This is a guest post by Nothing British about the BNP
Yesterday’s Times carried a report on the BNP’s recent attempts to align themselves contraversially with the Armed Forces community. But this is just small portion of a larger campaign by the BNP to rebrand, by associating themselves with a range of charities and other public causes.
Over the summer it was reported that the BNP had taken part in number of social action projects. This included the bailing out of an owl sanctuary in Rochdale and donations to a Down Syndrome charity in Scotland. Then there were the well publicised donations to the Royal British Legion through a BNP member in Huddersfield, a Scottish veteran’s charity in South Lanarkshire, the Gurkha Welfare trust and an attempt to donate money to Help for Heroes by auctioning off books by the ex-SAS commando Andy McNab that caused the greatest stir in the media.
Over on our blog, Nothing British, we have written about “Soldiers off the Street” (SOTS), a new BNP front which claims to help homeless veterans by feeding, clothing and finding shelter for Britain’s vulnerable ex-servicemen and women. We have subsequently reported this organisation to the Charities Commission ad Trading Standards for failing to reveal its extremist connections.
SOTS is run by the husband and wife BNP team Bill and Marie Murray. As head of the BNP’s Welsh division Mr Murray is a very senior member of the party’s inner circle. His wife is a seasoned activist and during the European elections the pair were praised by the party’s central command for co-ordinating the delivery of over 30,000 leaflets. Mr Murray was singled out by one activist who saluted his indefatigability. Murray is seen in this video alongside Nick Griffin, saying that Winston Churchill would have embraced the BNP.
Just as with Islamist “charities” our central concern was for the public being duped into donating money to the bogus SOTS under illusion that it is neutral and non-political. We were concerned that money, intended for a noble cause, was actually in the hands of cadre of extremists who might seek to use the concerns of hard-working people and convert it into political capital.
Furthermore, we feared that if this was allowed to continue without being reported to the appropriate authorities, bona fide groups and charities would be severely undermined by the Machiavellian activities of the BNP. Charities such as Help for Heroes and the Gurkha Welfare trust deal with particularly sensitive issues and must remain neutral at all times, but with the BNP lurking round the corner their good work is turned into a political football. This cynical use of public empathy benefits no one accept the BNP.
We should be left in no doubt, despite protestations from the likes of Simon Darby and Lee Barnes (who is, as usual, weirdly convinced our complaints are part of some Tory/Zionist conspiracy), the BNP are using charitable causes such as Down Syndrome and injured service personnel to deliver an enormous propaganda coup.
Over at Nothing British we don’t wish to apply a political filter to donations, we understand that times are tough. We sympathize with their predicament. However, we believe that charities should be asking themselves whether accepting a short term fix is worth giving a leg up to fascism.
