anti-fascism | ukwatch.net

Is a recession good news for the BNP?

JamieSW — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 18:13:48 +0000

Conventional wisdom suggests that the British National Party will benefit politically from a recession. Government ministers certainly seem to think so. Journalists think so. And the BNP themselves certainly think so.

With unemployment likely to hit two million by the end of the year and house prices dropping 15% in the past 12 months, most people are feeling the pinch. The government’s response to the credit crunch might have boosted its poll ratings in the short term but it could be the far-right BNP that benefits when the recession really bites.

“Economic meltdowns are one of the drivers of political revolutions, and the BNP must be ready to take advantage of the mess all of the other parties have made of the economy,” David Hannam, the BNP deputy treasurer, told a party meeting recently.

He went on to explain the party’s line of attack. “Each immigrant who entered Britain decreased job prospects for native British workers. Our freedom is linked to the financial state of the country, and in a recession it is the workers who are first and hardest hit. The truth is that in an economically declining society, the worker is hit, but even in a so-called economically growing society, it is the worker who also gets hit. Successful monopolies are a by-product of globalism, and it is monopolies that decrease the demand for workers.”

His view is backed by party leader Nick Griffin who is confidently boasting that the BNP will benefit enormously from an economic downturn.

The belief of a far-right gain is supported by the Labour MP Jon Cruddas. “I’ve got a sense of foreboding about what lies ahead,” he told the BBC. “It will make a qualitative difference in terms of the context within which they’re allowed to perpetuate their scapegoating and myth-making.”

The government, meanwhile, is worried that an economic downturn would result in increased racial tension and violence between communities and even terrorism. In a 12-page internal memo, leaked to the Conservatives two months ago, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith relayed her concern over the consequences of an economic crisis. “There is a risk of a downturn increasing the appeal of far-right extremism and racism, which presents a threat as there is evidence that grievances based on experiencing racism are one of the factors that can lead to people becoming terrorists.”

The memo added that a downturn would affect the need for migrant workers, particularly in jobs such as construction where they make up a large proportion of the workforce. “Increased public hostility to migrants” was predicted to result from heightened competition for employment.

The government is so concerned that it has recently established a new police taskforce to monitor racist violence.

Controversy

Last month the new Immigration Minister controversially weighed into the debate. Phil Woolas told The Times that immigration became an “extremely thorny” subject if people were losing their jobs.

“It’s been too easy to get into this country in the past and it’s going to get harder,” he said.

Employers should, he believes, put British people first, or they will risk fuelling racism. “In times of economic difficulties, racial stereotyping becomes stronger but also if you’ve got skills shortages you should, as a government, attempt to fill those skills shortages with your indigenous population.”

Woolas was careful to include all British people in his British first policy, highlighting the high levels of unemployment affecting the British Bangladeshi community. He claimed that it was all too easy for an employer to hire a migrant to fill a job rather than to retrain British people of all races.

While Woolas was actually addressing some tough issues, including many which have wrongly been ignored for too long, he left himself open to attack with a series of incendiary quotes which he should have known would cause offence. He promised not to allow Britain’s population to rise above 70 million and attacked “health tourism”.

“It’s a national health service – it’s not an international health service,” he said.

Woolas has not been alone in raising difficult and controversial issues. Trevor Phillips, head of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, also weighed into the debate last month. Speaking ahead of an address to a CBI conference, Phillips said: “After forty years in which it was impolite to speak frankly about immigration policy, we now must be able to address this fundamental aspect of economic policy without embarrassment or without fear of being labelled closet racists or open-border fantasists.

“In what is to come, the best defence against prejudice against immigrants will be to make those who resent them competitive, to give them a place in society.

“We may need to do so with the sort of special measures we’ve previously targeted at ethnic minorities. But the name of the game today is to tackle inequality, not racial special pleading.”

This was not his first foray into this terrain. He had previously stressed the importance of positive action to help white working class communities through the economic crisis. “What we are seeing is that there is a whole group of people, a large proportion of whom are white, who are going to suffer from this crisis who are going to be the people we should want to help, particularly because they come from the wrong side of town,” he said.

“We are going to have to do something special for them. We are going to have to put extra resources where young people can’t compete with migrants’ skills.

“And in some parts of the country, it is clear that what defines disadvantage won’t be black or brown, it will be white. And we will have to take positive action to help some white groups, what we might call the white underclass.”

Nothing is certain

However, there are dissenting voices to the view that the far right will necessarily gain from an economic downturn. “Although there tends to be a bit of moral panic about it, it’s never really happened in a way that, in any sense, threatens the domination of the political scene by the main parties,” Professor Colin Rallings, from Plymouth University, says.

He went on to stress that previous economic downturns had been accompanied by only short-term boosts for the right and were often geographically patchy.

Is Rawlings right? Will any boost for the far right be patchy and short-lived? Certainly recent history is on his side. The 1970s economic crisis failed to give any long-lasting boost to the National Front. Indeed, if anything, the political fortunes of the NF were already on the wane at the height of the crisis and certainly by the early 1980s, when unemployment topped three million and bank base rate was in double figures and reached over 15%, the NF hardly existed.

During the recession of the early 1990s, and despite widespread media-fuelled concern over refugees, the BNP remained a largely inconsequential political force.

A different world

There is reason to believe that events might be different this time around. Britain of today is very different from that of the late 1970s. The Cold War overshadowed British and indeed world politics. There was a vibrant left in Britain and a strong and very active trade union movement. The Second World War was still strong in public consciousness and nationalism was a dirty word.

Since then the Soviet Union has collapsed and Europe fragmented. Nationalism has become the driving ideology of the past 20 years and socialism and social democracy are experiencing an identity crisis of huge proportions. In the past year alone eight out of ten social democratic parties have been driven from power in Europe, partly to the benefit of the far right. Fascist and rightwing populist parties have been rising across western Europe and there is no reason to suggest that the same cannot happen in Britain.

Additionally, the BNP of today is quite different from the NF of the 1970s. The NF contested elections, but only in a half-hearted manner. For the NF leaders John Tyndall and Martin Webster elections were simply an organising tool but real power was going to be gained through control of the streets and by positioning themselves as ready to answer society’s call to restore social order.

By contrast, the BNP has understood some political realities. It has publicly dropped some of its hardline policies, such as compulsory repatriation, which it knew would not be accepted by the vast majority of the population, and it has turned to local politics. As a result the BNP is positioning itself as a real and lasting challenge to the main political parties, particularly Labour.

More importantly, the political terrain has changed. Disillusionment with the mainstream parties is at an all-time high, voting at an all-time low and active participation in political parties is, in too many communities, seemingly non-existent.

It is into this disillusionment that the BNP message is resonating. Race remains the cornerstone of BNP politics but its appeal is far wider and deeper. It is precisely because of this that the BNP could benefit enormously from an economic downturn.

In Stoke-on-Trent the BNP believes it can take control of the council within two years. If there had been a mayoral contest next spring there were many, including some government ministers, who believed the BNP could win. At 6% of the local population the non-white community is tiny compared to many other towns and cities across the country. Immigration and race are not the causes of the city’s problems but simply the prism through which the BNP allows local people to understand their problems and anger.

The same is true for many other areas where the BNP is doing well. The former mining communities of Rotherham, Heanor and Nuneaton, three other areas of BNP success, have relatively small BME populations but deep-rooted structural economic problems.

Compare that to the NF of the 1970s, which drew the bulk of its support from towns and cities, such as Leicester and Bradford, which experienced the greatest influx of non-white immigrants.

There are two other issues that differentiate the present from the 1970s. The Cold War has been replaced by a world defined by the “war on terror” and just as a recession could boost the far right, so fundamentalist religious groups will prosper.

As unemployment rises and disillusionment with mainstream parties deepens, friction between new and old communities will grow. Winding this up will be the BNP and other fascist groups on one side and fundamentalist religious groups, bent on demonising other communities and religions, on the other. There is a symbiotic relationship between these extremes, with both needing the other to justify their own existence.

This could play out on the streets, as we saw so vividly in Oldham and Burnley in 2001, or through a rise in domestic terrorism. It is this fear that is gripping the Home Office. We are already beginning to see a rise in violent racism and this is only likely to accelerate as the economy nosedives.

There has also been a rise in terrorism in recent times. While every Muslim plot attracts massive media attention, less known has been the increase in attempted far-right terrorism, both in Britain and across the continent. In 2007, ten people were arrested in alleged rightwing plots in Britain. While all were stopped before they were executed, it does raise the likelihood that rightwing terrorism, be it by individuals or small groups, will continue to grow. One can only imagine the consequences of a fascist bombing campaign against Muslim targets in Britain. Likewise, while the feel good factor following the decision to award London the Olympics probably helped to defuse a backlash against the London bombs of 2005, a similar bombing campaign amid an economic downturn might have a different outcome.

In the 1970s the trade unions played a crucial role in defeating the NF and today they have once again indicated their willingness to take a lead. But today’s world, particularly in the workplace, is very different from that of 30 years ago. The unions are weaker, more workplaces are un-unionised and also fragmented.

“The workplace is different from the 1970s,” says Paul Meszaros, secretary of Bradford Trades Council. “Back then workplaces were bigger and more unionised so it was more common for Asian and white people to work alongside each other. We were able to debate, argue and eventually find common ground.

“Today, workplaces are smaller and with communities living more separate lives and in different neighbourhoods within the city there are fewer opportunities for people to come together.”

Recession might be a gift to the BNP but whether it will exploit the opportunity remains to be seen. Despite its growing sophistication the BNP still struggles to win first-past-the-post elections. It has even performed poorly in recent by-elections, including some in traditional strongholds.

How opponents of the BNP react will also determine the potential electoral boost for the far right and this is where things need to change. The criticism of Woolas and Phillips has been strong and sometimes correct but it has also highlighted two fundamental issues. Firstly, a common unwillingness to debate difficult but very real issues and secondly an acknowledgement that progressives have partly contributed to the problem.

The error of identity politics

It is easy to criticise Woolas for his comments and of course some of his remarks echo the disastrous “British jobs for British workers” approach adopted by Gordon Brown last year. However, he was trying to grapple with some difficult issues, which all too many people prefer to ignore.

Likewise, Phillips’s call for preferential treatment for white working class communities has been met by a barrage of criticism, some of it justified, some not. Phillips is totally correct in saying that a growing number of white working class people feel ignored, abandoned and unrepresented. As I myself have argued previously, the BNP is providing an identity for sections of this group.

However, accepting the existence of these sub-groups and calling for preferential treatment is part of the problem in the first place. We no longer talk of a working class without sub-dividing it along racial lines. Playing identity politics is a very dangerous game and it is now coming back to haunt us. Too much government policy and spending, locally and nationally, is directed through the prism of race, which is unwittingly helping to create this “white” identity, which is in turn being exploited by the BNP. Too many progressive people have been complicit in this, knowingly or unknowingly.

To prevent the BNP from exploiting our economic worries, class needs to replace race in popular discourse. We shouldn’t have white unemployed or black unemployed but just unemployed. We shouldn’t talk about white workers or black workers but just workers. That isn’t to say that we should ignore groups or not recognise particular hardships or discrimination, but we have to find a way to bring people along together, to get them to understand a common interest and shared future. If we don’t then how can we complain when communal groups, including the white working class, compete for scarce resources.

Similarly, we need to develop a more secular approach. One of the successes of the anti-fascist and anti-racist struggle in the late 1970s was its secularism. This was particularly found within the Asian Youth Movement, which brought together young Asian people of different religious backgrounds. While accepting the right to faith, we again need to find ways to bring people from different religious backgrounds together and this is no easy task. It is not just a question of differences between Christian and Muslim communities. In today’s Britain there is widespread suspicion and distrust between many religions, another issue that has too long been ignored.

We must bring more politics (with a small p) into anti-fascism. Just as we have been arguing for the past couple of years that simply shouting “nazi” at the BNP is no longer sufficient, so we must recognise that just calling for “Hope” over hate is also inadequate. When people are struggling economically and perhaps see little hope around them, we need to be able to address some of the underlying issues that might make them susceptible to the BNP and answer directly racist myths. Hope is a positive concept but will only resonate when people feel good about the community in which they live and positive about their own economic future.

Fairness

However, we also need to show fairness in our approach. We need to demonstrate that we are fighting for everyone, regardless of colour of skin or religious background. We must also be prepared to criticise and condemn when it is necessary. Wrong is wrong, from whichever angle or community it derives.

Trade unions are in an excellent position to take on the BNP and its economic scapegoating, but it needs a different approach. Unions need to find a more direct way to engage with their members and their families than they do at present. A letter through the post or an article in a union journal is no substitute for a workplace meeting and human dialogue.

The road ahead will not be easy. A recession will increase insecurity and so suspicion and hostility between communities. As the job market shrinks and local resources become increasingly scarce so racism and bitterness will grow. The BNP could make huge advances in the next couple of years. Whether it does will partly depend on how we – government, unions and anti-fascists – respond.

Has Black History Month become too safe?

JamieSW — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 10:17:14 +0000

Every year in late September I get a flurry of emails from council officials telling me that October is Black History Month and that a number of events are taking place to celebrate it. These are typically accompanied by flyers featuring pictures of Mary Seacole or Nelson Mandela.

It’s very important that we should celebrate major black figures in history. But Black History Month has become very sanitised. It’s always the safest and least controversial figures that are put forward as its representatives.

Even though there’s a lot of talk about Mandela – who represents the overthrow of the racist apartheid system in South Africa – there is little mention of the mass struggles of black South Africans such as the Soweto uprising of 1976.

This is one reason why Black History Month is failing to connect with so many disaffected black youth. Another is the fact that more recent mass struggles of black people in Britain against racism – which would be directly relevant to young people today – are kept out of the picture.

Racism is still a cancer in society, and black youth feel this keenly. The gun and knife crime debate has led to increased police harassment of young black people.

Black people are seven times more likely to be stopped and searched than white people. Black children face higher levels of exclusion from school.

All this reminds me of the huge levels of racism black people faced when I was growing up in the 1970s and early 1980s. We felt that we were under siege.

There was vicious police persecution. I remember watching a group of white men jump out of a car, grab a Rastafarian man and beat him up. When people shouted for someone to call the police, one of the men took out his badge to reveal that they were the police.

There was also the racism of the fascist National Front (NF). We lived in Hoxton, east London, where the NF had its headquarters. This area was a bastion of racism. A pensioner spat at my sister and me as we walked down the street. People shouted, “Nigger, go home.”

But two events came together to drive back this tide of racism. The first was the anti-fascist movement, led by the Anti Nazi League and Rock Against Racism. This smashed the NF.

The people behind this movement in Hackney were mainly white, which helped me realise that a lot of people were anti-racist and that black and white could unite to fight racism. This was a very important stage of my life and it gave me a sense of hope.

The second event was the wave of riots that took place in Brixton, Toxteth, the St Pauls area of Bristol, Handsworth in Birmingham and other black inner city areas in the early 1980s.

This was black people saying that we’d had enough of racism. There was a sense that we had to move from being a persecuted sect to being a community that was proud to fight back.

There was a sea change in official attitudes after the riots. The government launched the Scarman inquiry into police racism. The media had to stop constantly demonising black people.

Today, when I tell young people about the racism my generation faced, there is a sense of disbelief that things were ever so bad. The fact that there is a generation that can’t imagine the racism that took place in Britain only 25 years ago shows the importance and effect of the struggles of that time.

Yet too many young people don’t know about these struggles. They hate the police, racism and their treatment at the hands of the authorities, but they don’t think anything can be done about it.

The establishment is now trying to roll back the gains that black people have made, but a benchmark has been set. There will be no going back to the levels of racism we saw in the 1970s.

As recession looms, councils and the government will be looking at areas where they can make cuts. In many areas this will mean cuts to black community facilities and youth provision.

We will need to fight against this. But black people face a lack of representation in official society. Many politicians and professionals are divorced from the black community.

After the Broadwater Farm riots in north London in 1985, local MP Bernie Grant made the immortal comment, “What the police got was a bloody good hiding.” That summed up how many people felt. It made people feel that here was a black politician who didn’t suck up to the racist establishment.

But the black politicians who rose up on the backs of the struggles of the 1980s don’t represent people any more. There’s a lot of talk from some of them, but no action. They are becoming increasingly irrelevant.

We need a renewed grassroots movement of black and white people to challenge the increase in police stop and search, school exclusions, racism and the rise of the fascist British National Party.

And this has to be an ongoing movement, not a once a year event. We need to teach young people the lessons of mass battles against racism – and inspire them to fight again.

Interview: Jon McClure of Reverend and the Makers

JamieSW — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:04:41 +0000

Jon McClure, lead singer of Sheffield band, Reverend and The Makers, hosted the recent 4,500-strong Love Music Hate Racism Rotherham Carnival. He speaks to Lee Billingham about his music and politics

How did you get into music?

I got into music by being a kind of poet and writer. I put on parties and performed poetry. I also wrote stuff for the Arctic Monkeys’ website. I used to write it under various pseudonyms, which kind of increased their mythology. It was more politically inclined than their music would be.

It was around the time of the Iraq war, during which time I had an Iraqi girlfriend for six years. She was from a Shia family, so we were increasingly politicised. That led me into being in a band called 1984 for a number of years, which were really political. I always had the nickname “The Reverend”, not for any religious reason but because people were always saying, “Oh, he’s like a preacher man.” After a while I started putting the prose and poetry into a more musical form, which has led me to be where I am now.

How do you feel about the music industry and the extent to which you can express yourself, particularly regarding political ideas and lyrics?

It’s difficult because here there’s no one doing it. There are people like Damon Albarn, Ian Brown and 3D from Massive Attack and people like that, but among new artists there’s only me and MIA who seriously and permanently question British government foreign policy.

That is really dark compared to the counter-culture in the 1960s and the punk movement in the 1970s and Red Wedge in the 1980s. They were a kind of social voice but now there’s none. This is at a time with the current economic situation, being at war in two countries, with the possibility of a war in a third country – or fourth if you include Pakistan – there’s the situation with climate change and there’s the rise of the BNP.

I would argue we need a politicised voice more than ever, but within mainstream music there’s no one, and you have to ask yourself why. I think one of the reasons is that it has been recently a bit of a commercial suicide to entertain politics in your music.

But my heroes were political – Bob Marley, John Lennon, Joe Strummer. It’s become un-cool to care about the world you live in. It’s become cool to take crack. I don’t think that’s a rebellious act. I think it’s far more rebellious to question the country we live in and the government. I never fell out of love with the idea of it being cool to care about the world you live in.

Do you think it’s something that’s actively discouraged in the music industry? Did you, personally have to be more subtle or have you always been overt with your messages?

I’d sooner be more overt, and increasingly the messages are becoming more overt. When I first came out two years ago the climate wasn’t there for me to be saying these things but now people are saying, “Maybe you’re right actually.”

I think there is conservatism in the music industry because of vested interests. But then there are really good people in the music industry too. There are some good journalists at the NME and there are some good people who work in the industry who want change. People are thinking, “We’re bored of guitar bands doing the same old shit,” and looking for something of a little more substance.

Until recently I was very pessimistic. But my optimism’s returning and I think it’s because people don’t want to listen until it affects them and suddenly all these things are starting to affect them. People are starting to think, “Petrol prices are going up. I wonder if that’s got something to do with Iraq.” Damn right it’s got something to do with Iraq! I think people are starting to put two and two together.

If people don’t give a shit about the world, that’s when the BNP comes to power. Suddenly they’ve got all these seats and people are thinking, “How did that happen?” I’m an eternal optimist. I think that’s one of the main differences that separates left from right: the left have an undying optimism in humankind and the human spirit.

What is your Instigate Debate project?

It’s a website I set up to talk about meaningful subjects to people in the public eye. We’re encouraging people to go up to celebrities, and rather than asking for a photograph or an autograph to ask them a question that means something.

We had a bit of a debate with a lad who works for the NME – while he liked the idea he didn’t think we were maximising it. But rather than us just being a closed shop or getting into a slanging match we said to him, “Why don’t you come and help us?” This thing has to be formed. In the same way that punk was unpopular at first, people have to help shape it and mould it, and he’s very kindly agreed to help us with it. What we’re doing is building a bit of a coalition of musicians, and the music press is going to get behind it. In that regard it becomes a real movement. It’s tangible, because there are kids out there who are ready to go and do this. As a way of encouraging people we’ll go and play at their house. It could be the start of something quite big. I’m excited.

The idea was to hold to account some of the journalists from papers like the Sun, and in particular the Daily Mail and people in the right wing press who really hold more power than the people in Westminster. They’re unelected “people-shapers”. If the government had any morality they’d pass some kind of monopolies bill for press freedom, because Rupert Murdoch and the people who own the Daily Mail have a monopoly on people’s minds.

I’ve got a song on my new album called “Hard Times for Dreamers”, and it really is. Unless we fight back and make people aware, and we make these people look like the bigots they actually are, we aren’t going to get anywhere. For example the “Fagin’s Heirs” headlines about the Romanian pickpockets that were supposedly running rampant in London: no one was ever charged but there was no retraction, maybe a one-line thing. The truth becomes completely distorted, which gives rise to the BNP.

What do you think about the rise of the BNP and using the culture of music as a weapon against them?

The rise of the BNP has been fuelled by the right wing media who are putting the blame on immigrants. The blame within society should be over the mismanagement of the economy and foreign policies by successive Tory and Labour governments.

The problem isn’t immigrants. Unfortunately the fuel being thrown onto the fire by the right wing press is making white working class people, who are looking for someone to blame for the things they see to be wrong with society, put their faith in the BNP. But what these people think they are doing is safeguarding Britain. What they’re actually doing is giving power to Nazis, people we fought a war against. I remember talking to an ex-RAF fellah. He said he didn’t understand it: “I fought for six years against them Nazis only for them to get elected where I live.” I thought that pretty much summed it up.

Other musicians taking a stand against them is good, because young people listen to music and also there’s a much funkier and cooler message in it than marching up and down a street with Dr Martens boots on.

It’s sad to say, but looking at the music world people seem to be more into making money than they are into making any sort of statement. I think it’ll be a bit like the speculators in the stock exchange – they’ll be caught out for that. They’ll be caught out for chasing dollars. They’ve got no substance. I’ll laugh at them when that comes. They won’t have any career left. Their own greed will be their downfall.

What did you think about the LMHR event in Rotherham last month and the effect it had on South Yorkshire?

The event was brilliant. I think the effect on South Yorkshire has been massive because everybody knew about it. I’m in favour of grandiose political gestures: you need a gig with thousands. Even people who were just there for the bands got the message loud and clear. I think the BNP will have an increasingly difficult time in Rotherham after that and it gives us the chance to make networks to go back to next election and say, “Remember that gig we did? Well, this is why we did it. In these elections we don’t want you voting for the BNP.”

You and your family have been getting some grief for your work with LMHR.

There’s some far right websites where I’ve been threatened and someone would phone up my parents to say I’m a psychopath. My parents have had to go ex-directory. It’s upsetting because my parents aren’t me. If you’ve got an issue take it to me. It’s just cowardly.

It also underlines the tactics of fear that the far right and the BNP use. I would never threaten them physically. I’m completely opposed to everything that they stand for politically, but I would never threaten them or any member of their family. It’s disgusting that they stoop that low, but I won’t be deterred.

One of the first things that brought you into politics was the illegal invasion of Iraq. What do you think about the situation in the Middle East now?

I think the occupation of Iraq should end, primarily because the Iraqi people don’t want the US or British troops there. Everything else is an irrelevance. The other problem is people don’t talk about Israel. People are scared to talk about it because of accusations of anti-Semitism. The state of Israel, however, is holding the democratically elected government of the Palestinian people to ransom, and Gaza has become a big concentration camp. Hamas, whether people like it or not, were the democratic choice. If we go around the world espousing the merits of freedom and democracy we have to respect other people’s choices. We can’t have democracy but only when it’s the people we want to get in. You can’t espouse freedom and democracy while we’re allying with Azerbaijan or Saudi Arabia, two of the world’s most brutal dictatorships.

The Israeli government should accept the fact that they have to come to a permanent accommodation with the Palestinian people the same way that the white South Africans and white Rhodesians did, because the three of them were all in alliance in terms of counter-intelligence and counter-terrorism manoeuvres. In actual fact there’s not a lot of difference really. For Barack Obama and US presidents to just blindly profess their support for Israel, no matter what it does, is very dangerous. And we have no cause to be in Iran at all. The US aren’t going to be able to win in a military fashion. It’s just not going to be possible.

As well as the politics of your music you give expression of an experience, particularly a working class experience, and perhaps an experience of the north of England.

There’s a slight bit of humour in it, I think. You hear it in a lot of Sheffield music – a bit of cynicism. We’ve been fucked over for so many years I think people resort to humour. Hearing Jarvis Cocker’s lyrics and Richard Hawley’s and my own, it’s that slightly tongue in cheek, “It’s shit up here, innit? But let’s have a laugh.” My first record was quite regionally specific. It’s located in the working class because that’s where I come from. I could never make that record twice because that’s not where I am anymore, but it’s certainly rooted in that. I don’t want to be a rock star who talks about leaving Sheffield. There’s only me and Richard Hawley who still live in Sheffield of the Sheffield musicians, and I think that keeps you grounded.

The 1980s Sheffield scene seems to run through your music. What’s your attitude to making music?

I’m very open-minded and I owe a lot of debt to Cabaret Voltaire, Human League and Pulp. I think the thing is that in the 1980s everyone was so skint that they couldn’t afford new gear. Everyone ended up with analogue synthesisers and stuff.

Sheffield has always had an artistic community and because all the steel factories shut down the students and the artists could move into them and use them. That’s why electronica took off because people were saying, “We’ve got a synth and an empty room. Shall we do something with that?” That’s literally how it began, and in that regard it’s a really organic thing. I think people assume Sheffield music began and ended four years ago with the Arctic Monkeys, but there’s a lot of things happening – Warp Records and Squarepusher, and everything from Cabaret Voltaire and Human League era. It’s a very vibrant city, I think our music is a fusion of all of the stuff put together.

What plans are there for the Northern Carnival 2009?

The same way the Rotherham gig sent a message across South Yorkshire, I think the Northern Carnival will send a message across the whole of the north of England, saying, “What are you doing? Stop this. We don’t want the BNP round here.” Hopefully people will sit up, take notice and actually listen to what we’re saying.

The message will be a very loud and powerful one, and that’s needed. We had the one in London last year, but a lot of the problems are in the north, a lot of the deprivation, a lot of the racial tension. I think we’ll smack it next year and it should be beautiful, and I think the BNP will be put out of existence.

Websites:

Reverend and the Makers

Jon McClure’s politically charged side project

Nothing is more important

JamieSW — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 21:03:38 +0000

There is a tangible shift occurring in British politics. Gone are the days of traditional class politics, when the working class voted en masse for Labour and the more privileged for the Conservatives. A new force is emerging, which will, if left unchecked, prove disastrous for both Labour and the left in general.

Magnus Marsdal’s article talks about the changing politics of Norway and finds comparisons with the rest of western Europe. It is a phenomenon that is also taking place in Britain, albeit a few years later than in some other countries.

The British National Party (BNP) was formed in 1982 out of an earlier split within the National Front and for many years it languished on the fringes of politics. In 1999 Nick Griffin became its leader and his more political and media savvy approach enabled the party to exploit rising racial tensions in Oldham, Burnley and Bradford in the summer of 2001. Since then, against a backdrop of rising Islamophobia, a growing eastern-European migrant workforce and New Labour’s fixation with Middle England, the party has risen steadily. It now has 55 councillors and last month secured a seat on the London Assembly.

And all this in a period of supposed economic success.

The BNP has long been dismissed as a cranky fascist party, made up of thugs, criminals and Nazis. While it is true that the leadership has its ideological roots in fascism, it is time we had a better explanation for the party’s rise and appeal.

Society in Britain, like much of the industrialised world, has become dislocated over the past few decades. Globalisation and the increasing dominance of international finance and corporations have shifted power far away from local communities. This, coupled with the loss of empire, Britain’s changing place in the world and even the possible break-up of the United Kingdom have all challenged the identity of many, particularly those towards the bottom of the economic ladder, who naturally are more concerned about change.

Politically, there has also been the growing divorce between the political parties and their electorates. The preoccupation with a small number of voters in a few key marginals has resulted in New Labour echoing the whims and prejudices of a mythical Middle England. Class has been removed as an economic and political category in Westminster discourse. Labour’s traditional voters feel ignored, taken for granted and even abandoned. At the same time, the Tories have for decades ceased to offer a real opposition in many traditional Labour areas, leaving a dangerous vacuum.

In 1968 US sociologist Don Warren described the emergence of the ‘middle American radical’ to explain the rise of right-wing presidential candidate George Wallace. He saw a radicalised group of voters, drawn largely from the skilled working class, who opposed the political and economic elites while simultaneously despising those who they regarded as undeserving poor. A white identity emerged that had no political articulation.

A similar phenomenon is occurring in today’s Britain. The Labour Party too often fails to articulate the concerns of large swathes of its traditional working class supporters. Over the past 20 years turnout has slumped in Labour heartlands. Suddenly, as the BNP has emerged as a political force, many are now turning out to vote for them. Towns like Stoke-on-Trent reflect this change. Only a few years ago Labour held every seat on the council. Today, it holds just 16 out of 60, with the BNP close behind with nine. The local ethnic minority population is comparatively small, suggesting that voters are flocking to the BNP for some far more fundamental reasons.

Nor is there much comfort for parties to the left of Labour. It is easy to blame New Labour for the rise of the BNP but few have questioned why the far-left parties fail to attract significant support from white working-class voters. If anything, the far-left vote has actually shrunk since 1997 and the occasional successes of Respect or the Greens have been based on specific ethnic minority communities or middle-class liberals.

Race is a prism through which many voters view their world but it is not the underlying issue. That is why immigration minister Liam Byrne’s attempts to quicken the introduction of the Australian points system will ultimately fail to deal with the political problem. He might hope to appease voters’ concerns over immigration but unfortunately he, like many others, is misunderstanding the rise of the BNP.

Britain might have been slower to see the emergence of a major far-right party than elsewhere but this could change very quickly. Next year’s European elections, contested under proportional representation, will give the BNP its greatest chance to break into the mainstream.

The rise of the BNP is not a passing phenomena. We must now debate new strategies for organisation and policy, counter- organise on the ground and deal with the material issues that lie behind its popular support. Nothing is more important for this movement.

Jon Cruddas is the Labour MP for Dagenham. Nick Lowles is editor of Searchlight magazine

London Meltdown

JamieSW — Sat, 03 May 2008 10:34:44 +0000

What could go wrong did go wrong. Boris Johnson is mayor, with a convincing lead. The BNP got a seat on the Assembly. And the Left List failed to make an impact except in a few concentrated areas. The reasons for the latter are obvious enough: launching a new brand name in the space of a couple of months; set-back by a recent split in the organisation; squeezed by the Tory surge and the desire of many to ‘Stop Boris’ by backing Labour; squeezed by direct competition with those who still had the old name (who did poorly, but better than us overall, and much better in City and East); squeezed by a higher turnout. There were so many things militating against a strong Left List showing. But even I would not have expected last night’s atrophy. New Labour has collapsed decisively not on some right-wing hocus-pocus about crime or immigration (although the media hysteria obviously contributed to this), but on the ten pence tax rate and the economy and the sense that Labour doesn’t even try to represent ordinary working people any more. But the Left has not been in a position to make any inroads as a result. And, in part because of the poisonous climate generated over immigrants and Muslims, the Nazis of the BNP are on the Assembly while their estranged half-cousins from the National Front (who consider the BNP sell-outs) polled strongly in Bexley and Bromley as well as in Lewisham and Greenwich. There are some hard fights ahead.

The Blairites’ advice was evidently no use to Ken, who lost it in the last few days with a series of bizarre declarations, building up to his claim that he wanted to arrest people for littering. Even Boris Johnson didn’t go that far. The Blairite strategy is to move so far to the right on certain issues that even the Tories can’t criticise you, while giving the left some friendly words. More accurately, this is the Clintonite strategy of triangulation developed by the Republican PR man Dick Morris. Livingstone listened to this kind of advice at his own immense peril, but what else did he have to offer? He tried at the last minute to cut a vaguely ‘progressive’ looking deal with the Green Party, but I suspect that most Berry voters would have given him a second-preference anyway. And the Greens didn’t do all that well in the end, despite some locally strong votes. They kept two seats on the Assembly, but gained little from the extensive media exposure. Livingstone didn’t have anything new to offer Labour voters, wasn’t really keen to distance himself too much from the government, had no chance with most right-wing voters – his niche was exhausted and depleted. The Tories have been canny in selecting Boris because, despite his obvious unfitness for the role, his burlesque comedy obscures the memory of the ‘nasty party’. I suspect that ‘nice’ centre-right voters who might previously have lumped for the Lib Dems went back to the fold. It’s been hard to detect much in the way of policy from the Tories, and certainly little distinctive. Johnson did not win on an aggressive platform of clubbing the unions, hammering immigrants and brutalizing petty criminals. This isn’t Margaret Thatcher, the next generation. It is BoJo the Bozo, the clown from hell, all slapstick and bravado. His platform consisted of some relatively unthreatening centre-right soundbites, which is one reason why the (quite legitimate) attempts to make him sound scary didn’t work. One very small contributor to Johnson’s win is highlighted by John Harris in the Guardian today: “the topsy-turvy, faux-progressive politics minted by the self-styled pro-war left”. I don’t credit Nick Cohen, Martin Bright and company with very much influence at all, but they certainly contributed to the reactionary media campaign about ‘Islamism’, providing a ‘progressive’ proscenium for the racist dramaturgy.

What of Labour’s national wipe-out? First of all, we’ve just seen the complete enervation of the New Labour vision of a Whiggish coalition, a ‘progressive’ lib-lab bloc for centre-left hegemony in the 21st Century. New Labour collapsed, but the Liberals didn’t pick up very much of the slack. In Wales, as in Scotland, the nationalists are getting the benefit of the anti-New Labour vote. In England, the Liberals lost control of some councils and gained some, and they seem to have a net gain overall of just one council. It is surprising in this context to see the Lib Dem result being spoken of as if it’s a credible one for Nick Clegg. Commentators have been quick to draw comparisons with 1983, but the last time Labour’s share of the vote was this low was in 1968, shortly after Enoch Powell’s ‘rivers of blood’ speech and at the height of Harold Wilson’s unpopularity over devaluation. Wilson’s government had also, despite some moderate reformist pledges, reneged on many commitments at the behest of the IMF. What is different this time round is the extent of Labour’s collapse in its heartlands. It didn’t just crumble in the marginals. It lost core votes across Wales, in Hartlepool, and in Wolverhampton. It lost a strong presence in Reading, by no means a marginal seat. It was kicked out of Bury in Greater Manchester after 22 years. The rapid erosion that began under Blair is now an avalanche. Blair’s 2005 election victory was more of a loss for the Tories than a thumbs-up for New Labour, with just over a third of voters backing the government and with less voters than supported Labour when it lost in 1992. It is now obvious that the Labour Party will crash to a poor second in 2010, while the Tories will pick up around 40% of the vote. The Lib Dems will not match their 22% vote in 2005.

Anyone who thinks that Labour is about to turn left is kidding themselves. Far more likely is that the government will take a more aggressive stance toward the unions (as it did in 1969, with ‘In Place of Strife’) and make a demonstrative crackdown on immigration (as it did with the Commonwealth Immigrants Act in 1968). Labour doesn’t contain the resources for a regeneration of its battered left, any more than it did when John McDonnell failed to get enough PLP support to even run a campaign against Gordon Brown. The last vaguely leftish credible alternative to Brown was the late Robin Cook, whose standing after his dignified antiwar resignation speech would have made him the obvious candidate. And even he would have struggled. Just because the left-of-Labour vote was poor, just because the Tories have made a decisive recovery, don’t think that we can place our hopes in a New Labour conversion, or that we can avoid continuing to try to build a left-of-Labour alternative. We will be lying to ourselves in quite a dangerous way if we imagine that we can claw back some space by just abandoning the electoral terrain to New Labour. The fact that it is now a more difficult task in the short-term does not mean it can be wished away.

For socialists, however, elections are not our main kind of activity. Saying that, I run the risk of appearing to diminish the hard work put in and the hopes invested in the campaign, and that is not my meaning. However, while we should spare no blushes in being directly honest about what just happened, we should not allow ourselves to disappear up our own ballot-boxes. How we intervene in the coming crises over pay, the economy, and the rising threat of racism and the far right, is far more significant than how many votes we rack up. One of the first things we can do is turn out for the protest against the Nazi BNP outside City Hall, this coming Tuesday at 6pm.

1,000 anti-fascists wreck Oxford’s sham debate

JamieSW — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 12:25:10 +0000

I was one of over a 1,000 protesters from all walks of life that gathered outside the Oxford Union debating club on Monday of this week to try and stop it from hosting a “forum” featuring two leading Nazis.

The decision to roll out the red carpet for Nick Griffin, leader of the fascist British National Party (BNP), and convicted Holocaust denier David Irving, had caused outrage among students, trade unionists and community groups.

The atmosphere at the protest was electric as people thronged around the Union building, arguing with those trying to attend the meeting.

The air was full of real political debate – in sharp contrast to the superficial rituals that the Union prides itself on.

Weyman Bennett, joint secretary of Unite Against Fascism, spoke to the protesters. “Granting Griffin and Irving a platform is a threat to all of us,” he said. “Wherever fascists are active, racist attacks and other hate crimes increase.”

People kept up a noisy presence by chanting and singing, when suddenly a gate swung open. Around 60 of us pushed our way into the Union compound past a pair of security guards that tried to rugby tackle us.

Eventually around 35 of us made it into the debating chamber – fending off attempts to physically block us by the Oxford Union’s champions of “free speech”.

We argued with the people inside, telling them that what went on in their chambers had real effects in the outside world.

By giving a platform to the BNP they were giving credibility to an organisation that actively promotes the worst kind of violence against black people, Asians, Jews and other minorities.

At this point they decided to walk out of the debating chamber and hold their meetings with Nazis in two separate rooms elsewhere.

Speaking tour

The atmosphere was getting ugly, so we negotiated to be let out. We marched out of the building, rejoining the protest outside to cheers.

This protest was vitally important in building the breadth and confidence of the anti-fascist movement.

We united a whole range of people and organisations – students’ unions, trade unions, the Jewish and Muslim societies to name but a few – in a show of strength against the BNP’s race hatred.

Griffin is desperate to overturn the no platform policies that have prevented fascist thugs from organising effectively among students for years.

He wants to go on a speaking tour of universities with Irving, using “free speech” as an excuse to spread his poison.

We need to build more mass protests like this to defend the no platform policy and to send a simple message to the Nazis – never again.

London: the Stepping Stone to Power?

JamieSW — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 01:25:09 +0000

Kicking off an eight-month campaign, party leader Nick Griffin joined Richard Barnbrook, the BNP’s candidate for Mayor of London, in a Dagenham pub last month. In front of 130 people Griffin claimed that the BNP would win between one and three seats on the London Assembly, which if achieved could create a momentum for two seats in the London region in the European election a year later. Success in the European election, he went on to claim, would solve the party’s financial problems and provide it with a respectability that could not be touched by its political opponents.

While the BNP has no chance in winning any of the 14 constituencies, which use the first-past-the-post system, the party believes it will gain representation through the London-wide top-up election, in which 11 seats are available. These seats are distributed to reflect the party’s overall share of the vote.

To win one Assembly seat the BNP would need to get 5% of the London-wide vote. For two seats they would need around 8% and for three little more than 11%.

In 2004 the BNP polled 4.8%, missing a seat by 5,000 votes. The UK Independence Party polled 8.2%, gaining two Assembly seats. Given that the last London election was held on the same day as the European election and that UKIP has imploded since then, the BNP quite rightly expects the UKIP vote to collapse. It must also be remembered that since the last London election the BNP has emerged as a significant force in outer east London, gaining 12 councillors in Barking and Dagenham and one in each of Havering and Redbridge. There are a further six BNP councillors just over the London border in Loughton.

On paper it would appear fairly easy for the BNP to gain the additional 5,000 votes for one seat. After all, BNP gained almost 8,000 in Barking and Dagenham in the last general election, a 40% increase on its 2004 London Assembly vote.

Support for the BNP appears to be concentrated around the outskirts of London, particularly in outer east London and on the fringes of south and southwest London. In addition to Barking and Dagenham, the BNP polled 10% in some wards in Havering, Sutton, Croydon, Lewisham, Hillingdon and Enfield. This corresponds with where the UKIP picked up most of its support. Both parties fared poorly in inner city London, which confirms the view that the UKIP collected a white right-wing vote.

The BNP’s belief that a sizeable chunk of the UKIP vote could switch to it is highlighted in research published by the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust. The Far Right in London: A challenge for local democracy? showed there was a common identity between BNP and UKIP voters, and to a lesser extent Conservative Party voters. “The results of the mayoral contest suggest linkages between UKIP and the BNP in some voters’ minds, in that those giving their first preference to the UKIP candidate were more likely than other voters to give their second to the BNP candidate, and those giving first preference to the BNP candidate were more likely to give their second to the UKIP candidate. … nearly half of BNP voters chose the UKIP mayoral candidate Frank Maloney as their second choice, while over one fifth of UKIP voters chose the BNP candidate Julian Leppert as their second choice.”

The report went on to discover that as many as a quarter of London voters would consider voting for the BNP, though this is obviously quite different from those who would actually vote for the BNP.

This has been backed up by the London Elections Study which showed that people who expressed a “liking” for the UKIP were also more likely to state a “liking” for the BNP and vice versa. A further project (Margetts, Dunleavy and van Heerde, 2005) has identified the existence of a “right bloc” in London politics, consisting of the BNP, the UKIP and the Conservatives. According to the State of the Nation survey, the crossover between these three parties appears stronger in London than elsewhere in the country.

The existence of a potential rightwing block vote of 8-12% is what makes the BNP confident of electoral success in the capital next year. While most UKIP voters will probably move to the Conservatives next May, especially if there is a close contest for Mayor, at least 20% could move over to the BNP, giving the racist party 6.5% even before the BNP’s growth in the capital since 2005 is taken into account.

To achieve the 11% minimum required for three seats would need a 250% increase in the BNP vote. The party has obviously been looking at its fairly uniform performance in local elections in recent years, with its candidates averaging 14.7% this year. However, because of the ethnic makeup of London the BNP would need closer to 20% of the white vote, which seems highly unlikely.

Will the BNP succeed?

So is the BNP guaranteed success in London next May? Of course not. While the figures show what a difficult task we are facing, there are still seven months to go and everything to play for. The very fact that London has such a diverse population automatically means that 35% of voters should naturally be opposed to the BNP.

There are also a good many white voters who are strongly against the fascists. The same research by Rowntree found that the BNP was Britain’s most disliked political party, with three-quarters of respondents saying they would never, under any circumstances, vote for it. This proves that there is a large anti-BNP vote out there to be mobilised.

Mobilising the anti-BNP vote is crucial. Given the size of London it is not feasible for anti-fascists to undertake door-to-door campaigning across the capital, other perhaps than in Barking and Dagenham as this will be vital for the general election and the 2010 borough council elections. Instead, anti-fascists have to look for alternative forms of campaigning to reach the largest number of people with as little effort as possible.

The focus for much of our work has to be the BME and newly arrived communities. Most should have an intrinsic dislike of the BNP though the threat would have to be explained. Another element of our campaign must be voter registration, particularly for the newly arrived communities from eastern Europe. This should be done in conjunction with the trade unions and linked to campaigns to improve their working conditions. Discussions are already under way with our Polish sister organisation, Never Again, to help in this work.

The fundamental issue for anti-fascists is boosting turnout. To break the 5% threshold to gain one seat, the BNP will have to find an extra supporter for every 20 in increased turnout. As table 2 shows, a high turnout could seriously derail the BNP’s chances, particularly of getting more than one person elected.

It would be catastrophic for the BNP if the general election were on the same day as the London election. Based on the same turnout as the 2005 general election, the BNP would need over 150,000 votes just to get one person on the London Assembly. Three seats would require more than 330,000 votes and, given the intense campaigning of a general election and the reduced media profile the BNP would receive, the task would be almost impossible.

The wider political scene will impact on the BNP, both negatively and positively. The BNP will benefit from the demise of the UKIP. In 2004 the UKIP’s vote was boosted as the London and European elections were held on the same day, which will not be the case this time. Since then the UKIP has suffered several splits and defections. However, the English Democrats might take some votes from the BNP because of the attention that their mayoral candidate Gary Bushell might attract.

Boris Johnson standing for the Conservatives might however help the BNP. While his name on the ballot paper is likely to reduce the BNP’s own mayoral vote, some of the anti-party voters Johnson might attract on the basis of giving Ken Livingstone the boot are likely to be natural BNP voters. As has become evident in recent years, the BNP has proved successful in tapping into the sector of the population that is disillusioned by the political system and does not normally vote.

Searchlight is working with the trade unions, political parties and other anti-fascist groups to establish one united campaign for the London elections. We believe that a new strategy is needed that targets the sections of the population that are likely to vote and mobilises those communities most likely to be opposed to the BNP. While winning the political argument is important, this election will hang on increasing the turnout. Our target turnout must be 45% with our voters coming out. If we achieve this then Griffin’s rolling plans for the next few years, which might even include him standing in London in the European election, could well be in tatters.