The British National Party ( BNP ) is a far-right, whites-only political party in the United Kingdom, formed as a splinter group of the British National Front by John Tyndall in 1982. The party's current chairman is Nick Griffin, himself a former national organiser of the National Front.
The BNP has no elected Members of Parliament. In the 2005 UK general election, the party received 0.7% of the popular vote, the eighth largest share. The BNP finished fifth in the 2008 London mayoral election with 5.2% of the popular vote. Mayoral candidate Richard Barnbrook was elected to one of the London Assembly's 25 seats. In addition to already holding several metropolitan borough council seats, the BNP won their first county council seats and European Parliament seats on 4 June 2009, winning one council seat in both Lancashire and Leicestershire, and one European Parliament seat each in Yorkshire and the Humber and North West England.
According to its constitution, the BNP 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". The BNP proposes "firm but voluntary incentives for immigrants and their descendants to return home". The party also advocates the repeal of all anti-discrimination legislation, and restricts party membership to "indigenous British ethnic groups deriving from the class of ‘Indigenous Caucasian’". The BNP also accepts white immigrants that are assimilated into one of those ethnicities. The BNP asserts that there are biological racial differences that determine the behaviour and character of individuals of different races, although it claims that it does not regard whites as superior to other ethnic groups, "Racism"...is not a consequence of "false consciousness", economics, imperialism or the work of evil agitators, it is part of human nature.
The party is ostracised by mainstream politicians, and opposed by the leaders of Westminster's major parties, including Conservative Party leader David Cameron, Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and Liberal Democrat party leader Nick Clegg.
History
The current use of the name British National Party is its fourth appearance in British politics. The original BNP emerged during World War II when a handful of former members of the British Union of Fascists took on the name. This group would later become known as the English National Association. A second British National Party also emerged in 1960 and went on to form a part of the National Front (NF). Around 1970, Eddy Morrison briefly attempted to organise a group of this name in Leeds but he quickly abandoned the idea to join the NF.
Founding of the modern BNP
The current BNP has its roots in the New National Front, founded in 1980 by John Tyndall, a former chairman of the National Front. 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, with much of the early funding provided by Tyndall's father-in-law, Charles Parker.
In 1983, in its first general election, the party sponsored 53 candidates; three more than was required to obtain a Party Election Broadcast on television. The broadcast was transmitted on 31 May and consisted of Tyndall, flanked by two Union Flags, speaking to a camera. Images of the Brixton riot were shown as Tyndall's speech was broadcast. One observer noted that the "emphasis was less heavily anti-black... than the National Front's". The giving of television time to the BNP was controversial, and was debated on 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 he said that he was hopeful that the two parties could reunite. This policy, however, was in direct contrast to the National Front's proposed Bill of Rights in their own 1983 General Election manifesto ( Let Britain Live ) making discrimination on grounds of sexuality a criminal offence (the first British political party in fact to publicly make such a commitment) and may have been more intended to siphon NF members unhappy with a manifesto pledge largely at the insistence of NF's National Activities Organiser (and de facto leader) Martin Webster who, despite being gay himself, was once one of Tyndall's close allies.
The party's candidates won 14,621 votes in that election. The BNP's average vote was less than the National Front, and in the two constituencies where both parties stood candidates, the NF was clearly more popular. Unbeknown to the BNP, Ray Hill was also working for the group Searchlight, and observers have suggested that the party's relatively low profile in its early years may have been related to his sabotage. - however this needs to be offset against the fact that Ray Hill polled by far the highest BNP vote that election (see also the later 1992 infiltration by Tim Hepple on the behalf of Searchlight)
The increase in the deposit required of parliamentary candidates hindered the party during the 1987 general elections, when it had only two candidates. The first time that the BNP attracted widespread attention was the Dewsbury riot of Summer 1989. Around 1,000 people took part in a "Rights for Whites" demonstration after some white parents in Dewsbury had been trying to withdraw their children from racially integrated schools.
1990s
After some financial troubles, the party's national headquarters were established at Welling in South East London in 1989. In the early 1990s, the party saw a growth in popularity mainly in London and the urban southeast, In the borough of Tower Hamlets the BNP gained its first council seat. (a campaign directed by Eddy Butler).
Tim Hepple and the BNP's first council seat
During this time Searchlight had once more infiltrated the party, this time in their Brick Lane 'Bunker' HQ in Welling courtesy of Tim Hepple, subsequently detailed in July 1993's expose booklet At War With Society (ISBN 0952203804 : 9780952203803).
The BNP's chief steward, Derek Beackon, was elected as the party's first councillor in a September 1993 by-election in Millwall by a majority of seven votes; he was a last minute replacement for Eddy Butler, and not originally expected to win. Although Beackon achieved little on the council before the full council elections(in which he lost his seat, largely due to an increased local turnout), the by-election win led to more publicity for the party.
This led to accusations by such anti-fascist and anti-racist groups as Red Action, Green Anarchist, and Workers Against Racism that Searchlight had employed Hepple to overhaul the BNP in order to keep themselves employed at a time when the far-right was at its lowest ebb since the 1950s. This claim was substantiated by Larry O'Hara's booklets A Lie Too Far and At War With The Truth , which exposed Hepple and Hill's attempted agent provocateur activities among enviromental campaigners at Twyford Down. Both would subsequently retire from their activities with Searchlight .
The party headquarters site became a venue for anti-fascist protesters who linked its presence to hate crimes in the surrounding area. A near-riot ensued on 16 October 1993 when the police forced a 15,000 anti-BNP protest march to change its route away from outside the party building. During the riot, 31 people were arrested and 19 police officers were injured.
Anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial
The BNP, its former leaders and present leader, Nick Griffin, have promoted anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial in the past. In 1996, writing in his own publication, The Rune , Griffin stated that:
I am well aware that orthodox opinion is that six million Jews were gassed and cremated or turned into soup and lampshades. I have reached the conclusion that the 'extermination' tale is a mixture of Allied wartime propaganda, extremely profitable lie, and latter witch-hysteria.The following year, during a Cook Report documentary he stated:
There is no doubt that hundreds, probably thousands of Jews were shot to death in Eastern Europe, because they were rightly or wrongly seen as communists or potential partisan supporters. That was awful. But this nonsense about gas chambers is exposed as a total lie.In 1988, The Sunday Times revealed that Holocaust News , a publication that claimed the Holocaust was an "evil hoax", was being published by the BNP's then deputy leader, Richard Edmonds, on behalf of a BNP front organisation, the Centre for Historical Review, and distributed by members. John Tyndall, the party's leader, said he was not involved in the publication but that it had his full support.
The 2002 Channel 4 documentary Young, Nazi and Proud featured hidden-camera footage of the then BNP youth leader Mark Collett stating his admiration for Adolf Hitler, and stating "I'd never say this on camera, the Jews have been thrown out of every country including England. It's not just persecution. There's no smoke without fire." It also featured footage of visitors to the party's annual "Red White and Blue" festival, some of whom wore the legend "88" (code for HH, "Heil Hitler"). Collett resigned from the party after the documentary's filming, but rejoined shortly afterwards, with Griffin's approval, on the condition that Collett change his views on the subj
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