BNP protest backfires

Searchlight by Simon Turner | Wednesday, 4 February 2009

The Manchester branch of the British National Party held a demonstration last month outside Manchester Town Hall in protest at a jobs fair for the black and minority ethnic communities.

The pathetic gathering of a dozen supporters attempted to hand out leaflets and copies of the party’s Racism Cuts Both Ways pamphlet to passers-by. However, few people seemed interested in their material and the BNP activists soon gave up.

One local woman, who threw the BNP leaflet in the bin, later told Searchlight: “Don’t they have jobs to go to? In the present economic crisis we should support every effort to help get people back to work.”

The BNP leaflet called the jobs fair racist, but what it failed to mention was the BNP’s own policy of discrimination. Its 2005 general election manifesto called for white British people to be given preference in jobs, housing and education. Ethnic minorities would become second-class citizens under the law.

It appears that Manchester BNP’s protest has backfired. No sooner had they begun gathering outside the town hall than a couple of city councillors were straight on the phone to Searchlight offering to work more closely together.