Silverdale Tours coach trashed for carrying English Defence League

Silverdale Tours has been revealed to be the latest company companies prepared to profit from transporting the English Defence League (EDL).

The EDL had planned a march through Tower Hamlets to the East London Mosque on 3rd September 2011. The planned demonstration was in the vein of loyalist Orange marches in Northern Ireland.

A heavy police presence kept groups separate throughout the day but, at around 6pm, a group of EDL supporters, travelling in a vehicle hired from Silverdale coaches, drove past the East London mosque hurling insults. The coach was pursued and set upon by a crowd who broke windows and hurled street furniture. As the news spread around Whitechapel, hundreds of local people poured onto the streets and confronted police who had moved in to protect the EDL.

In 2010, Ausden Clark, the official coach company for Leicester City football club, confirmed that it would no longer provide services to the EDL after Corporate Watch revealed they had transported EDL supporters to a rally in Bradford (see here).

In February 2011 Andrews of Tideswell, another company used by the EDL in Bradford, made a statement that it would not carry the EDL (or other protesters) again after several of its coaches had their tyres slashed by anti-fascists prior to the EDL's Luton demo.

Johnsons Coaches have contacted Corporate Watch and informed us that on the occasions that they have provided services to the EDL they have done so at the request of West Midlands police. The company did not, however, pledge not to provide services to the EDL in the future.

Silverdale Tours are based in Nottingham at Little Tennis Street South, Nottingham,NG2 4EU.Tel: 0115 912 1000(0115) 912 1000, Fax: (0115) 912 1558, Email: info@silverdaletours.co.uk.

Companies that have provided services to the EDL in the past and have not pledged not to do it again include:

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

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

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

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

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

Johnsons
Johnsons Coaches, Liveridge House
Liveridge Hill, Henley in Arden
Warwickshire, West Mids, B95 5QS

Corporate Watch

Welcome moves against the EDL

Great to hear that the police have formally applied to the Home Secretary to get the English Defence League march on Tower Hamlets banned. I’m something of a freedom of speech fundamentalist but this was an open invitation to violence.

I have had my differences with East London Mosque and believe that it is a pernicious political influence in the area. But there are many decent people who attend the mosque and no one deserves to be threatened with violence by these extremist thugs.

Hats off to Hope Not Hate, the anti-fascist organisation, which has been lobbying hard to persuade the authorities to see sense on this issue.

Oddly, Sunny Hundal at Liberal Conspiracy thought the march should go ahead. His argument that EDL violence loses it supporters is very peculiar and I can’t believe he really means it, predicated as it is on other people being hurt or having their property damaged.

Dave Hill gives some good context in his blog. In particular he claims that Lutfur Rahman, the mayor of Tower Hamlets, who has previously been a deeply divisive figure, has worked with his political rivals to bring the community together in opposition to the march. If true, this is a welcome development.

Unfortunately, however, Hill makes the mistake of suggesting that the EDL has been influenced by journalists who have warned about Islamist politics in East London. He provides no evidence for this line of thinking, which veers dangerously close to the nonsense touted by Socialist Worker. In an extract from a new book published on Multiculturalism published in the Trot paper Dilowar Khan, the director of East London Mosque, has even made the outrageous claim that the EDL has been inspired by my journalism and that of Andrew Gilligan.

This would be laughable if it weren’t so irresponsible.

For now, however, let’s be glad that the police have done the right thing and hope that Teresa May does so too.

Spectator