"Sing Down Campsfield" demTHE ATTEMPT by the Nazi British National Party to stage a comeback in Tower Hamlets, after the defeat of their only councillor Derek Beackon last May, has flopped.
In the September 15 by-election in Shadwell ward, they took 305 votes against the Labour Party's 1800. Shadwell is bisected by Cable Street, site of the historic anti-tascist battle against Moseley's blackshirts in 1936.
Despite their defeat. the BNP came within 12 votes of the second-placed Liberal Democrats and beaten the Conservatives who got a wretched 74 votes.
Although the BNP have not succeeded in capturing another seat, their vote shows that they are a factor in the politics of the area. TWO HUNDRED activists attended last Saturday's UNISON "Fightback" conference in solidarity with the Sefton branch, which after having been found in conShadwell borders onto Canary Whart, where conspicuous luxury stands cheek-by-jowel with the desperate housing conditions and general squalor in Shadwell itself.
There is a large Bengali community. Bad housing together with a significant immigrant community leads to racist accusations that immigrants are getting preferential housing allocations In every case this has been proved to be nonsense. The BNP are adopting typical "divide and rule" tactics, where homelessness and unemployment is blamed on immigrant workers Last year's BNP Millwall victory has however had a salutary effect in mobilising anti-tascists and the local community every time the BNP show their faces.
Millwall will be much more difficult for the BNP to repeat. bled calling on it to organise further meetings and conferences in its own name.
Fightback is basically an SWP front in the mould of the ANL. It calls initiatives and invites affiliations, but has no democratic structure.
In fact, despite arguing that it is premature for the left to organise in an ongoing way, Fightback does have an organisational backbobne - the SWP.
Join forces
The Campaign for a Fighting and Democratic (CFDU), which is working to build a democratic and, non-sectarian left network, made a proposal to join forces with Fightback, to organise a democratic, united conference of the left.
This proposal was not just rejected by the Fightback organisers but ruled out of order (!) and not allowed for discussion ion the spurious grounds that it had been submitted too late - despite the fact that no one knew in advance of the conference that resolutions were to be taken at all!
The SWP bureaucratic ham fist went to absurd lengths; delegates were required to submit speaking slips giving an account of what the speaker intended to say!
Fightback will not be a real organisation, but will be taken off the shelf and dusted down when the SWP feel like it. The CFDU must go ahead with its December conference to create a united and democratic left organisation within UNISON.