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This article is about the modern party. For the 1960s BNP, see here.

The British National Party (BNP) is the most prominent far-right political party in the United Kingdom. It has 53 councillors in local government, but unlike some of its European analogues, it has no presence in the national Parliament; some argue that this is because the UK's first-past-the-post system makes it difficult for small parties to achieve electoral success in UK elections.

According to its constitution, the BNP "stands for the preservation of the national and ethnic character of the British people and is wholly opposed to any form of racial integration between British and non-European peoples", and is "committed to stemming and reversing the tide of non-white immigration and to restoring, by legal changes, negotiation and consent the overwhelmingly white makeup of the British population that existed in Britain prior to 1948". To achieve this aim, the BNP advocates the use of "firm but voluntary incentives" to remove ethnic minorities from the UK. Membership of the party is restricted to "Indigenous Caucasians."

The BNP does not deny that it is racist, however, stating that it is merely standing up for the White British working class. The party believes that racism is a part of 'human nature', based on comparative scientific studies into the relationships between groups within species, and as a result describes its supporters as "realists".

Opposition to the BNP includes politicians as diverse as David Cameron and Ken Livingstone , and is a primary aim of such groups as Searchlight and Unite Against Fascism.

History

Founding of the modern BNP

The modern BNP has its roots in the New National Front, founded in 1980 by the late John Tyndall, a former chairman of the National Front (NF) and veteran National Socialist ideologue. Tyndall was a member of the previous (1960s) BNP, which itself was one of the organizations that eventually became the NF, and was Chairman of the Front for most of the 1970s. Following the 1979 general election Tyndall came under heavy criticism after the party's strategy of nominating a large number of candidates was perceived to have failed. He resigned from the Front in January 1980 after failing to oust its National Organiser, Martin Webster. The New National Front called for an "Anglo-Saxon Alliance" of the UK, Germany and the USA.

First general election

In 1982, the New National Front and a faction of the then-disintegrating British Movement led by Ray Hill merged to form the new British National Party. Tyndall was elected leader and Hill became his deputy. The launch was announced in a press conference in the spring, and on April 24, the party had its inaugural march in London. At its first general election, in 1983, the party sponsored 53 candidates, three more than was required to obtain a Party Election Broadcast on television. The broadcast went out on May 31 and consisted of Tyndall, flanked by two Union Jacks, speaking to camera. Images of the Brixton riot were shown as Tyndall's speech attempted to encourage nationalism (one observer noted that the "emphasis was less heavily anti-black... than the Front's"). The giving of television time to the BNP was controversial and was debated on the following edition of Right to Reply on Channel 4.

During the campaign Tyndall stated that the only significant differences between the BNP and the National Front lay in the fact that his party would bar homosexuals from high office, and that he was hopeful the two could reunite. The party's candidates won 14,621 votes: it was noted that the BNP's average vote was less than the National Front and that in the two constituencies where both stood, the NF was clearly more popular.

Mid-1980s

Unknown to the party, Ray Hill was actually working for the anti-fascist group Searchlight and observers have suggested that the party's relatively low profile in its early years may have been related to his sabotage. The party held a rally in Bradford on July 21, 1984, having notified the police of their intentions; the police decided not to tell the Bradford Community Relations Council, and were present in large numbers at the rally.

With the disintegration of the National Front, the BNP had friendly relations with the Support Group faction, and also attempted to recruit members of the dissolved Federation of Conservative Students (an attempt that did not see success, as the BNP's authoritarian policy did not appeal to the libertarians of the FCS). The increase in the deposit required of Parliamentary candidates hindered the party during the 1987 elections when it received 553 votes having put up 2 candidates. However, the party formed some strong international links.

Early 1990s

After some financial troubles, the party's national headquarters were established at Welling in south-east London in 1989, above a bookshop operated by the party. In the early 1990s the party saw a growth in popularity mainly in London and the urban south east, and especially in the borough of Tower Hamlets in the inner East End where increasing immigration from Bangladesh in an area of housing pressure led it to campaign for "Rights for whites" (a campaign directed by Eddy Butler). At two by-elections in 1990, the party came in third, and on October 1, 1992 the party won 20% of the vote in a by-election in Millwall ward.

A second by-election in Millwall in September 1993 saw a renewed BNP campaign to take the seat. The party obtained its first councillor, Derek Beackon, with a majority of seven votes. Although Beackon was able to achieve little on the council before the full council elections (in which he lost his seat, after anti-fascist campaigners flooded the area), the by-election win led to a great increase in publicity for the party. The party headquarters site increasingly became a venue for anti-fascist protesters who frequently linked its presence to racial crimes in the surrounding area. A near-riot ensued on October 16, 1993 when the police forced a 15,000 anti-BNP protest march to change its route away from outside the party building (31 people were arrested and nineteen police officers injured).

Their slogan during this period was "Defend Rights for Whites".

Griffin assumes leadership

Nick Griffin joined the BNP in 1995. Griffin had been a member of the NF Directorate under Tyndall and remained after Tyndall's resignation, eventually leaving the Front in 1989, to join the International Third Position. In 1999 he replaced Tyndall as BNP leader after a leadership election. Tyndall went on to run several articles in his magazine Spearhead (which Griffin had previously edited) that were highly critical of the Griffin leadership. He was expelled from the BNP in August 2003. He continued to publish articles in Spearhead attacking Griffin and disputing the BNP's account of his expulsion. He was readmitted to the party in December 2003 after an out-of-court settlement with Griffin, announced his intention of challenging Griffin for the leadership in July 2004, and was expelled again in December of the same year. Tyndall died on July 18, 2005.

Improved electoral performance and policy revamp

Griffin began a programme of modernising the BNP's image, dropping policy of the compulsory repatriation of non-whites and replacing it with a firm encouragement for "voluntary" repatriation . This was followed by an improvement in electoral performances. This was also a time of increased voter alienation with the major parties and some have argued that this was the primary cause of the party’s triumphs. In the 2002 local elections, the BNP gained 3 seats in Burnley and averaged 20% of the votes where it stood councillors. The party was accused, however, of exploiting the high tensions in areas that had recently undergone racially-motivated riots .

2004 BBC documentary

The increased success led to increased scrutiny from the press. In The Secret Agent, a BBC documentary broadcast on July 15, 2004, filmmaker Jason Gwynne went undercover and joined the BNP for six months. His secret filming recorded party leader Nick Griffin calling Islam a "wicked, vicious faith"; party member Steve Barkham confessing to assaulting an Asian man in the 2001 Bradford Riot; party member Stewart Williams stating that he wanted to "blow up" Bradford's mosques with a rocket launcher; and council candidate Dave Midgley confessing to pushing dog faeces through the letterbox of an Asian takeaway, a claim denied by the proprietor.

In his speech, Griffin stated that "For saying that, I tell you, I will get seven years if I said that outside", apparently referring to the maximum sentence for the criminal offence of incitement to racial hatred.

The day after the documentary was broadcast, Barclays Bank froze, then suspended, the BNP's bank accounts.

The BNP's response to the programme was that it had featured "the loudest and most hot-headed BNP activists were deliberately plied with drink and subject to suggestive provocation". In the wake of the documentary the party expelled Barkham and Midgley (but not Williams). Griffin did not apologise for his own comments, stating that "it's still not illegal to criticise Islam". He and BNP member Mark Collett were subsequently prosecuted for incitement to racial hatred (see below).

Events in 2004 and 2005

A 2004 joint press conference between Griffin and leader of the French Front National, Jean-Marie Le Pen, sparked protests.

The party has increasingly positioned itself against Islam, which Griffin has repeatedly called "wicked and vicious". In the wake of the 7 July bombings in London, the BNP released leaflets featuring images of the bombed Route 30 bus and the slogan "Maybe now it's time to start listening to the BNP." This move has been criticized by some as playing on people's high emotions and grief following a horrendous attack .

On July 21, 2005, Griffin and BNP activist Mark Collett pleaded not guilty at Leeds Crown Court to four and eight charges, respectively, of incitement to racial hatred. The charges resulted from the BBC documentary The Secret Agent (see above). John Tyndall was also due to appear in court but had died three days earlier. The case ended just over five months later on February 2, 2006. Griffin and Collett were each acquitted of half of the charges against them with an open verdict delivered on the remaining charges. The Crown Prosecution Service announced that they would pursue a retrial on the remaining charges.

After the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy, the BNP republished one of the cartoons of Muhammad on a leaflet, accompanied by a photo of Muslim demonstrators holding placards bearing murderous slogans and a "Which one do YOU find offensive?" caption.

Run-up to the UK 2006 local election

Events in the run up to the 2006 local elections seemed to show an increase in support for the BNP, with research carried out by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust, showing that, in the parts of England where the BNP have put most of their resources, one in four voters is considering voting BNP with the figure at one in five in parts of London . A government minister in the Department for Work and Pensions Margaret Hodge has also highlighted the increase in support by saying that eight out of ten white working class people in her London constituency of Barking are “tempted” to vote for the BNP. The increase in support for the BNP has been described by some as a protest vote and others as voter alienation with the three mainstream parties (Labour, Conservatives, and the Liberal-Democrats) . The increase in support for the BNP was notably demonstrated by a poll released by YouGov, a British polling firm, that indicated that the BNP vote had surged to 7% in the wake of media attention, a more than ten-fold increase over the previous general election.

A YouGov poll in April 2006 found that the majority of Britons agreed with many BNP policies, when unaware they were associated with the BNP. 59% supported the halting of all further immigration, and average support for the BNP propositions cited in the poll among those who did not know they belonged to the BNP was 55%. However, there were also certain BNP propositions were strongly opposed by those polled, including non-white citizens being inherently "less British", and the party's policy of encouraging the "repatriation" of ethnic minorities. Support also fell among those who were told that the policies were those of the BNP.

The UK 2006 local election results

On May 5, 2006, the results of the 2006 local elections were reported by the BBC and showed what some have described as a dramatic increase for the BNP. The party presented about 350 candidates, of which 33 were initially declared to be winners: the second highest gain of any party in the elections. This more than doubled the number of seats held by the BNP (before the elections, the BNP was estimated to have held about 20 local political seats). Also noteworthy is the fact that the constituency of Barking and Dagenham has become, according to many newspapers, the first council in the United Kingdom to have the BNP as the second-biggest party . However, the BNP were briefly the second largest party on Burnley Council in 2003.

Critics of the BNP, however, say that the voters were simply punishing the unpopular Labour Party, rather than expressing an increased interest in supporting the BNP; they have also noted that the party's gains leave it with 53 out of over 20,000 councillors in the UK, a very low proportion.

In the May 4 2006 local elections, BNP candidates came second in a further 70 seats.

BNP candidate Sharon Ebanks initially appeared to have won a seat in the Birmingham ward of Kingstanding, but shortly after the declaration the returning officer announced that many of her votes had been double-counted and that the seat should have gone to the Labour candidate . However, as electoral law states a declaration cannot be overturned without a court order, she was declared the victor and sworn in as councillor. Ebanks finally lost her seat on 26 July 2006 when the High Court confirmed her votes had indeed been miscounted. She was immediately replaced by Labour candidate Catherine Grundy .

The Birmingham Sunday Mercury reported that Ebanks had a black Jamaican father, in apparent conflict with the BNP's policy of white-only membership. Miss Ebanks denies this is true, and has previously spoken against inter-racial marriages. In October 2006 Ebanks was expelled from the BNP for making anti-semitic remarks.

Policies, and position on the political spectrum

The BNP is generally not regarded as economically "right-wing": that is, they oppose laissez-faire economics, instead emphasising so-called Third-way distributism. Rather, the description of them as 'far-right' relates to their authoritarian brand of ultra-nationalist and collectivist policies, as well as their promotion of racial segregation and compulsory military service. The Thatcherite former Conservative Party Chairman Lord Tebbit has said that the BNP policies of "central direction of the economy, nationalisation, worker control of businesses, and opposition to capitalism and free trade" are left-wing rather than right-wing and that "nationalism, racism and anti-semitism are not uniquely of the Left or Right but can be found on either side of the spectrum".

Since Griffin took over its leadership, the BNP has tried to moderate its ideology in line with the "Euronationalist" approach adopted by a number of far-right European counterparts such as the Austrian Freedom Party set up by Jörg Haider. This is a pattern of emphasis and presentation of policies cited as a factor in such parties' increased electoral successes of the 1990s and, arguably much more, the 2000s.

Under John Tyndall's leadership, for example, the party campaigned for the compulsory repatriation of all ethnic minorities. The party now advocates "voluntary repatriation" encouraged by government grants. This was a policy for which Griffin argued during his 1999 leadership campaign: at the time The Times quoted him as saying that while, like many members, he still privately supported forcible repatriation, he believed the policy was a "vote loser".

The party's other policies include:

• The ending of immigration to the UK from all areas except Western Europe, North America, and Australia.
• "A massively-funded and permanent programme, using and doubling Britain's current foreign aid budget, will aim to reduce, by voluntary resettlement to their lands of ethnic origin, the proportion of ethnic minorities living in Britain"
• The removal of all illegal immigrants
• The repeal of all "anti-discrimination" legislation, including the Race Relations Act.
• Withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union and the pursuit of protectionist economic measures.
• Encouraging greater share ownership and worker co-operatives.
• Restricting foreign aid to the support of countries receiving "repatriated" members of ethnic minorities. Griffin argued against giving unconditional foreign aid, including disaster aid, claiming 'charity' is not an acceptable use of public funds.
• The introduction of corporal punishment for petty criminals and vandals, and the introduction of capital punishment for paedophiles, terrorists and murderers.
• The reintroduction of national service and the denial of some civil rights from conscientious objectors refusing to perform national service.
• The requirement that all law-abiding adults completing national service maintain a standard-issue military assault rifle and ammunition in their home.
• A mandatory jail term for anyone assaulting an NHS worker.
• Providing extra resources for special needs children, and reversing the closure of special needs schools.
• The reunification of the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland in a 'federation of the nations of the British Isles'

Other policies include the promotion of organic farming, funding to encourage women (in every family) to stay home and raise children not yet of school age, and increasing defence spending.

Source: BNP website

Electoral strategy

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Because of its lack of substantial electoral support across the country the BNP is still widely considered to be at the fringes of British politics. However, media comment on some issues such as asylum-seekers is often very close to the BNP's position, and the party's chairman, Nick Griffin, has described the tabloids as "one of the BNPs best recruiting agents" in the past.

The BNP aims strongly to appeal to those members of the population who consider immigration a threat to jobs, a cause of rising crime, and a basis for cultural decline. Under its current policy, the party backs an immediate halt to all further non-European immigration and the voluntary resettlement of non-white people to their lands of ethnic origin by way of generous "homeward-bound" grants which would be made available to anyone who wanted to take advantage of them.

According to the BNP, an increasing number of former Conservative supporters are turning to the party. The party claims that their strong anti-EU policies strike a chord with many disenchanted Conservative voters; however, in the run up to the 2004 European elections this position was also articulated by the more mainstream United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), resulting in them receiving the majority of the anti-Europe "protest vote", rather than the BNP.

Currently the major emphasis of the BNP's electoral propaganda appears to be anti-Islamic, alleging widespread support of extremism and terrorism amongst the Muslim community.

Electoral performance

National parliament

For full details of candidates and votes in parliamentary elections, see British National Party election results

1. The BNP: Anti-asylum protest, racist sect or power-winning movement? Nick Griffin, Accessed June 3 2006
2. Election Resources:Parliamentary Elections in the UK Accessed July 14 2006
3. BNP election manifesto, 2005
4. BNP election manifesto, 2005 op cit
5. Peter Barberis, John McHugh and Mike Tyldesley, Encyclopaedia of British and Irish Political Organizations, Pinter, 2000, p. 661
6. Ray Hill with Andrew Bell, "The Other Face of Terror, Grafton, 1988. ISBN 0-586-06935-6
7. Martin Harrison in The British General Election of 1983, Macmillan 1983, p. 155
8. "Tyndall's race policy", The Times, June 4 1983, p. 5
9. David Butler and Dennis Kavanagh, The British General Election of 1983, Macmillan 1983, p. 354
10. Barberis, McHugh and Tyldesley, op cit, p. 594
11. Richard Thurlow, "Fascism in Britain", I.B. Tauris, 1998, p. 258
12. "Police kept rally secret", The Times, August 2 1984, p. 2
13. London Research Centre, "By-election results to the London Borough Councils 1990-94", p. 68-69
14. See, e.g., letter to The Guardian September 15 1992 from Richard Adams, John Austin, Diane Abbott and Len Duvall
15. Rajeev Syal and Tim Rayment, "Rioters clash with police over neo-Nazi bookshop", Sunday Times, October 17 1993
16. Cohen, Nick (2001-07-01). "Fist in the kid glove" (HTML). Race in Britain. The Observer. Retrieved 2006-07-16. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
17. For example John Tyndall, "The Problem is Mr Griffin" in Spearhead, October 2003
18. Simon Hughes interview with Juliane Worricker on BBC Radio 5 Live, 7 May 2006
19. Nick Ryan, "Green and Unpleasant Land", The Times, 10 April 1999