No platform policy hits BNP

| Thursday, 28 April 2005 Source: Searchlight

London trade unionists have stopped an election hustings that was to take place at Brunel University on 3 May because a British National Party candidate had been invited to participate. This would have been the sole campaign appearance by Cliff LeMay, the BNP candidate for Uxbridge.

In a good example of effective cooperation between Searchlight and the trade union movement, Searchlight informed officials of the GMB and Unison of the student union's invitation to the BNP. Both unions have an active policy of giving no platform to nazis and racists. They immediately contacted the college authorities and the student union to express the concern of their members at the university. Within hours the invitation to the BNP was withdrawn.

LeMay, a Battersea postman and member of the Communication Workers' Union, had expected to be the BNP candidate for Croydon Central. At the last moment he was ordered to stand in Uxbridge as the BNP had no one in west London to do the job.

Elsewhere too the BNP have found they are not welcome.

A BNP candidate in Wokingham said he was "amazed" to be barred from a public election forum. Richard Colborne, who is standing for election in the constituency, was refused entry to Wokingham Methodist Church where the hustings was being held.

All the other parliamentary candidates were invited to attend the event last week, but Churches Together, the organiser, decided it would be inappropriate to invite the BNP.

Forum chairman the Rev David Hodgson said: "Many of the people who attended the meeting would have found his views offensive and we believed that he would have disrupted the meeting.

In March the Methodist Church advised congregations not to invite "extremist" parties to election hustings on church premises. Anthea Cox, the Church's co-ordinating secretary for public life and social justice, said: "People worry that they have to give a platform to all the candidates in their constituency. In fact, the law only obliges them to avoid bias towards any one party."

Colborne arrived at the church in the company of Tim Rait, the BNP's candidate for Maidenhead, and Bob Gertner from the BNP's Croydon branch. They were also asked to leave.

In Huddersfield a BNP candidate accused a head teacher of being fascist when he was not invited to take part in a school event.

Pupils at Colne Valley High School met a group of election candidates yesterday to gather tips on campaigning for the school's mock election on 5 May. Students have been working hard in recent weeks to learn about the election process and nominate their own school candidates to stand in the election.

The Labour, Liberal Democrat, Green Party and Conservative candidates were among those invited to advise pupils on the election process. But David Exley, the BNP candidate for Dewsbury, claims the party was deliberately excluded from the event for political reasons.

He said: "I think it is totally undemocratic and if that isn't being a fascist dictator then I don't know what is.

"I suspect she is imposing her own political views on the whole school."

But Linda Wright, the head teacher, dismissed claims she was acting politically. "It is not about this election, it is about the electoral process. None of our children can vote so the candidates were not electioneering.

"There were a lot of parties not invited. We only invited those the children had chosen to stand as in our own election.

"They were the three key parties – Labour, Conservative and Lib Dem – and the Green Party because so many pupils are concerned about the environment.

"I find it deeply offensive that they are making politics at school about how democracy works into party politics."