The Leninist ideologues of the SWP believe a ban on the BNP will go some way to eradicate racism. To this end they re-formed the Anti Nazi League in January 1992 to confront racist boneheads head on and to awaken public consciousness as to a "new Fascist threat". Similarly, the Anti Racist Alliance — another of the anti-racist groups that have sprung up in recent years, vying to be the standard bearers of the cause — believe making racial harassment a criminal offence and tightening restrictions on the sale of extreme-right literature will make racism go away.
Both seem not to realize that the prevalence of racist ideas is largely due to the official racism that has been perpetrated by British governments, local councils, courts, police, etc throughout the twentieth century.
Successive Liberal, Tory and Labour Governments have been at the forefront in promoting xenophobia through Act of Parliament for almost 90 years: 1905 Aliens Act; 1914 Aliens Restriction Act; 1962 Commonwealth Immigration Act; 1968 Commonwealth Immigration Act; 1971 Immigration Act; 1981 British Nationality Act; 1991 Asylum Bill. These Acts resulted in the lowering of successful applications for UK citizenship by 28 percent last year the lowest for 10 years.
Racist candidate
In 1964, a Tory candidate won the Smethwick Parliamentary seat from Labour with the slogan "if you want a nigger lor a neighbour, vote Labour". In the May 1979 election, a month after Blair Peach lost his life at an anti-Nazi rally, the NF vote fell from 19.2 percent to 6.1 percent in its strongest seat. This had less to do with public disapproval of racism and more to do with the ascendancy of Margaret Thatcher. As one Guardian writer pointed out:
The demise of the NF as a political force was mainly due to Margaret Thatcher rather than any anti-racist campaign. When she said in 1978 that the British people feared they were ’being swamped by an alien culture’, NF supporters switched to Conservative" (14 May).
November 1991 saw Kenneth Clarke, the then Education Secretary, stepping in to prevent a housing association moving five black families from inner-city Nottingham into his neighbouring suburban constituency of Rushcliffe. Clarke feared the families would be "problem families", and that their homes would become half way houses for criminals. Challenged on the matter he replied "I am not concerned about the colour of people’s skin, but you don’t put square pegs in round holes” (Guardian, 22 November 1992).
The current panic about the rising tide of fascism has been sparked by a BNP candidate, Derek Beackon, securing a council seat in the East End ward of Millwall. One BNP councillor, however no more constitutes the dawn of the Fourth Reich than did the victory of the two NF councillors in Blackburn in the mid 1970s.
Neither is racism in Tower Hamlets anything new. When the Liberals took the Tower Hamlets council from Labour seven years ago they embarked upon a discriminatory housing policy, which was attacked for its racist nature in giving priority to the sons and daughters of Tower Hamlets residents. In 1991 the Commission for Racial Equality look the Lib-Dcm council to the High Court for failing to ensure that their housing policies did not discriminate against ethnic minorities. The High Court ruled against the Lib-Dem council housing policy. However, the extent of official racism was this year to become even more evident when the Court of Appeal went on to rule against the decision, permitting the council to investigate the immigration status of applicants.
If anything, the BNP victory was the result of local disenchantment at the efforts of the three mainstream political parties in the area, and frustration caused by local levels of poverty, unemployment and deprivation. Tower Hamlets has pockets of high unemployment and last year out of a total housing stock of 67,581, 45,475 houses were found to be unfit to live in or in desperate need of repair.
Racist housing policy, though, is not confined to the East End of London. In October of this year it was announced that the Labour-controlled Liverpool City Council were to be taken to the High Court by the Commission for Racial Equality, for its failure to comply with its order to end discriminative housing policy.
Official racism is all around us, and not confined to the activities of a few East End boneheads. The whirlwind of patriotism and jingoism, for instance, whipped by the Gulf War with the help of the right wing press (Sun, Daily Mail, etc) provoked widespread violence and racial abuse in Britain, including the firebombing of 20 mosques.
In June this year, European Community Ministers agreed to strengthen the walls of "Fortress Europe" in the wake of an influx of Bosnian refugees fleeing the civil war in former Yugoslavia. At the same time the British government were detaining 200 immigrants without trial.
Hitler impressed
Those who think that the BNP are unique in their wish to make Britain "racially pure" would do well to remember that the sentiments expressed by Winston Churchill almost 90 years ago. Churchill, impressed by the theories of Social Darwinism, theories that also impressed Hitler, wanted to sterilize 100,000 "mentally degenerate" Britons who he felt were threatening to sully the British character.
These sentiments have echoed down the years, changing form as the situation demands and nowadays finding outlet, amongst other things, in official opposition to the ERM and Maastricht, "Buy British" campaigns and belligerent tabloid headlines that condone the efforts of "our boys" overseas. Anything, in fact, that might impinge upon the 'British way of life" is viewed as a threat by reactionaries from the Labour Party to the extreme right.
The calls to "Ban the BNP" and "Bash the Fash" by the ARA and the ANL must be opposed by Socialists. As Socialists we should uphold the right to platform. Once we beg the state to regulate organizations and movements we set precedents that pave the way for regulations for other organizations Gay Rights. Pro-Abortionists, single parent groups, perhaps a ban on the SWP. the RCP and the Socialist Party? Andrew Puddephatt of Liberty expresses similar thoughts: in banning the BNP. he said "there is a danger that the government will begin to ban groups which are opposed to their policies" (Guardian, 28 September).
Calling for a ban on the BNP is tantamount to admitting that the working class lacks the ability, the confidence, the ideology, the arguments to tackle racist views head on and to discredit them. At the same time, appeals to the state to ban far right groups distracts attention from the real cause of racism — the capitalist system. Those who openly promote racism can hardly be counted on to abolish it
Home Secretary Michael Howard was right when he commented on the BNP: "Paradoxically, repressive legislation might actually be welcome to such organisations".
To ban the BNP would be to force it underground, to make it a paramilitary organization and thus more attractive to its supporters who relish violence and thrive on the oxygen of publicity. In Northern Ireland a host of organizations are banned (IRA, INLA, IPLO, UVF, UDF, UFF) — this does not stop them killing hundreds of people a year and causing widespread destruction from Belfast to London.
During the ANL march on the BNP headquarters at Welling, a black police constable. Leslie Turner, was apparently singled out for a beating by ANL activists. Speaking from his hospital bed. PC Turner reflected that the BNP had a "legitimate right to freedom of speech" (Times, 18 October).
Is there not an irony in this for the SWP? That in a march they organized to confront racism a black police constable was beaten up who believed racist thugs — who also would have liked to have given him a beating — should have the right to express their views.
Perhaps the BNP could also draw a lesson from this. Of the 20,000 who took to the streets that day. the one that took a beating in protecting them was one they would "repatriate". Both parties, the BNP and the SWP, should stop their infantile bickering and single-issue policies and realize that the real cause of poverty, housing shortages, unemployment is the capitalist system, a system where profits always come first. What we need is class unity. If we must ban anything, ban capitalism!
John Bissett
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