grew disillusioned.

The problem was that the only person capable of mounting a credible challenge against Griffin was John Tyndall, at the time subject to a campaign of vilification for that very reason - but Tyndall, with his Nazi past and barely reconstructed views, was anathema even to those Griffinites who had come to loath their leader.

Tyndall's death removed the biggest thorn in Griffin's side, and there has since been no other personality within the BNP who stands out even remotely as likely leadership material - not that a personality likely to present a future threat to Griffin will ever have the chance to stand out, as Jonathon Bowden discovered last summer.

Had the BNP not begun to experience its first real electoral successes as disaffection with Griffin began to rise then it quite likely that the party would have descended into vicious faction-fighting, which might have been the end of the extreme-Right for a decade or more. But election success - albeit localised - did come, and Griffin was quick to take the credit.

BNP members - more like the "sheeple" they despise than they care to believe - were happy to go along with him, and in so doing were prepared to overlook their leader's less savoury character traits and blind themselves to the stark evidence that the BNP was increasingly beginning to look like what Martin Webster christened "the Griffin Family Business".

Of course there are many reasons for the BNP's initial spurt of electoral success, none of them much at all to do with Nicholas Griffin.

It might be argued that the best election agent the BNP ever had was Blairism and its apparent (if not intentional) attempts to disconnect itself from its core electorate - an electorate unlikely, especially in the northern towns where the first BNP gains came, to find any merit in voting for the then divided and demoralised Tories, or the Liberal Democrats. We must add in to that the 2001 Oldham riots, and the fact (much as it grieves us to say it) that in certain areas of strength the BNP did have capable organisers who ran intelligent, competent local campaigns with which Nick Griffin had no connection at all.

Further gains followed, of course, and Nick identified himself with every success, to the point where many BNP members really did (and still do) believe that without the guiding hand of Griffin the BNP would have achieved nothing at all.

This is utter nonsense. If there were any truth to it at all then the BNP would have achieved comparable results to those it obtained in places like Oldham and Burnley over the remainder of the country. Save for some small pockets where the circumstances outlined above pertained, it did nothing of the kind - but Nick was never eager to take the credit for that.

The probable truth is that finding himself the leader of the most electorally successful British racist party to date came as of much as a surprise to Griffin as it did to anybody else. Even so, Griffin seemed fixed on undermining "his" achievement by continuing the ludicrous (and legally expensive) hunt for John Tyndall's scalp, the unending litany of expulsions and proscriptions, and was quite prepared to wreck the BNP in its strongest electoral areas (Burnley being the textbook case) if he smelled the least whiff of personal disloyalty.

To many, even the BNP's enemies, these seemed like the actions of a demagogue more interested in preserving his hide than those of a man possessed of "flair and vision" with "positive ideas for the future".

Tyndall died, and the BNP's then electoral high point came and went, Griffin and his leadership team reduced to promising breathroughs to come.

Last year, as we all remember, along with the BNP itself we expected the party to add to its tally of 49 sitting councillors at the 2007 local elections. Everything seemed set fair for them to do so. We gritted our teeth, the racists prepared to crow - but early into the election night results it was clear who would be doing the crowing, and it wasn't the BNP.

The next morning we wrote:

The BNP's march to power turned into a cul-de-sac of indifference yesterday, with the racist party failing to make any impression in the English local elections.

Predicting at least a doubling of their 49 councillors, a devastated BNP finds its tally (at the time of writing) remains 49. Though the BNP did pick up seats it lost the same number, making no net gains. Of the nine BNP councillors up for re-election only one successfully defended his seat.

Claiming "mixed results" in an attempt to hide an electoral calamity from its shell-shocked members, there was no real disguising of the BNP's utter failure over large swathes of the country. The party's fortunes stalled and went into reverse in areas where its hopes were high, notably Sandwell and Birmingham, where thousands of votes were lost. Votes in cities such as Coventry were barely improved over those obtained thirty years ago by the National Front. In an effort to distract attention from the Birmingham debacle, the BNP is focussing attention on the fact that it gained more votes than the renegade Sharon Ebanks and her tiny number of New Nationalist Party candidates.

Griffin did not rush to identify himself with this particular set of results, nor did he attempt to explain why, when - by its own assessment - conditions had never been better for the BNP, all that could be reported was abject failure.

Of course, Griffin had other concerns by then, the lacklustre leadership challenge of Chris Jackson assuming a new and threatening importance in the light of the appalling election results, which challenge had to be hamstrung (as it was) before any damage to Griffin's position was done.

The paranoid sequel to Jackson's challenge was well enough reported here and is fresh enough in our minds not to bear a full re-telling, save to recall Griffin's infamously insane "vermin", "thieves" and "liars" blog diatribe, backed up by an equally hysterical and inventive four page spread in the BNP's "Identity" magazine - and, naturally, the purging and proscribing quickly followed.

Post the 2007 locals, the BNP continued to fight in by-elections, where it could concentrate its resources in pursuit of the best possible showing. Their results were lamentable - though there were areas, the East Midlands and adjacent districts being salient cases, where the party could produce a good first-time vote. Unfortunately for them, where the party's performance could be measured against previous outings in the same ward, their vote invariably fell.

Seeking a crumb of comfort, the party was overjoyed to retain a seat in Loughton, making a great deal of fuss over this "achievement" - and going to great lengths to silence wiser voices which pointed out that the BNP vote had fallen by a notable 5% and that the seat had been retained by a margin of 20 votes against a candidate who did not belong to one of the major parties. To say, as some did, that this was no small cause for concern was to invite attack as a "troublemaker", a "splitter", an "anti-BNP Red" and all the usual epithets beloved of the Griffinite BNP.

All that mattered was that the seat had been retained, and to hell with any unwelcome analysis - thank you, Nick!

They were to pay for this self-deluding complacency.

Ignoring for now the damp squib of the BNP's Decembrist revolt, the BNP began mustering its electoral troops early for the 2008 locals. As was clear from their numerous blogs and their posts on their usual internet hang-outs, they had worked themselves up for a real breakthrough.

This was going to be their year - they could feel it in their bones.

We couldn't. Everything we'd seen and recorded of BNP performances over the past year told us that though some gains were likely, nothing much was going to change and the established picture of electoral stagnation and reverse would continue.

For once, the BNP leadership cultivated a healthy restraint in its predictions, even inventing the meaningless spin-phrase "quiet revolution" to explain the BNP's snail's pace growth (or lack thereof) to a potentially restive membership. And there was a distinct air of unreality in the lead up to election day.

What struck us was the idiotic claim made by BNP deputy chairman and Griffin cheerleader Simon Darby that he had made a "breakthrough" by sealing a deal with the Pensioners Party whereby that party would recommend its members and supporters to vote BNP. The only fly in the ointment was that the PP had a total of six members, was completely unknown and without influence, and its leadership seemed to be unaware of any deal with the BNP. Members of other parties might have resented this cynical attempt to con them, but, all too typically, the BNP sheeple seemed more outraged that the con had been exposed.

Unreality continued as virtually powerless parish councillors became equated in Griffinite BNP spin with district councillors, an exercise designed purely to push up the total number of BNP "councillors" gained and to prove to an all too gullible membership of how well things were progressing for the BNP - proof in itself that the BNP's leadership had no great expectations for the 2008 locals. Several non-political parish council seats fell unopposed into the hands of the BNP, each "gain" being proudly reported on the BNP website.

It was so much whistling in the dark.

The BNP gained a grand total of ten "real" councillors, and its vote in its own heartlands fell, frequently by considerable margins.

Nick Griffin did not rush to bask in the reflected glory of this particular success, and though many BNP members still regurgitate the Griffinite smoke-and-mirrors line that something remarkable happened on May 1st, it is apparent that hard reality is finally beginning to bite for some of their number.

The plain fact, which they cannot ignore, is that by its own lights electoral conditions were never better for the BNP than they were on May 1st. A long serious of immigration controversies preceded the elections, some in the same week, there was the 40th anniversary of Powell's "Rivers of Blood" speech, falling together with the BBC "White Season" series, and the party frequently received completely uncritical press coverage. They themselves were reporting on ecstatic doorstep receptions for their canvassers.

And still Nick Griffin could deliver only 10 extra councillors from the 612 seats fought by the BNP.

Following the locals we had to wait 24 hours for the results of the London Mayoral race and the GLA elections - 24 hours in which Griffin must have prayed for a miracle. At all events, the BNP's spinmeisters began to play down expectations (and with good reason), uncertain whether they would gain anything at all.

Disaster seemed to beckon for what party apparatchniks were calling the BNP's finest campaign, but finally the much-hyped Richard Barnbrook scraped a GLA seat with 5.4%.

In the wake of this apparent "landmark" victory, as they touted it, the BNP seemed oblivious to the fact that 30 years ago the more honestly racist National Front averaged pretty much the same vote and better over large swathes of London. The truth is that the BNP should have achieved election on 7-8% of the vote if there was to be any credibility to their claim of "progress". They did not.

Again Nick Griffin failed to deliver.

After nine years of Nick Griffin's "vision and flair", in the most favourable circumstances imaginable, the BNP still manages a miserable grand total of 55 (real) local councillors and one elected (just) member of the GLA.

This is not a record that would wash in any political party other than the BNP.

To sum up the nine years of Nick Griffin's leadership, then, there has been, from the beginning and ever since, a long series of legally challengable expulsions of those who either cast doubt on Griffin's financial management of the party or who were deemed a threat to his position. There has been a ruthless willingness to wreck the BNP in its own areas of strength for no better reason than that members in those areas felt their loyalties to the party over-rode any presumed loyalty to a man they did not trust or in who they lacked confidence. In short, there has been continual internal strife since 1999.

If the incessant amendments to the BNP's risible constitution were not enough to make Nick feel safe, then, as some of you will be aware, the party has issued "Activist Declaration" forms - the only case we know of in British politics where ordinary members of a political party are being forced to swear something not a million miles removed from the Nazi oath of allegiance, and at the same time to give themselves as hostage to fortune to whatever constitutional changes Griffin chooses to enact.

Clearly a trap is being loaded, since: "I agree to abide by the British National Party’s Constitution and any amendments made to it under the provisions of the Constitution".

Those signing this (Barnsian?) document, especially those closely allied with Griffin's internal opponents, may as well hand the man a loaded gun and wait to be shot the moment the inevitable constitutional amendments are made.

It can have no other purpose.

Perhaps the sudden appearance of this scurrilous document can be best explained by the fact that elections for the European parliament are now a year away, and if there is one thing we know Griffin longs to do it is to bag his ticket on the Euro gravy-train.

To that end he has already deposed Chris Jackson as North-west Regional Organiser in favour of himself, and parachuted himself in as the BNP's number one candidate in the region. We also saw, when a general election seemed but weeks away last autumn, that Griffin's overarching concern was to preserve BNP finances for the Euro elections - strange behaviour for a British "national" party.

You or I might think a good general election performance would be of more lasting benefit to the BNP than Griffin's flying off to Strasbourg and the riches of an MEP on the back of a tiny vote in north-west England, but the BNP have convinced themselves that this is the way forward - failing to notice that a similar exercise has done the UKIP no good at all, and never really asking themselves exactly what a lone BNP representative in Europe is going to achieve for the party.

However that may be, with the prize now in sight the Griffin Family Business must be protected from hostile takeover, and we can't help but to think that the "Activist Declaration" form is a large and sinister part of that protection.

In perspective, then: in nine years Nick Griffin has taken the BNP from nowhere to next to nowhere. In the most favourable conditions ever to exist in which a racialist and nationalist party could expect to grow, the BNP under Griffin has remained stunted, its membership numbering well under 10,000, despite the regular repetition of the lie that hundreds join every week.

It remains electorally moribund, and where it has met with success it has done so despite the turbulent Griffin, not because of him. His record is, by any measure, lamentable, nine years of effort and eye-watering expenditure on the part of the BNP producing a paltry crop of 55 local councillors who all too often are not up to the job and all too prone to find themselves confronted with past indiscretions.

That Griffin has managed for so long to pass off his leadership as a story of unparalleled success is an achievement of sorts, we suppose, but we on our side of the fence really do thank our stars that the BNP chose to land itself with the most divisive and incompetent leader ever to grace the stage of the far-Right in Britain.

"Flair and vision"? It seems more like stuff and nonsense to us.