Tory couple from Dudley quit party in row over 'racist' doll

These are the photos that caused two prospective Tory councillors to resign from the party

Bill and Star Etheridge are seen posing with a controversial golly doll. 41-year-old Mr Etheridge was due to stand for the Tories in the Dudley Council elections in May along with his wife Star, aged 39. But a Conservative Party disciplinary committee suspended the pair after a complaint from party volunteers. The couple have now resigned from the party and Mr Etheridge said he was joining UKIP instead.

Mr Etheridge said he posted the pictures on Facebook to promote a “healthy debate” about the toy after the couple bought one on a market stall. He and Star organise their local branch of The Campaign Against Political Correctness.

“We thought we’d post pictures of it as an interesting talking-point and to provoke a healthy debate,” said the dad-of-three. “We never said ‘bring back gollies’. I’m aware some people may be offended, but they’re offended on behalf of someone else – they’re do-gooders.”

Conservative disciplinary committee secretary Stephen Phillips wrote to the pair about their 30-day suspension on Friday. He said: “The committee is satisfied that the complaint raises serious issues that might bring the party into disrepute and/or that you may be guilty of conduct not compatible with membership of the Conservative Party.”

A Conservative Party spokesman said: “Following a complaint by members of the voluntary party in the area, two Conservative members have resigned from the party.”

Mr Etheridge added: “We do not intend to be silenced and will increase our campaigning against political correctness.”

And UKIP MEP Mike Nattrass said he would be welcomed into their party. He said: “Bill’s decision to join UKIP is yet another boost for the party and an endorsement of all the good work we have done here.”

Birmingham Mail

Excalibur - what's new in the world of crap?

Excalibur - rubbish for all occasions

If there is one thing that the BNP can be relied upon for, it is that it embraces the grotesque in the guise of patriotism, and nowhere is this more apparent than in the catalogue of disasters that is the Excalibur stock list.

For some strange reason (possibly to do with the recent full moon), I found myself perusing the delightful 'What's New' section at the Excalibur site. It was rather like stepping into Harrods - everything was gaudy, overpriced and on many levels deeply offensive. Yet there is a compulsion to go on looking and a feeling akin to that you had when you were a kid and you picked at a scab on your knee. You know it's going to hurt, it's certainly not going to get any better and yet the lure of mingled pain and revulsion is irresistable.

Bizarrely, I expected Excalibur to have made some small concessions to the possibility that non-whites may have suffered a complete mental collapse and joined up after the recent rule change that finally allows them to become members of the party that has been slagging them off and lying about them for years. I was disappointed (though not entirely unexpectedly). The white mug is still there, as is the 'Golly Collection'. And the interminable (and terminally boring) tomes by Arthur Kemp, proving over and over again that the white man is superior in every way to anyone anywhere of any other colour ever, so there.

The white man - in the form of the third-rate market-stall trader Arthur Kemp - is certainly superior in stocking cheap crap for his gullible bargain-hunting customers to waste their hard-earned readies on. Here's an example, and I make no apologies to the companies who produce this rubbish (which, I'm told, are Chinese).

Tudor Educational Colouring Postcards A set of 4 colouring postcards with Tudor images on the front and a postcard design on the reverse with educational information. Each pack is supplied with 6 [very short] pencils.

There's far worse. Last year's Red, White and Blue, the BNP's annual piss-up and golly-burning weekend, was a disaster for the party. Even though it was the tenth RWB and was much publicised in party bulletins, it was poorly attended and, we're told, lost a great deal of money. It was also met by a massive demonstration by anti-fascists. Thus, the party is still trying to flog off all the T-shirts and badges it couldn't find buyers for at the RWB, nearly a year later. Free badge or not - it's still shite.

Special Offer: RWB 2009 T-Shirt and Badge
£10 Size Small Buy both official RWB 2009 T-Shirt and Badge together for just £10 postage and packaging included.

Naturally, the What's New section of Excalibur has books about Spitfires, Vikings, the evils of multi-culturalism - and an idea they nicked from us and our Yearbook - Headline: The Best of BNP News. Cheeky buggers. But tat and tackiness win the day, and this little delight should win a prize for the ghastliest piece of merchandise seen this year.

Union Jack Tie A smart tie containing a pattern made up of Union flags. Eyecatching.

Eye-watering, certainly. The worst is, however, reserved for last. In the interests of, no doubt, welcoming non-whites into the party, the BNP greets them with what can only be construed as a not so subtle warning should Nick Griffin ever become Queen.

Queen Elizabeth I's Blackamoore Expulsion Order It is not widely known that between 1596 and 1601, Queen Elizabeth I ordered the expulsion of all non-indigenous Third World people, whom she called "blackamoores" from Britain. Now, for the first time ever, Excalibur is proud to exclusively offer reproductions of the original expulsion orders...Both original handwritten orders have been reproduced in full on fine quality thick paper, suitable for framing or display.

Why? Why would anyone be 'proud' to offer a reproduction of an expulsion order for blacks, even if it is four hundred years old? Only a complete moron would want to have such a thing framed and hanging in his home and only a party that is unrepentantly and blatantly racist to the core would ever dream of selling such garbage.

What's new in Excalibur's world of crap? Not a lot really - but it certainly is all crap.

Children of Hate - Fighting Back Against Racist Parents

Sixteen-year-old Stephan Mills rejected his father's racism despite years of indoctrination.
Psychologists say that is more common than many people think. Stephan's mother says that
thanks to her ex-husband, Stephan "had to relearn [how] to be a civilized human."

When Stephan Mills was 10 or 11, his father sat him and his older sister down after supper one night and told them that if they ever became emotionally involved with someone of color, he would kill them.

"I just nodded in agreement," said Stephan, now 16.

The incident seemed normal to a boy who for years had been steeped in his father's bigotry. Arthur Kemp, a South African white supremacist who has ties to British and American hate groups, indoctrinated his children with racist and anti-Semitic beliefs from the time they were very young. Stephan mostly adopted those views as his own. Several years ago, however, he rejected all that his father stood for. The experience would radically change his life and lead to his ongoing estrangement from his father, who's now divorced from his mother and believed to be living in England.

"Stephan's resentment toward his father is based partly on the fact that, in his sister's words, he had to relearn to be a civilized human," said his mother, Karen Mills. (Karen and Stephan Mills live near Johannesburg, South Africa, and the Intelligence Report interviewed them by phone and E-mail).

There was a lot to relearn. Arthur Kemp "was a very involved and doting father" when his children were small, Karen Mills said. He read to them often, carefully choosing books he felt would reinforce his ideology. Among them were the original "Noddy" series, English children's books that featured Golliwogs, dark-skinned caricatures that were later removed from the text because they were deemed racist. In one of Kemp's favorite Noddy books, the Golliwogs steal Noddy's car. Kemp enjoyed telling his children that the Golliwogs' theft of the car amounted to typical behavior for blacks.

But it wasn't only in books that Kemp found justification for his racism; post-apartheid South Africa offered plenty for him to complain about. "He tried to imprint on the children how bad Africa and everything here was," Karen Mills wrote. After striking workers toppled trashcans, for instance, "Arthur took the children into the main streets of the town and made them walk among the rubbish."

He also forbade socializing with non-white children. If they arrived at a friend's party to find that a black child had also been invited, Kemp made his children go home. When Stephan was six, his father reluctantly took him and his sister to swimming lessons at a public pool where one of the children turned out to be black. "He told us to get out and that we were leaving," said Stephan, who now uses his mother's maiden name. "I was still pretty young so I didn't really understand what was going on."

Kemp's attitude didn't change even when his children's health was at stake. When the family was living in Britain, he plucked his 6-year-old daughter, Joanne, from the dentist's chair rather than allow her to be treated by an Indian dentist, Karen Mills said. As a result, she suffered for three days with a tooth abscess.

When his children grew older, he allowed them to listen only to "white resistance" bands. Rap, especially, was prohibited. Although baseball caps, sneakers, baggy pants and big T-shirts were in fashion, he considered these items "ghetto nigger" clothing and wouldn't let his children wear them. He also relished showing them articles and statistics that purported to prove that blacks were inferior. He contended that blacks could never be race car drivers because they have poor depth perception, that they cannot swim because their bones are too dense, that they are not as intelligent because their brains are smaller.

"The children were actively encouraged to be vocal about their views and to challenge their peers," Karen Mills wrote. "In Stephan's case in particular, this resulted in him being ostracized and made an outcast as he followed his father's lead."

Stephan said he had few friends until his first year of high school. At times, he suffered from depression because his father's brainwashing had so alienated him from his peers, his mother said.

"I wasn't really someone that people wanted to hang around with," Stephan said. "They regarded me as weird because I was constantly talking about Hitler."

Karen Mills said she initially went along with her husband's views to please him, but the marriage grew troubled as he devoted himself increasingly to far-right politics. She refused to read his opus on white superiority, March of the Titans: A History of the White Race, and criticized him in front of their children.

With his marriage collapsing, Arthur Kemp became violent, especially toward Stephan, Karen Mills said. Once, when Stephan was about eight, he hit his son's face until his nose bled and blood spattered on the bedroom wall, she said. He stopped only when the maid's screams brought Karen rushing into the room and she pulled Kemp off Stephan. Later, Kemp allegedly beat Stephan while his mother was at work. The backs of Stephan's legs were so swollen that he could not bend them to get into his bath. "If you ever hit my child again," she told Kemp, "I'll kill you."

Still, she did not report the incidents to the police. "You try to block it out because maybe it's more than you can deal with," said Mills, a lawyer who now works for the South African government. "You hope that it'll resolve itself and turn a blind eye."

Kemp dismissed the allegations from his former wife in an E-mail to the Intelligence Report. "It is all a pack of lies from a mentally ill person," he wrote. "I am disappointed that you would stoop to exploiting a person with severe psychological problems in this way." Karen Mills responded that Kemp has always claimed she's mentally ill simply because she disagrees with him.

Mills still feels guilty for allowing her children to suffer what she now sees as both physical and emotional abuse. "Why couldn't I do something?" she asked. "I just never stood up to him."

Kemp's persistence in forcing his beliefs on his children — along with his disengagement from their lives as he immersed himself in white nationalism — led them to question their father and the values he espoused, Karen Mills said. In a September 2008 post on the anti-racist site Lancaster Unity, Stephan called his father a "racist ass" and said he should be deported to South Africa. He wrote: "I remember almost every night when we would ask for a bedtime story (when most NORMAL fathers would read their children a normal book) he would instead tell us stories about how the white race was all supreme and then read us chapters from his horrible book "March of the White Titans" [sic]. Well dad if you ever read this or even hear about it I just wanted to let you know that I HATE YOU!! You have no idea what i went through at school because of you, you twisted my mind and made my entire childhood a horrible misery."

As his wife and children lost respect for him, Kemp withdrew further from the family. Karen Mills believes that's because they no longer fit his image of the model right-wing family that would help him achieve his political goals. "His political beliefs are the absolute be-all and end-all of his life," she said. "I think the reason why he's cut the children off is they don't conform to his political beliefs and aspirations."

Instead, "he began to seek out people who admired him and particularly his book," she recalled. "The admiration, and in particular the view of him as this great right-wing academic, became his main driving force."

He left the family in November 2006. "Picture this situation," Stephan wrote in November 2008 on Lancaster Unity. "I am fast asleep on thursday morning and when i wake i find that he is gone and then i receive a phone call from him telling me he is on a flight to London… THIS ASSHOLE DIDNT EVEN HAVE THE MANNERS TO SAY GOODBYE TO MY FACE!! I have not seen my father in now [a]bout two and [a] bit years."

Karen Mills said Kemp has had almost no contact with his children since the divorce. "I don't think there's any way that Arthur could fix the broken relationship with Stephan," she said. Nonetheless, "Stephan has gone through something of a catharsis." In addition to his posts on Lancaster Unity, he chose to discuss his father when he was assigned to give a school speech on someone who had influenced him — only he said his father's influence had been entirely negative. Now, his social life is improving, and he has resolved to be as unlike his father as possible. "I am stuck with some of his traits and characteristics — Mom used to joke with me that I have the Kemp laziness gene — but definitely not his political views," he said.

Yet there's no bringing back the years he lost to his father's hate. "You," he wrote to him in the September 2008 Lancaster Unity post, "will never understand what you have done to me."

Southern Poverty Law Center

Row brewing over Premier League golliwogs

A row is brewing between a Powys-based seller of racist novelty goods and the Premier League over the use of club insignia and colours for racist memorabilia.

Patriot Products, run by BNP supporter Roger Phillips, sells a range of “official” merchandise alongside BNP badges, “Enoch Powell was right” paraphernalia and golliwogs wearing the colours of clubs like Manchester United, Portsmouth and Wolves. Patriot Products was launched at this years BNP Red, White and Blue rally.

The site is managed by the Green Arrow, an anti-Semitic, anti-Moslem blog run by Paul Morris, a BNP activist and conspiracy theorist.

The Premier League, Liverpool FC, Chelsea FC, Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur FC have Nothing British’s dossier and are considering their options. The legal costs of a battle with this irritating little site may seem disproportionately large. However, the football industry has invested so much to rid itself of assocations with racism that any complacency could be very costly in the long term.

Nothing British

Angel-faced racist aged 12 - Girl burns golly at BNP's Red, White and Blue

A little girl grins with glee as she holds a golly over a fire . . . while a jeering BNP politician finds the doll guilty of BEING BLACK during a vile mock trial and execution. The baying crowd cheers when the toy - dubbed Winston - is condemned and dropped on to the flames to "die". Goading on the assembled adults and kids, the politician, a local council candidate, yells out these chilling words: "Let's get a real one . . . in the town we'll find one or two."

The sickening stunt was staged at the British National Party's annual FAMILY festival last weekend - yet the BNP insists it is NOT racist as part of its successful ploy to attract votes in elections. Around 1,200 members converged on fields at Codnor, Derbys, for the Red White and Blue "fun" weekend. Our undercover reporter, posing as a supporter to gain entry to the members-only event, secretly filmed racism everywhere.

(Left, GUILTY: Golly 'Winston' is held by girl before being dropped on the fire)

For £1 a go, people were throwing wet sponges at a man in a Barack Obama mask locked in stocks. Elsewhere stalls were selling T-shirts with slogans like It's A White Thing and books such as Race, Evolution and Behavior - which insists whites give birth to larger-brained babies and blacks are prone to crime. Supporters gave Nazi-style salutes and shouted Sieg Heil.

And in the "political tent", party chairman and MEP Nick Griffin, 50, was setting out how his party would deal with proposed anti-discrimination laws forcing the BNP to change its whites-only membership policy. He said: "Since if we want to survive we will be forced to let them in, the key will be before we do so to change the party - to ensure that whoever's coming in doesn't have any control."

Saturday night was the climax of the festival - and when the vileness reached its peak. Firstly, around 50 skinheads took part in a PAGAN ceremony to summon occult powers for their cause. They chanted incantations as they passed around and drank from an animal horn filled wth mead.

(Left, JUDGE & JURY: Coombes (seated), Hamilton (top left), and a BNP mate)

Two hours later, local council candidates John Coombes, of Maidenhead, Berks, and Dick Hamilton of Marlow, Bucks, were sitting with others around a brazier. Hamilton's ghettoblaster blared out songs supporting Hitler and attacking "niggers". Then began the "trial" led by Coombes, 45.

A 12-year-old girl there with her dad (we are protecting her identity) held a golly called Winston over the fire as Coombes "charged" him with "mugging, rape, drug dealing". He sneered: "Right Winston, you're about to get cooked. Anything else to say? Says he ain't a drug dealer. He thinks he's not black. He's charged with being black. Now get on there."

Skinhead Hamilton chipped in: "If he jumps off he's innocent." Coombes went on: "He's guilty, guilty as charged. Let's get a real one - in the town we'll find one or two. They'll also be guilty of the heinous crimes I charged him with - may God forgive your horrible soul." Coombes repeated the charges then added: "He may have appeared innocent to you lot but I'm sure he done lots of things wrong."

During the weekend the party's other MEP Andrew Brons used his stint in the political tent to compare Muslims to SMALLPOX during his speech. He declared: "I'm less concerned about the presence of mosques than the presence of the people that use them. Being worried about the presence of a particular mosque is almost like looking at a disease like smallpox and saying it's a problem with spots."

Ex-BNP cultural officer Jonathan Bowden, 47, also attacked Islam, and dubbed Jewish Israel as "cancer". He bleated: "The only way this (Muslim) problem will be solved is if they go back - go back to their civilisation. (But) we must renounce support for Israel. Israel is the cancer that lies at the heart of much of this."

(Left, SICK SALUTE: Party supporters make the Nazi sign and yell out 'Sieg Heil')

And Greater London Authority member Richard Barnbrook joked about BLACKING himself up. The deputy opposition leader of Barking and Dagenham council boasted: "I've got balls made of steel. In my own ward, if I go around naked, and put boot polish on my face, they'd still love me."

In the evenings, supporters sat round campfires venting hate. During one chat, Stockport area organiser Duncan Warner explained to our reporter in sick twisted logic why using the word "Paki" was OK.

"Paki means pure. So why do you get offended when all that they're doing is calling you pure?" he whined. "You get called a Paki, how can you get offended by that?"

Elsewhere party supporter Danny Marshall, of Cotmanhay, Derbys, and his girlfriend Bev boasted of using intimidation tactics to rid the village of foreigners who'd moved there. Bev said: "Where I live is National Front. It's BNP. There's this black family that's just moved in from Nigeria. An hour later they were out...They were coming to nick our jobs. They had an hour to get out of their premises - from us people, ourselves."

Marshall said: "The Lithuanians and Czechs are sneaking in because they're white. You find the fuckers on the doorstep."

Bev added: "These guys from Poland came into Cotmanhay and did a car wash. Somebody wrote BNP on their sign - once that was there they were gone...guess who that was? Me and Danny. I wrote BNP."

Elsewhere another man moaned: "If things don't become any better, and I become older, so I'm 70 or 75, I'll take a GPMG (machine gun) - seriously, I'm not joking here - and I'm going to fucking destroy lots of people.

On one occasion shouts of "Reds, reds" broke out. BNP members grabbed hammers and axes then charged to the perimeter fence. A lone anti-facism protester trying to get into the festival was stopped by police before the thugs got to him.

During the weekend police arrested 19 of the protesters outside - and one BNP member. Meanwhile, half an hour after the sick golly burning the BNP's London organiser Bob Bailey arrived. With him was Griffin - who stated last October "the BNP is not racist". Together they warmed themselves on the embers.

NoTW

Tea and mugs at the BNP garden party

An English village, a summer festival – what could be more agreeable? But beneath the traditional trappings lies an air of menace.

Showing their true colours - an Obama effigy comes in for a soaking at the RWB

A man wearing Islamic dress and an Osama Bin Laden mask poked his head through wooden stocks and was pelted with sponges for his trouble, while a neighbouring stall did a roaring trade in golliwog mugs and Union flag badges. This was not your average summer fete. A bouncy castle and ice-cream van did little to lighten the mood at the British National Party's festival yesterday.

BNP members, huddled under tarpaulin and shivering in their shorts, appeared less than thrilled by the grey Derbyshire skies and chill breeze that heralded the start of their annual summer gathering.

Listed in the Domesday Book, the sleepy village of Codnor in the Amber Valley district is a former mining community, with a population of just under 5,000. Only 12 miles from Derby and 14 from Nottingham, Codnor (chillingly for those who live there) is regarded by the BNP as "the heart of a rural district whose ancient history and cultural heritage exemplify all that is steadfastly and typically Anglo-Saxon".

The "Red, White and Blue" festival was billed as a family event. In this case the "family" extended beyond mum, dad and a couple of sticky-fingered children. One cousin from out of town was missing: a US white supremacist was banned from entering Britain for the festival last week. But others had rallied and speeches were scheduled from Roberto Fiore, leader of the Italian far-right Forza Nuova and a friend of the BNP leader, Nick Griffin.

And, of course, there were members of the BNP "family" from closer to home. "It is nice to speak to people from different countries who share our views," said Dave Clarke, 56, who has attended the event for the past five years. Like many at the festival, Mr Clarke wore his political allegiance on his chest: a T-shirt bearing the St George's Cross and a row of BNP stickers decorating the brim of his hat.

Most who attended yesterday came with their children, and in this Mr Clarke was no exception. He brought his 16-year-old daughter, Rebecca, hoping she would "learn about her culture and heritage, things that are being forgotten".

Along with family, British culture and heritage were high on the agenda. When Mr Griffin picked up the microphone in the "Political Tent", it was not to speak of the party's political future but about researching his family's history. He encouraged others to do the same.

Numerous posters celebrated British soldiers who fought in the First and Second World Wars, while in one corner of the field a group of white wooden crosses commemorated "people who have died as a result of anti-white violence". It was one of many surreal touches in an event that both fascinated and appalled in its apparent normality: a Ford Ka was up for grabs in a raffle, while a coconut shy featured images of Tony Blair, Jack Straw and Gordon Brown, offering festival-goers the chance to "knock a traitor off the stick".

Amid makeshift cafés selling tea and cakes sat marquees run by local BNP branches. At the Manchester stall, "Then and Now" displays contrasted photographs of white 1960s schoolboys with modern schools in the city's multicultural Moss Side area, beside slogans claiming that schools have been "dumbed down" to meet the needs of immigrants.

Media entry was tightly controlled. All but the most like-minded journalists, myself included, were assigned two minders; some publications were denied access altogether.

Things were getting a little ugly on the other side of the iron gates and thick hedgerows – not to mention countless security guards and policemen – that separated BNP members from about 1,500 anti-fascist protesters. The Derbyshire force put the cost of policing this year's protest at some £500,000, and reported a score of arrests as demonstrators hurled missiles, including eggs and flour, in frustration at being unable to get to the BNP members. Many had travelled to Codnor with groups such as Stop the BNP, Unite Against Fascism and the Trades Union Congress.

"We know they have a hardcore neo-Nazi membership, but in holding events like this they are trying to secure new members," said 43-year-old Dean Ryan, from London. "We're here to remind those people that this is not just a fun day out. I'm planning to protest peacefully, but I've seen the BNP be violent and as far as I'm concerned self-defence is no offence."

Snippets of chants from the protesters drifted across the site. Refrains such as "What shall we do with the BNP? What shall we do with the BNP? String them up like Mussolini" created a sense of unease, although the voices were frequently drowned out by the constant whirring of a police helicopter circling overhead.

The BNP professed itself happy with the way the day had turned out. "We've chosen a very secure site here," said Mr Griffin. "We're tucked away, so we're not in people's faces. It is discreet. We haven't done much marketing this year, but I'd say we've got more than last year."

The people who live nearby were considerably less happy. For them, the gathering had been as much of a nuisance as they had predicted. With roads closed and hundreds of protesters chanting, local residents do not look forward to the festival, which has been held in the town for the past three years.

Kevin Grant, 50, who lives less than a mile from the festival site, viewed the whole thing as an irritant: "Last year I was called a neo-Nazi by protesters, and I don't even vote for the BNP. This year we've been told to stay in our houses all day."

Independent

Campaigners' victory keeps BNP out of Hastings

Local PCS reps led a protest against the British National Party's plans to hold a Christmas quiz and social evening Ore community centre in Old London Road on Monday night (8 December 2008). However when local media made the community centre aware of the demo late yesterday afternoon, management backed down and cancelled the BNP’s booking.

Hastings PCS rep and delegate from the newly relaunched Hastings and District TUC Trades Council, Nigel Sheahan, hailed the decision as a major victory:

“As soon as we saw the Hastings Observer article last Friday about this event we organised reps from unions across the local area to come to hand out leaflets at the event. Fortunately the community centre cancelled on the BNP when they realised the strength of feeling. We needed to point out the public that by holding this event in a council-owned facility and selling golliwogs and other ‘patriotic Christmas gifts’ the BNP were clearly trying to stir up racial tension. Fortunately the community centre cancelled on the BNP when they realised the strength of feeling.”

Chris Laverick, local organiser for Love Music Hate Racism who joined in the protest added, “Its great that the combined efforts of us all has forced this positive decision, I am overjoyed that the community centre saw sense and kicked out the racists”.

Campaigners will be writing to East Sussex County Council for an explanation and an assurance that the BNP will not be welcome to use council facilities in the area in future. Protests are also being planned by anti-fascist campaigners for proposed BNP Christmas events in Hove (today, 10 December 2008) and Crawley (Saturday, 13 December 2008).

Wired Gov

Community centre bans BNP after Golliwog row

The venue set to host the British National Party's controversial Christmas party tonight has pulled the plug on it after a host of complaints.

The Ore Community Centre in London Road had been hired by the party to stage its festive fundraiser at a cost of £10 an hour. However, the BNP sparked widespread outrage after announcing it would be selling Golliwog dolls at the event alongside St George crosses, Union Jacks and BNP regalia.

Critics branded the dolls racist and condemned the BNP as biggotted far-right extremists - demanding to know why a community centre would allow such a group to use its facilities.

At the time (last Thursday) a spokesman for the centre said the BNP used the hall on a monthly basis and that they "had never had any problems with them". However, he later confirmed a meeting would take place to decide whether or not the BNP was a suitable client. Now, hours before the event was set to take place, it seems the committee has decided to ban the right-wing party - much to the disgust of its local organiser.

BNP bigwig Nick Prince has slammed the decision. He said: "The British National Party has used the venue since April 1 2008 and has always treated the venue with total respect and there had never been a problem or an incident."

He claimed he was informed by telephone and told the decision was taken after pressure from certain individuals - individuals Mr Prince believes include a host of local politicians. Hastings MP Michael Foster and local Labour leader Jeremy Birch were among those who criticised the controversial BNP last week.

Mr Prince said: "I believe it is pressure from the likes of Cllr Birch and Mr Foster that has started this. A community centre should be used by all for all and there is no reason for the British National Party not to be allowed to use it."

The Christmas party, which was set to include a quiz and Activist of the Year prize, was due to be picketed by anti-fascist protestors. Representatives from Hastings and District Trades Council, Unite Against Fascism and Love Music Hate Racism had all planned to protest against the BNP outside tonight's event.

Hastings and St. Leonards Observer

BNP slammed for selling 'Golliwog' dolls at Christmas do

The British National Party have sparked a new row by advertising Golliwog dolls for sale at its Christmas party.

A flyer sent out by the party this week advertising a Christmas quiz and social evening set to take place at Ore Community Centre in Old London Road on Monday night. Alongside the time and details of the festive bash was a line advertising a wide range of Golliwog merchandise on sale and it is this that has caused the most outrage. The dolls are seen by many as racist but in recent years have been used by the far-right as a symbol of political correctness gone mad.

The term was first used in Florence Upton's 1895 book The Adventures of Two Dutch Dolls and subsequently picked up by Enid Blyton, who included a Golliwog in her Noddy books. Since then Golliwog has been seen by many as a derogatory term for a black person.

Just last year a shop in Rye was criticised in The Observer for selling Golly dolls and the news the local BNP will be flogging the dolls alongside St George crosses, Union Jacks and BNP regalia has sparked a host of angry complaints.

Chris Laverick, who recently organised a Love Music Hate Racism gig in Hastings, was one of many who was appalled. He said: "I understand the BNP is selling Golliwog dolls at there events. They clearly think that is amusing. That shows us that underneath their new image of suits and respectability there is still the racist and fascist thug that we remember from the 70's and 80's."

Hastings MP Michael Foster was equally outraged. He said: "I am surprised a community centre is dealing with an extremist group such as the BNP. What is more outrageous is the fact they are provocatively selling Golliwogs as a perfect Christmas gift."

Councillor Jeremy Birch, also condemned the BNP. He said: "This just confirms that this is a racist organisation. By selling these dolls as Christmas presents they are basically saying they are a party just for white people. I am also disappointed that a community centre meant to be serving local people has agreed to let an extremist group use its facilities."

A spokesman for the Ore Community Centre confirmed the BNP used the hall on a monthly basis, paying £15 an hour to do so, and that they "had never had any problems with them". However, the source added they would be holding a committee meeting to decide whether it was appropriate to let them continue to do so.

Nick Prince, the leader of the local BNP, defended the decision to sell the dolls. He said they also sold Golly fridge magnets and a range of patriotic toys such as teddy bears with England flag t-shirts on. He said: "Golliwogs are traditional toys which pre-date teddy bears by five years. People have a choice whether or not to buy them. If they offend people then they should not buy one. There is huge demand for Golliwog toys. We have actually sold out but we will be getting more in stock."

Bexhill Observer