National Front (UK)
The British National Front ( most National Front or NF called ) is a British far-right party, which had its heyday in the 1970s and 1980s.
History
Start-up phase
The NF was born on February 7, 1967 under the chairmanship of AK Chesterton, cousin of the author GK Chesterton and former leader of the League of Empire Loyalists ( LEL), was founded. My goal was to combat an immigration and a policy of multiculturalism, on the other hand they also wanted to multilateral agreements and institutions such as the United Nations or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ) block, bilateral agreements should replace between states. The new movement urged the LEL in a lasting coalition with the British National Party and the third conducted by Robin Beauclair Racial Preservation Society. Although there existed a spell, which should prevent the entry of neo-Nazi groups in the party, but members of the neo-Nazi Greater Britain Movement by John Tyndall circumvented this prohibition by they entered as individuals.
Heyday in the 1970s
The NF grew during the 1970s and in 1974 14,000 members. In local elections, the party achieved particularly good results. So got the NF (along with a splinter group ) 44 percent of the votes cast in Deptford and struck almost the Labour candidate. In three parliamentary by-elections the NF won the third place, although it should be noted that they are only in one of these cases - the Newham - election in 1975, when the former candidate of the Communist Party of Great Britain Mike Lobb took for the NF - more votes than the Liberal Democrats received.
The electoral base of NF consisted mainly of workers and self-employed people who spoke out against the alleged threat posed by foreign workers. In addition, the party attracted some disillusioned members of the Conservative Party, which brought a lot of expertise and reputation in the NF. Of particular importance was that of the so-called Monday Club, who had founded the Conservatives in response to Harold Macmillan's Winds of Change speech. Political basis of the NF were anti - communism and liberalism, support for the Ulster loyalists in Northern Ireland, opposition to the European Economic Community and the advocacy of forced expulsion of new immigrants and immigrants from the Commonwealth, by virtue of the former pass system at this time could enter as equal citizens to the UK.
The NF was known for their noisy demonstrations that were in the 1970s, a common sight, especially in London, where the NF often anti-fascist resistance from groups such as the International Marxist Group of Tariq Ali or later the Anti Nazi League of Socialist Workers Party faced. Opponents and opponents of NF regarded this as a neo-fascist organization, and its activities are even today still fought by anti- racist groups such as Unite Against Fascism and Searchlight.
The NF was first led by Chesterton, who left the party after the half of the board ( led by the major financier of the NF, Gordon Marshall - also known as " Gordon Brown" ) had deprived him of the trust. It was in 1970, a supporter of Enoch Powell replaced by former Conservative John O'Brien. However, O'Brien drew back when he noticed that the senior positions were systematically taken over by former members of the Greater Britain Movement. They wanted to achieve with it that the party of John Tyndall and his deputy, Martin Webster, could be dominated. O'Brien and the Treasurer of the NF, Clare McDonald, transferred a small group of followers and supporters in the National Independence Party of John Davis, leaving the leadership Tyndall and Webster.
In 1973, the NF could win a shocking success in a by-election in West Bromwich: The party won 16 percent of votes in third place and was the only time in their history, their election deposit back ( candidates must have a pre-election mortgage deposit, which they will get back on reaching a certain number of votes ). Reason for the success was mainly adopted by the candidate Martin Webster role of the nice "Big Mart " and the expensive election campaign, were carted to the busloads of supporters and supporters in the district. In the period following the party achieved considerable successes, but was never able to gain a seat directly in an election. The only exception was a seat at the elections for the City Council Carrickfergus in Northern Ireland in 1975, in which retired the opposing candidate.
In 1974, the documentation ThisWeek of ITV plc revealed the neo-Nazi past ( and ongoing connections in the present) of Tyndall and Webster. This led two weeks later to a turbulent Congress, in which the party chairmanship passed to the populist John Kingsley Read. This and his supporters and supporters were, however, after a short time forced out of the party - not least because of the intimidation of " honor guard " of Tyndall - and Tyndall returned to the forefront of NF. Read Founded in connection the short-lived National Party, which could obtain two council seats in the elections in Blackburn 1976.
Decline in the 1980s
Since the year 1979, the National Front lost its influence in the political life of Great Britain. The rise of the Conservatives under Margaret Thatcher and her restrictive positions on immigration and domestic policy promoted the NF completely sidelined. Many former Tories returned again to their political homeland. Additionally brought Tyndall short-term decision to fund the shows, a total of 303 candidates, in order to give the appearance of growing strength, the party to the brink of ruin, as all election pledges were lost in the amount of 150 pounds (Most nominations existed only on paper, and there was no real campaign instead ). Tyndall's leadership was provided by Andrew Fountaine question, and this was formed, after he had been ousted from Tyndall, a fork, the NF Constitutional Movement. The influential group in Leicester split at this time also from the short-lived and ended in British Democratic Party. Given this dramatic melting together of the party Tyndall was expelled from the party and replaced by Andrew Brons to the party leadership. Tyndall formed his own New National Front, which was, however, forced the court to rename. Tyndall decided to rename the NNF in British National Party (BNP ) - from the original BNP were he and his followers have been excluded. The BNP displaced in the period following the National Front from her place as the dominant party on the outer right edge.
The decline of the party in the 1980s was rapid, although the party succeeded to gain some support in the West Midlands and in parts of London. The party tried several times in vain to gain a following in Northern Ireland. Your opponents and adversaries considered the NF as a skinhead party with thinly veiled neo-Nazi views - a view that the party loudly disagreed with ( and who did not accept many skinheads ). Contrary to popular opinion and the view through the tabloids (also Searchlight advocated this view) lost the NF a large proportion of their recruited from the Oi! Scene followers as a result of their support of radical Islamic positions such as that of Louis Farrakhan and the Ayatollah Khomeini. These lost followers and supporters joined in the aftermath of the British National Party, the rapidly declining British Movement or even the neo-Nazi network Blood and Honour.
Cleavage
In the late 1980s, the party split into two halves. This played especially the concept of the "political soldiers " a prominent role, which was represented by young radicals such as Nick Griffin, Patrick Harrington, Phil Edwards and Derek Holland, who became known as the Official National Front or Third Way. Under the leadership of "political soldiers " lost the NF interest in elections and preferred a more revolutionary strategy. On the other side stood the Flag Group, which consisted of the traditionalists such as Ian Anderson, Martin Wingfield, Tina "Tin -Tin " Wingfield and Steve Brady and took under the banner of NF on the parliamentary elections in 1987. The Flag Group launched some rather amateurish political undertakings; the ideas of Social Credit and the Distributismus gained a certain popularity, as always, but was actually the immigration policy ( race relations ) in the center of attention. In 1990, the political soldiers distributed to groups such as Third Way and the International Third Position (ITP ), leaving thus the Flag Group control of the NF, whose chairman then Ian Anderson and Martin Wingfield were.
Name change to National Democrats
To the same extent as the BNP grew up in the 1990s, shrank the NF. As a result, Ian Anderson decided to change the name of the party in 1995 to try a new start as the National Democrats. This move proved to be very unpopular ( the results of the vote on the name change has been doubted by many ), and more than half of the 600 members were renamed continue under the name of National Front. The National Democrats brought out for a while the old NF- journal The Flag and the NF beat 1997 by-election in Uxbridge ( the two leaders stood here as a candidate opposite). The LF, however, launched a new magazine, The Flame, which appears at irregular intervals until today.
Current National Front
The NF is currently largely on the ground, even if it continues to exist as a small party and takes up to elections. Current Chairman Ian Edward. The NF presented 12 candidates in the 2005 parliamentary elections, in which it none of them managed to reclaim their election pledge; total the party received 7148 votes. The NF has links to loyalist paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland.
While earlier leaders of the party did talk by Holocaust denial on its own, the NF now holds in official party pronouncements with an explicit anti -Semitic remarks rather reserved and represents instead ethnopluralistische positions. With campaigns for " immigration stop " or "freedom of speech " she tries to appeal to xenophobic sentiments. After the British National Party ( pursuant to a court judgment), since 2010, non-whites must allow a party membership formally claimed the NF to distinguish himself as the only British party by "white purity" ( which apparently had also crossings of the BNP to the NF result ).