BNP parasites

[luke]

The BNP is finished as an electoral force
Nick Griffin comes out of the local elections facing the fact that his attempted strategy of BNP 'modernisation' lies in ruins

"Hammered by Labour – same as everyone. No surprise, no disgrace", tweeted BNP chairman Nick Griffin as the scale of his party's total obliteration in the local elections became clear. Griffin and the BNP went into these elections hoping to stem its electoral demise, which was triggered by a combination of infighting and the party's failure to break through at the 2010 general election. Today, the party leaves the contest facing the daunting realisation that it is no longer a significant player in British electoral politics. Put simply, the BNP's electoral challenge is over.

Here are some facts that will be facing Griffin this afternoon, as he sits down to consider how he might possibly sustain the morale of a dwindling and disgruntled base of foot soldiers. At the time of writing, the BNP has lost 10 of the 12 seats that it was defending.

Long gone are the days when the party could claim dozens of local councillors. Furthermore, gone are the days when the party could point to local bastions of support. Perhaps most significant of all, for the first time in 10 years there is not a single BNP councillor on Burnley borough council. The home of the party's initial breakthroughs over 2002-03 is now officially BNP free.

In other former strongholds, its vote has similarly collapsed. Two seats have been lost in Amber Valley, where the BNP vote slumped by almost 50% in Heanor East and Heanor West. Two seats have been lost in Rotherham, where, although support for the BNP remains, the reality is that it has fallen dramatically from four years ago. Support has crumbled in South Tyneside to between 4% and 13%, where not long ago Griffin could count on figures around 30%.

And in London – where the party focused most of its efforts in an attempt to win a seat on the London assembly, the data suggests it has been thoroughly trounced. To add to the humiliation, in areas such as Basildon and Dudley support for BNP candidates was lower than support for their more extreme rivals, the old National Front (NF). As the anti-fascist network Hope Not Hate points out, we have not seen results like these since the 1990s, when the BNP never seriously invested in the ballot box strategy.

So what now? Griffin needed something – anything – to put in front of his weary followers as evidence that the party is not a spent electoral force. Evidence of an electoral revival was also needed to fend off the challenge from groups like the NF, and forthcoming plans by the English Defence League to enter elections with the British Freedom party (BFP). But the reality is far from what Griffin desired. Consider this: despite economic recession; despite deep cuts to local services; despite continuing public concern over immigration; despite high levels of dissatisfaction with the main parties; despite ongoing political distrust; despite an unpopular coalition government that includes the Liberal Democrats – home for many protest voters; despite continuing public anger over the expenses scandal and more recent media and cash-for-access scandals; and despite a Labour party that has not yet reconnected fully with its core base – the BNP has completely failed to make even an electoral squeak. At one time, voters in some parts of the country appeared willing to back the party. Today, they appear completely uninterested. In my view, the British National party's quest for electoral success is finished and Griffin's attempted strategy of "modernisation" lies in ruins. The question that remains is what will emerge to fill the vacuum?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/may/04/bnp-local-elections-electoral-force-finished

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BNP 'truth truck' gets stuck...

[luke]

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"Fenian bastards" is pretty much the same as calling someone a 'black bastard' as it is an insult to describe all Catholics. If he's ever on national tv/radio again, I hope to hear him try and splutter his way out of this.

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A fatal blow? The latest split within the British National Party
The resignation of MEP Andrew Brons is another blow to Nick Griffin. But the future of the far-right lies elsewhere.
Extremis Project
17 October 2012

Yesterday, one of the two British National Party Members of the European Parliament resigned his membership of the flagging extreme right group. The resignation of Andrew Brons -a veteran and influential activist within the far right- leaves Nick Griffin as the only BNP voice in the European Parliament. More broadly, the split reduces the total number of elected BNP officials to four -a long fall from its heyday in 2009 when the party had one seat on the Greater London Assembly, two MEPs, and dozens of local councillors.

The departure of Brons was a long time coming, and will surprise few who take an active interest in Britain’s far right. The roots of the split lie in a series of personality disputes, and allegations among the grassroots that Griffin is financially and politically incompetent (or, as some claim, simply corrupt). As journalists poured over the BNP’s ‘success’ at the 2009 European elections, inside the party a growing revolt was fuelled by a feeling among some of the more astute BNP organisers that -looking toward UKIP’s 13 seats- their party should actually have done far better. ’Perhaps this is as far as we can go with Griffin’, they began to mutter.

The subsequent failure to breakthrough in Barking and Stoke at the 2010 general election, and a series of costly legal disputes, pushed a growing number of these activists to the conclusion that the party could go no further, and that -ultimately- Griffin would never relinquish control. Some of these rebels left politics altogether. Others joined a growing number of far right competitors. The increasing significance of the latter was evident by the time of the 2012 local elections, which -excluding the BNP- were fought by a total of 149 candidates from a range of other extreme and radical right-wing groups, including the English Democrats, National Front, British Freedom, Democratic Nationalists, England First or the British People’s Party. While these parties vary in terms of their ideology and history, most are united in their opposition to Griffin.

Of course, this internal warfare is nothing new. Historically, Britain’s far right has long failed to cultivate the internal unity and discipline that have come to characterise some of its far more successful cousins on the continent. Factionalism is the perennial Achilles heel of the British far right. Similarly, even from 2001, and as its electoral fortunes improved, the BNP exhibited an ongoing tendency to implode: a revolt from activists loyal to its expelled founder, John Tyndall; a rebellion from activists who bemoaned the lack of financial transparency; and then a revolt from the so-called ‘December rebels’ who voiced dissatisfaction over the party’s growing debt and Griffin’s dictatorial style of leadership. Each of these challenges failed, as Griffin’s stubborn persistence became one of the defining features of the British far right. Indeed, for this reason alone Brons’ resignation is unlikely to enact the fatal blow to Griffin, who though embattled will not simply abandon forty years of work on what many within the movement describe simply as “the cause”.

Electorally, however, Griffin is unlikely to retain his seat in the North West region at the 2014 European elections. This owes less to infighting than to the conclusion reached by most voters that his party is simply not a credible or legitimate alternative, despite their concerns over core far right issues. His only hope lies in stubbornly persistent economic stagnation, and evidence that the far right has reaped some electoral benefits from the financial crisis. At the 2010 general election, the BNP polled strongest in constituencies that experienced the largest increases in unemployment rates since 2005. Add to this the prospect of further local service cuts, ongoing public concerns over immigration and asylum, and anxieties in northern towns over the ‘grooming’ or child exploitation issue, and there emerge clear opportunities for the only far right movement in Britain that can realistically claim to be a household name. In other words, while it is unlikely that the thirty-year old BNP will save its last remaining seat in the European Parliament, it is far too early to write off the prospect.

Yet, seen from another angle nor does it really matter whether or not Griffin retains the seat. Since 2010, the BNP has been ramping up its involvement in non-electoral activities, partly as an attempt to flirt with disgruntled factions of the English Defence League, but also because of Griffin’s own ideas about how to sustain a far right movement. Think-tanks and academics like to interpret the relative health of far right parties simply by counting their number of votes. But far right parties like the BNP are also social movements, which view electioneering simply as one of several strategies available to them. Just as important as the quest for votes is sustaining a loyal band of true believers – through the good times, and the bad.

For veteran activists like Griffin, sustaining the ideology and ‘passing over the torch’ to future generations is paramount. And this is where the significance of more recent groups like the English Defence League comes into play: though often reduced to a public order issue, or the ramblings of Tommy Robinson on Twitter, the key point about groups like the EDL is that they have radicalised somewhere in the region of 1,000-3,000 young, working class men into the orbit of far right and counter-Jihad politics. In many respects, these supporters form a stronger foundation for a far right movement than those who were active in the 1960s and 1970s: they are more likely than average to have experienced unemployment; are economically insecure; pessimistic about their prospects; have already given up on mainstream party politics; and are concerned not simply about Islam but a broader cluster of immigration-related issues. Judging from his recent overtures, it is these young angry white men who veteran activists like Griffin see as the future ideologues of the British far right.

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Nick Griffin's Hacked Twitter Account



I say!

[luke]