Author: Simon Cressy | Date: December 2009

National flop

The BNP’s vote “overwhelmingly” in favour of a party-wide ballot on allowing non-white people to join is creating waves in the ranks of the far right. One organisation hoping to benefit is the National Front.

The British National Party’s decision at its annual conference in Wigan last month to pave the way for the removal of restrictions on party membership based on ethnicity has already created dissent among the rank and file party membership. A number of BNP organisers are known to be unhappy with the party’s direction. Some have gone so far as to defect to the much smaller National Front, promising to bring their members with them.

But there are serious doubts over whether the NF is in a position to challenge the BNP. Today’s NF is the remnant of an organisation that in the 1970s threatened to become Britain’s fourth party, though never won any elections. After a series of splits John Tyndall, the NF’s former leader, went on to form the BNP. The NF is where Nick Griffin, now leader of the BNP, started his political career at the age of 15 and honed his skills at political intrigue and manipulating and surviving internal dissent.

Over the past 18 months the NF has experienced mutiny, upheaval and back biting. Under the ageing leadership of its Norfolk-based chairman Tom Holmes and his deputy Bernard Franklin, the NF ground to a near standstill. Membership was at an all time low, the party newspaper, The Flame, appeared once in 15 months and the NF website waited similarly long for updates. Morale within the ranks could only be described as poor.

Terry Blackham, the convicted gunrunner who was the NF’s main activist, walked away from the party following differences regarding his personal life and accusations of financial irregularities.

Rebellion was in the air and the catalyst appeared to be the reemer-gence of Tony White, the convicted violent Leeds thug.

White turned up with two East London NF activists, Dave Hill and Bob James, at Speakers’ Corner in central London on 31 August 2008 for a vigil to remember white victims of racist violence. It had been organised by POWER (Patriots of the White European Resistance), a small nazi quasi-terrorist group by then on its last legs, but the NF hijacked the event.

A few months later, White acted as an official steward for the NF at its annual Remembrance Sunday march to the Cenotaph. Average attendance at the march had dipped to around 50 over the previous few years and had reached a new low of 30 in 2007. However, in 2008 it suddenly rose tenfold to around 300.

Although Holmes and Franklin led the march, it later emerged that the pair had not wanted to stage the event at all that year. The NF had been marching to the Cenotaph since 1969, missing only 1986 following a punch-up at the meeting point between factions led by Griffin and Martin Wingfield, now Griffin’s communications and campaigns officer in his North West European Parliamentary constituency.

The “Young Turks” of Stuart Hollingdale, Hill and White were determined that whatever happened they would march to the Cenotaph. In pursuance of their aim the three men managed to gather together a whole menagerie of nazis, freaks and thugs from a variety of small extreme-right groups, including the British Freedom Fighters, British People’s Party, POWER and the Racial Volunteer Force.

Also noticeable was a small group from the BNP led by the South African Neil McAllister.

Various websites declared that the Front was back. But their triumph was short-lived as the splits in the party deepened.

The Young Turks launched a website attacking the leadership and calling for change. On it White declared that he was the NF organiser for Yorkshire. He was being a little economical with the truth, however. Numerous mes-sages on websites such as Stormfront, the international nazi forum, declared him a liar and fantasist, and not all NF activists were happy to see him back after his previous spell in the party, which had eventually got him imprisoned for handing out racist literature to school students.

White quickly found his name on the proscribed members’ list.

Over the following months other familiar names joined the NF. Among them was Nick Walsh, the former BNP organiser for Hull, who was drafted in as the NF’s group development officer. Tom Linden, a former BNP organiser for Harrogate, is now the party’s national press officer as well as the Yorkshire organiser. And Eddy Morrison, the drunken veteran Leeds fascist and founder member of the BNP, was brought in as the head of publicity and tasked with setting up a new and functioning website and establishing a regular party publication.

These new officers joined together with the remaining unhappy members to make a concerted bid to remove Holmes and Franklin.

The opportunity came at a meeting in Bradford in September, which featured as guest speaker the white supremacist and former Croatian diplomat Tomislav Sunic. Unbeknown to Holmes and Franklin, the NF directorate met alongside the meeting and a new directorate was voted in. Franklin was unceremoniously dumped as deputy chairman, to be replaced by Ian Edward, the former Hillingdon BNP organiser.

Also brought into the directorate were Linden and Joe Rhodes, a former cocaine addict from Bradford. The veteran racist Norman Tomkinson stayed as the NF’s national treasurer.

Surprisingly Holmes was not removed and remains chairman, but all is not well as he has refused to accept the new leadership and there are moves to have him replaced by Edward. Holmes has issued his own NF newsletter in which he blamed Morrison for the mini revolt, labelling him “a known troublemaker and alcoholic”.

Holmes also refused to attend this year’s Remembrance Sunday march, stating in his newsletter: “I will not associate with the traitors who have their own agenda for the Party I had dedicated my life to”.

Numbers at the Cenotaph fell dramatically to little over 100, despite the NF claiming the presence of “hundreds”. Steve Rowland from south London led the march with Hill. Morrison, Linden and Rhodes all travelled south from Yorkshire and Tomkinson made the journey from the West Midlands.

True to his word Holmes failed to show, but one surprise on the day was the appearance of Mark Atkinson, leader of the RVF, acting as a steward.

The NF could potentially prosper from the BNP’s forced rule change. However the power feud within could leave the party once again politically stagnant.

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