May 2012 - Editorial: Subversives for a ‘traditional Britain’
Published on Friday, 04 May 2012 20:31 Written by Gerry Gable
This month we pay a long overdue visit to Britain’s ultra-Conservatives and some of their allies with the first of a series of articles by Adam Carter on people who are very far removed from the senior party in the government coalition. Some of those who are influential in the Traditional Britain Group have long-time associations on the extreme right and were a thorn in the side of traditional One Nation Toryism. They were among those who plagued former Prime Minister Edward Heath, who stood up to threats to his leadership and government from racists such as Enoch Powell and the 34 Conservative MPs who, as members of the once powerful Monday Club, held the balance of parliamentary power during his administration. These were the people who supported Ian Smith’s racist regime in what was then Rhodesia, and similar causes. During that period entire branches of Monday Club were shut down.
Also active were also the small but influential groups such as Tory Action, run by the City banker and former deputy head of MI6 the late George Kennedy Young, and WISE (Welsh, Irish, Scottish and English) run by Joan Mason and the late fascist supporter Lady Jane Birdwood. Many of those involved were not only anti-democratic but hard-core racists and Holocaust deniers. At their meetings often more than half the audience consisted of members of openly nazi and fascist groups.
Even Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher became concerned about their machinations, but it appears that in the guise of the Traditional Britain Group these people have resurfaced over the past decade and are reaching out to columnists on national newspapers and organisations such as the UK Independence Party.
Among the Conservatives who read Searchlight I am sure there must be some who are appalled at this creeping subversion and are keen to expose the threat that the Traditional Britain Group represents for their party. It would be good to hear from you.
Such subversion is not confined to the Tories, and Labour is not blameless in this respect. The last government did little if anything to curb the influence of organisations such as Migrationwatch UK, of which at least one senior officer addressed the Traditional Britain Group, while the Home Office was using Migrationwatch as a conduit to pursue and propagate an increasingly rightwing agenda on immigration.
When we have time we will place on our website some of the more illuminating stories we wrote at the time about these groups and individuals.
As we go to press the trial of Anders Breivik is well under way. Any coverage in this magazine would be premature and rapidly overtaken by events. We will publish an analytical article about the trial after the verdict. However we welcome the recent police raids on some of Breivik’s British fellow Islamophobes of the so-called North West Infidels.
This month we follow up our April story about a serving Royal Marine who is also an active Nazi, by raising the matter with General Sir David Richards, Chief of the Defence Staff.
Finally we would like to join all antifascists in looking forward to a meaningful defeat of the fragmented far right on 3 May. It’s been good out campaigning in some of the hot spots and helping to produce, with others, hard-hitting material.