Billy Bragg: Beating the BNP at Glastonbury, June 26th 2010

Show Racism the Red Card are taking part in a debate at noon on Saturday on Glastonbury's Leftfield Stage

The Leftfield Stage - Glastonbury festival's "Pop and Politics" Tent - is returning to Worthy Farm this year . It is curated by Billy Bragg, and Show Racism the Red Card are delighted to have been invited to take part in the afternoon debate he is hosting on Beating the BNP.

Billy Bragg is a musician and activist, born and raised in Barking. During the General Elections this year he was a very active ambassador of the Hope not Hate campaign against the BNP.

If you're at Glastonbury, please come and visit the Leftfield Stage (Saturday, 12pm) to hear more from Billy Bragg, who is joined by SRtRC's Leroy Rosenior and Tony Kearns, Deputy General Secretary of the CWU.

Show Racism the Red Card

Shit Through My Letterbox

It's not everyday Nick Griffin writes to me begging for cash, but that's exactly what he's done. This morning thousands of BNP leaflets polluted Stokie letter boxes with their usual mix of lies and hate.

As most readers will be aware, the posties' union, the CWU has agreed a conscience clause with Royal Mail management that allows postal workers the right to refuse delivery of offensive material. As a racist, fascist organisation that would like nothing better than to see "Marxist" trade unions ground beneath the jack boot, the BNP have always fallen foul of the conscience clause. To get round this, the BNP have bundled their pathetic pleas for cash in an unbranded envelope featuring a glum, elderly couple and the legend "Ay up duck, thar's sum rate gud stuff fer Stokies in 'ere" (pictured). Don't be surprised if they use a repurposed envelope elsewhere.

There's no need to dwell on the begging letter itself, except to say Nazi Nick must think Stokies are as thick as his minions if he wants us to swallow the whopper that "tens of thousands of pensioners freeze to death in winter, even here in Stoke" (underlining theirs).

NB: The BNP have provided a free post envelope with their material. I'm only sayin'.

A Very Public Sociologist

BNP leaflets will go undelivered

The extremist British National Party face the prospect of seeing their election leaflets go undelivered, the postal workers leader has warned.

Billy Hayes, who leads the Communication Workers Union, sent a reminder that his members are fully entitled to refuse to handle any BNP material. Hayes told OBV: “The union’s position is we negotiated a conscience clause where every individual members is entitled to refuse to deliver if the find it offensive to deliver leaflets for fascist parties.”

Asked whether that could mean widespread refusal to deliver BNP leaflets, he said: “It’s quite common, yes. You don’t get many people in Stockwell [for instance] wanting to deliver BNP leaflets.”

The union leader was speaking during a visit to Operation Black Vote’s east London offices. Hayes stressed that it was important for political parties to get his members on their side, but added that he had no intention of following his predecessor into politics.

Asked if he was ever tempted to follow the CWU’s former general-secretary Alan Johnson, he replied: “Only in so far as representing my members. I have no desire to be the Home Secretary just yet.”

OBV

London postal workers refusing to deliver BNP leaflets

The British National Party is fuming after hundreds of postal workers across South London refused to deliver election leaflets.

The Royal Mail is legally obliged to deliver the leaflets but Communication Workers Union members are exercising a "conscience clause" in their contract not to carry out the work. Workers say they disagree with the controversial far-right parties policies which include voluntarily resettling immigrants. That same union today announced intentions to strike over pay.

Managers agreed to the clause and have been forced to draft in expensive agency workers to offices in Brixton, Stockwell and South Lambeth to clear the backlog.

Pollsters are predicting a "electoral breakthrough" for the party in European and local elections on Thursday with a perfect storm of voter apathy in the wake of the expenses scandal and a low turnout.

"Members won't touch them"

CWU official Martin Walsh told the South London Press: "The leaflets came in last Tuesday but our members wouldn’t touch them. We have a national agreement that states that staff do not have to deliver them but bosses still put our members under pressure. In the end, agency staff were brought in to deliver them."

Staff are "corrupting electotral process"

A BNP spokesman said postal staff are corrupting "the election process not to deliver the leaflets". Adding: "If they don’t want to deliver them they should not turn up to work, not get paid and give the money to someone else who is willing to do the job."

Exceptional circumstances

A Royal Mail spokesman would not comment on agency staff having to deliver the pamphlets, but added: He said: "Royal Mail has legal obligations under the Representation of People Act to deliver election material, so long as the material is legal, and so we deliver all legitimate literature from all parties. In exceptional circumstances – where any individual has a genuine concern – we encourage them to discuss it with their manager and, if necessary, we make alternative arrangements.

We’re not able to comment on individual offices, however can confirm that all election material due to be delivered by the Royal Mail is being dealt with in accordance with the terms of the service paid for by customers."

London Daily News

BNP leader Nick Griffin says postmen should be sacked for not deilvering his leaflets

BNP demands sack for defiant posties

BNP leader Nick Griffin has said postmen who refuse to deliver his election leaflets should be sacked.

In a message on the far-right party's website, Griffin urged supporters to complain to Royal Mail if they do not receive a leaflet.

He branded posties who won't distribute BNP propaganda as "antidemocratic idiots". Communication Workers Union officials in Bristol have backed Royal Mail staff in the West Country who have refused to put the leaflets through letterboxes.

Griffin told supporters to "catch these anti-democratic idiots and get them sacked". His comments have since been removed from the BNP website.

Last night a spokesman for antiracist organisation Searchlight said: "The BNP are trying to bully postmen into delivering hate-filled propaganda. It should be a matter of individual conscience for each postal worker whether they deliver the BNP's message of fear and racism or not."

Pete Doherty is to headline the Mirror's Love Music Hate Racism festival. The festival, at Stoke City FC's stadium, is on Saturday, May 30.

Today the Mirror's Hope Not Hate bus will be in Spennymoor, Co Durham, at 11am, then Ferryhill from 12.30pm. On Sunday we will be at Grey's Monument in Newcastle from noon.

Mirror

BNP buffoons are a disgrace

Like perennial pantomime villains, the BNP are out in force trying to convince us voters that we should elect them to the European Parliament in June, an establishment that surely goes against their very nature of hating all foreigners.

Sadly - unlike pantomime villains and however much we hiss, the BNP persist like a bad smell.

Their claims that 80 million Muslim Turks would ‘swamp’ the UK are so nonsensical that there is no way they can claim to know anything about politics, or people (For a start the population of Turkey is not 80 million and even if it were, I’m pretty sure the vast majority would not think that moving to the UK was a good idea)

However, their rhetoric somehow has widespread support, especially in the north of the country and in the Midlands. Their targeted leaflet campaign in these areas seeks to draw on hatred in areas where the BNP perceive there to be race problems. And it appears that the focus of their attacks on ethnic minorities has moved away from their traditional enemies of Blacks and Asians and onto Turks instead.

There are a million reasons why we should not even consider voting for these fascists but sadly we cannot ban them and as abhorrent as these idiots are, we have a democracy, which allows for their existence. It is therefore up to the electorate to send them packing and ridicule their pathetic attempts to take part in the democratic process.

Failing to vote and allowing such a poisonous minority party to gain any kind of power will allow the BNP to link up with other fascists in Europe and open the door for them to not only be funded by us but to draw on resources from the EU Parliament, free to spread their message of hate around the continent.

Sharp suits and smart haircuts – as Fevzi Hussein from the CWU Union rightly points out – do not make these people any more palatable.

I can only urge for those people that are eligible to vote on 4 June, turn out and do your civic duty. Because complacency will only open up the door to extremists who would like nothing better than to plunge us all into a race war.

Londra

Postmen 'threatened with sack' for refusing to deliver BNP leaflets

Postal workers claim they are being forced to deliver British National Party election leaflets or face the sack.

Royal Mail bosses are said to have warned postmen they could lose their jobs unless they carry the ultra-Right-wing party's campaign literature. Around 100 workers in the West Country have told union leaders they will not carry the anti-immigration leaflets because they do not want to promote the BNP's extremist 'rubbish'.

Postmen, who were asked to start delivering the BNP's 29million leaflets this week ahead of the European elections next month, are also said to be afraid for their safety if they are seen delivering the anti-immigration message in racially mixed areas.

The Communication Workers Union (CWU) has accused Royal Mail chiefs in Bristol and Somerset of 'bullying' and says one office threatened workers with the sack if they did not comply. Bristol and District CWU spokesman Dave Wilshire said today: 'What's happening is that managers in Bristol are effectively bullying people. Someone from Thornbury said to me if we don't deliver it we will get the sack. That is outrageous.'

Royal Mail is breaking a 'conscience clause' agreed four years ago which allows staff to refuse to deliver literature they find offensive, he said.

'Over the past 48 hours I've had around 32 calls from individual members and those speaking on behalf of groups, saying they don't want to deliver the material. That is fair enough. The clause says members don't have to deliver material if they feel threatened or if it is against their personal beliefs.'

He added: 'In Bristol we have the St Paul's area which has a very high density of those from ethnic backgrounds. Anyone being expected to post BNP stuff through there is going to feel at risk.'

Mail Online

Postie BNP leaflet row

Sheffield postmen say they are "disgusted" after being asked to deliver leaflets for the British National Party along with normal mail. Some posties at the Barnsley Road sorting office in Firth Park are refusing to deliver the leaflets for the far-right party.

Political parties, along with any other organisation, can pay Royal Mail to deliver flyers on their behalf as long as they meet "advertising and legal" guidelines.

But one member of staff, who did not wanted to be named, said: "We have received a load of BNP leaflets to be delivered to every house on each route. Bearing in mind large areas of S5, like Firth Park, have a large Asian and other ethnic minority population, I find it disgusting that Royal Mail would allow this to happen. I myself will be refusing to deliver the leaflets and, like other members of staff, am disgusted Royal Mail would let this happen. The people in charge should be ashamed."

The BNP said it wasn't up to postmen to decide what to deliver. Spokeswoman Marlene Guest said: "There are a lot of things that go out by mail that people could object to, but it's the postmen's job to deliver things. We are a legitimate political party. Some of these people who are objecting should come to one of our meetings and listen before they object."

Royal Mail declined to say if staff would face any disciplinary action for refusing to deliver the leaflets. But a spokesman said: "If any member of staff with a genuine concern raises it with their manager, they will be happy to discuss it with them."

Sheffield Star

CWU National Equality Officer Linda Roy says:

"The CWU have in fact taken a very proactive stance on this issue and we have negotiated an agreement with the business which effectively is a conscience clause and this allows our members the opportunity to decline to deliver material of this nature.

Given the Euro elections are coming up we actually communicated this to all our branches [including those in the Sheffield area] as it is especially important in times like these."