Blackpool ‘Blues’

In a night which saw a complete reversal of the old structure in Blackpool, the Labour group was thrown out including leader Roy Fisher, deputy leader Eddie Collett ,Mayor Allan Matthews, and social services supremo Sue Wright all lost their seats to the Conservatives.

The final tally is Conservatives 26 seats (+13) , Labour 13 ( - 12) and the Lib Dems 3 (-1).

The Blackpool area BNP fared badly in that it won no seats, but several incoming names as well as outgoing councillors noted that the votes for the BNP candidates were in three figure numbers, and were not the least votes in each area, in a mid range turn out.

The BNP results were Roy Goodwin (Highfield) 339 , John Kelly (Warbreck ) 313, Les Joy (Park) 339, Joan Cain (Haweside) 369, Phillip Murphy (Greenland) 370, Chris Ryan (Claremont) 275, and Kathryn Kelly (Bispham) 366. Comments by the party will be advised to the site.

Steve (thanks for the report Steve)

Probe into razor blade hate mail

A hate-mail investigation has been launched after a letter containing a razor blade was posted to a candidate standing in tomorrow's Bolton Council elections. The mail was sent to the home of Veritas candidate Anthony Backhouse and contained a handwritten note claiming to be from the British National Party.

Police have been called in to investigate the incident. Detective Inspector Paul Hitchen, from Bolton CID, said they would be examining the letters for forensic evidence and finger prints. He said: "We have got to treat this as a serious incident. The blades have been placed right inside the lip of the envelope. It does give us cause for concern."

Mr Backhouse, who is vying for a seat in the Tonge with The Haulgh ward, was warned about hate-mail on Monday by local Veritas secretary David Joneswho received an identical letter that morning.

"He said watch your post' because he was sent a letter with a razor blade under the seal of the flap. So I rang my wife and warned her not to open the post," said Mr Backhouse, of Mossfield Court, Bolton.

When he arrived home later in the day, he saw the letter. Mr Backhouse said: "It stuck out like a sore thumb. I put on a pair of gloves and opened it and found the razor blade hidden in the flap and the note."

He then alerted the police and reported the matter to election officials. Mr Backhouse, whose election opponents include BNP candidate David Wood, said he did not think the BNP was responsible. "It's just some crank. I am not perturbed by it in any way," he added.

The note, written on lined paper in capital letters, read: "Use your brains. Make way for the BNP."

There was also a drawing of the Union Flag.

The BNP has denied having anything to do with the letter. Roy Goodwin, North-west regional organiser for the BNP, said: "It's absolutely ridiculous and absolutely not from the BNP. It's obviously from an outside source trying to discredit the BNP."

The Bolton News

Lancaster's fascist BNP fails to impress

Click on image for full size
A pdf file of the poster (28k) can be downloaded from here.

For all Chris Hill's waffling on his rubbishy blog about target 'Gold and Silver' wards, Lancaster's contingent of the British National Party could only muster up a single candidate, despite the local party claiming to have fast-growing support in the city. And who is that candidate? Yep, Chris Hill himself. And where is he standing? Yep, Skerton West ward again - obviously ignoring the fact that his proportion of the vote dropped from 16% on the first occasion he gave us the joy of his company to 11% once voters realised he had nothing to offer except the usual BNP lies and bullshit.

So far, Hill has only been seen on his own while canvassing. No sign of his chum, Bradford BNP councillor, Paul Cromie, under almost constant investigation by the Standards Board for a handful of apparent misdeamours, or ex-Combat 18 thug with a bunch of convictions, Calderdale's Adrian Marsden. In fact, we could say that Hill was remarkably isolated - no-one has even bothered to come over from Blackpool to help him out.

Hill's election agent is not unknown to us though. It's Chris Hill.

This curious isolation grows even more curious when you consider that just up the road in Blackpool, Roy Goodwin, the BNP's North-West regional organiser, claims to run the most successful branch in the country, with regular attendance, he has stated, of up to three hundred people. Yet not one of those three hundred has come over to give Chris Hill a helping hand.

There are two reasons for this. One is that Goodwin, the subject of numerous complaints from his local membership for his bullying and aggressive behaviour, was lying about the numbers. A few weeks ago, he stated to the Blackpool Gazette that the branch saw 'fifty to seventy' attendees - a far cry from three hundred - which might also explain why Blackpool BNP are only standing in seven seats rather than going for a full slate. Too many, of course, but not quite the success story Goodwin would have us believe. Information that we have indicates that the true number is around twenty to twenty-five, which ties in pretty well to the seven candidates. Barrow, which we believe also comes under Roy Goodwin, is an even more disastrous branch (though nowhere near as bad as Lancaster). For weeks, Mike Ashburner, the local BNP mouthpiece has been droning on about how fast the party is growing in the town and how successful they are on the doorstep. How many candidates are standing for the party in Barrow? One. Who is it? Guess. Oh alright, Mike Ashburner.

The BNP always lies about its attendance for some reason. When we have a meeting, we count the people there and that's the number that appears in the records. Anyone involved with the BNP seems to have a problem with counting. According to Chris Hill, there were two hundred and fifty attendees at the BNP 'national' conference in Blackpool and just thirty-five protestors. According to the BBC, us and numerous commentators, there were fifty to sixty at the conference and two hundred of us, give or take half a dozen. An extremely large mistake for engineer Hill to make.

The other reason Blackpool hasn't bothered supporting Hill is that he has the reputation of being foolishly arrogant. Well, he'd have to be, wouldn't he. The one-man-band that Lancaster BNP clearly is, would suit Hill down to the ground. It's only in that way that he can keep himself convinced that everything he says is right. A recent unwanted communication to us proves the point: 'Neither Copeland or Laidlaw were ever BNP members that a facts, live with it!The BNP did not claim Cottage had not been amember, just that he was not a member at the time...' Yes, the mistakes are all his.

Fact: David Copeland (the Soho bomber) was at one point a member of the BNP.
Fact: At the time of his arrest Laidlaw (who shot random people for no apparent reason) claimed to be a BNP member.
Fact: Robert Cottage was definitely a member of the BNP at the time of his arrest for possession of bomb-making materials.

Not that I'd want to get inside the head of anyone who considers the BNP a valid party but one wonders what goes on in there. One of the pledges on Hill's current leaflet states: '...to give the indigenous people of Lancaster a voice on the council'. Just what the hell does that mean? Is that meant to refer to white British people in Lancaster, because they're pretty well represented on the council already. Or is it meant to refer to Lancaster people who have lived here for generations? If that's the case, why should Hill represent them any more than anyone else - he's from Bradford. Not that we care but if that's a central pledge for his campaign, he's on another loser.

Someone asked the other day why Hill keeps sticking his nose into Skerton West and the only answer we heard that made any sense was that he hoped to make capital out of the old and thankfully almost-forgotten problems on Ryelands that involved Mal Hussein. Patently that's not working, hence the pitiful 93 votes he earned at the last by-election, most of which didn't come from Ryelands anyway. But someone speculated on Hill's reception on the estate should it become known that Nick Griffin, the BNP leader, once described people who live on housing estates as scum. Yes, indeed.

We've provided a poster which, in our opinion, should be posted on every council estate in Lancaster and Morecambe, but particularly on Ryelands where Hill is currently trying to spread his filth and lies. Let's see what the locals think of Hill after we start spreading the truth around a bit.