Hope not Hate campaiging in the sun

It's been a fantastic morning delivering leaflets with more unexpected faces from across the area coming out to help. Thanks so much to anyone who came along. We achieved far more than I expected on today. I'm hoping that this has been the case across the country but especially in Barking.

Philosophy Football have just released a new T-shirt which I think will make anyone look fetching in the Springtime weather. There's even music to go with it. :-)



A13 The Road from Cable Street to Barking

The A13 starts in Whitechapel, just round the corner from Cable Street where Oswald Mosley's Blackshirts were stopped in 1936. Travelling east to the Essex coast it passes by Barking and through Dagenham where the Hope not Hate campaign are seeking to stop Nick Griffin and the BNP in 2010. SPECIAL CAMPAIGN PRICE JUST £14.99. Philosophy Football's A13 shirt will help raise valuable funds for Hope not Hate in Barking, wherever you live it wear in support.

Available from Philosophy Football







After having the local BNP passing judgement on the neck lines of my clothing recently perhaps even they will appreciate it.

moving forward

It seems that people have been talking about me and my news.
So guess it must be time to have my say.
Since being told that I was no longer in the Labour party I have
• had good friends who has expressed genuine love and affection for me and a wish for me to move forward in a positive way.
• contacted by a Tory M P expressing profuse regret and stating respect for my hard work and integrity
• contacted by a recently born again Independent wishing to “share my pain”
• a Labour group leader looking for the mobile number of a colleague
For all those from all political persuasions who have given me messages of support, thank you for your very generous words.
To the BNP who reverted to gloating at the situation I find myself in ... all the more time to do anti-BNP campaigning. The events surrounding my exclusion from the Labour Party do not cloud my judgement about who are real political enemies.
The task now is to get political change for Northampton which delivers real benefits for the people living here and destroy the evil ... the racist and the fascist views in our communities.

It's been an interesting few days. Firstly the mass revulsion at the Jan Moir article in the Daily Mail. The writing had been based on hatred of Stephen Gately because of the way he chose to live his life and the way he used to love in his life. In many respects this terrible event and Jan Moir's choice to get a cheap headline out of his tragic death has propelled Boyzone into new found popularity in quarters they would never have found favour with.

Over the weekend a local Community Centre in the Northampton South constituency had their local BNP candidate introduce himself at their open day. The recent press reports of the stand that the Royal British Legion has taken in respect of offers of support from the BNP, highlights how charitable and community organisations can and will be aware of the damage association with extremist parties can do. Increasingly with the run up to the general election this are the kind of new choices and conflicts many will have to face.

On the issue of the question time appearance of Nick Griffin, we have to wait and see the impact of this level of exposure for the BNP. For the record allowing a holocaust denyer and the figure head of a racist organisation on mainstream television can never be the right thing to do.

Wanting to think the best of folk

With news rapidly running about town about the proposals to close down the Northampton Borough Council Cliftonville offices there are plenty of people worried about whether they have a future in their job.
In the mean time the BNP locally seem to have taken to heart campaigning against them with a series of offensive posts on their blog. They try to pass the requests for the age of consent to be lowered to 10 and hate messages to the african and caribbean community and asian community as infiltration ... the truth is ... the BNP and their supporters do hate and this is the essence of what they do whether they like to think of this happening or not.

Unlikely bed fellows

Apologies for the lack of posting but life has been busy of late. With the local BNP standing in two by-elections over the next few weeks (Daventry District Drayton Ward) and Kettering Borough Northfield Ward) there has been a lot to be keeping up with.

It was intriguing to find that the Northants Patriot blog had started trying to earn revenue with a Google ad's stream, particularly when one ad related to equality diversity training and another related to bespoke consultancy for equalities work in local government. Seems like exactly the kind of stuff that the blog seemed to spend it's time criticising as 'a waste of money and why don't these people get real jobs rather than using my council tax for something that might be more useful instead' rant. I do wonder what the companies listed would think if they knew the exposure that they were getting.

This all co-incided with the shift in government direction to include far right extremism as part of the prevention of violent extremism agenda. It's been a long time coming but at least it's there now. The recent graffiti attack on the Ramgaria Centre on Craven Street in Northampton which included the National Front emblem is clear evidence of why work in this area is so important.

The last couple of weeks have had their ups and downs. Firstly, the swanspool by election last thursday was a definate up.

June 2009
con 548 46.0
lib 162 13.6
lab 361 30.3
BNP 120 10.1
1191

July 2009
Con Bell, Paul Anthony 958 41.2
Lab Cass, Pat 543 23.3
Lib Dem White, Julie Dorothy 282 12.1
BNP Robinson, David Peter 274 11.8
Green Hornett, Jonathan T. 270 11.6

Labour 7 points up and the BNP 2 points down :-)

With a by election in daventry soon (albeit not yet announced) it's all reasons to get our act together.

Thank you so much to all the many activists that delivered and organised the anti -BNP leafleting and the printing of the leaflet ... a lot of learning this campaign that will do us proud for the next few years

Careful who's bandwagon you jump on

I have a lot of respect for Tim Hadland, having served as a borough councillor with him. I remember when he expressed his condolences at the death of my parents, he wasn't aware that they were Conservative voters. He said that they didn't seem to be on their voter identification list. I did let him know that I seemed to be on the Tory voter ID list given that I seemed to get all the promotional literature from them.

However the letter six of the letters page of the Chron today really does concern me.

With the local Northants Patriot website (local BNP website) hoping that muslims stay away from the march through the town this week, I believe it is a case of being careful what bandwagon that you are climbing on.

Talking to key Army recruitment personnel in the region they talk about the activities of the British army from this region returning from Afganistan. They talk in terms of those from the forces responsible in reconnecting electric and water supplies for the area that they were working in. The officer I spoke to, spoke in very emotive terms of the muslim officer killed alongside him when trying to undertake the task. Almost exclusively, the muslim community would accept the actions of this regiment as support for Afgani communities and would celebrate the courage and commitment to duty that these individuals have shown. No need to think the worst of people.

The Challenges of next summer

Over the weekend, there seemed to be part campaigning, part attending a Searchlight seminar in London. After putting out the best part of 2000 Labour leaflets in Kings Heath with colleagues from Northampton South CLP and a neighbouring one, it was a bit strange going to the Searchlight seminar.

When it comes to anti-fascist campaigning, for quite some time it has seemed to me that there are those people who go to meetings and talk about anti-fascist campaigning and those people that do it. For those people that go and talk about it, it does seem to be significant time and effort in discussing why we are where we are.

For those of us involved in local anti-fascist work, often it feels quite a lonely place to be, with fairly minimal support nationally and people often looking for someone to blame when things go wrong and people wanting to take the credit when things go right.

Next summer with County and Euro-elections with a guaranteed BNP presence in both, a group of us are trying to pull together a meeting on our approach to this. Up to date our activity has been very localised, however the euro-elections present us with a far different challenge. With the last combined UKIP and BNP vote at the last Euros of 26% and the BNP polling in the mid-20ies to 30%, it's a factor that needs to be treated even more seriously than before.