United Kingdom: Racism and fascism
01 January 1991
United Kingdom: Racism and fascism
Issues in May local government elections
BNP loses east London council seat
In May local government elections, Derek Beackon, the far-Right
BNP's only elected representative, failed to retain his seat in
Tower Hamlets, despite increasing his vote (see bulletin no. 6).
The BNP did not win any of the seats they contested, but did make
sizeable gains in the east London boroughs of Tower Hamlets and
Newham (Guardian 7.5.94).
Conservatives in east London play race card
Five Conservative local government candidates in the east London
borough of Newham were accused of racism after registering for
local elections under the title of `Conservatives Against
Labour's Unfair Ethnic Policies'. The Conservatives, who were
standing in wards where the BNP were also represented,
distributed a leaflet in the form of a bogus newspaper that
claimed that Labour-controlled Newham council spent £6-7 million
a year on race equality policies and ran a `policy of ethnically
sensitive noise control' (Guardian 5.4.94).
Immigration and asylum
Special `entrepreneur' immigration status announced
Home Office minister, Charles Wardle, has said that foreign
millionaires wishing to invest £750,000 in government bonds,
shares or corporate bonds, will be allowed to bypass the usual
immigration rules to enter the UK. At the same time as announcing
the creation of a special `entrepreneurial investor', the Home
Office announced that there would be a crackdown on overseas
students and patients who come to the UK for private medical
treatment (Financial Times 24.5.94, Guardian 25.4.94).
UK under scrutiny for refugee prison policy
The Council of Europe has sent a team of investigators to the UK
to examine whether the widespread use of custody for asylum-
seekers amounts to torture or degraded treatment (Guardian
16.5.94). Following reports from the Chief Inspector of Prisons,
Amnesty International , and penal reformers, the Home Office has
announced that it is to end the use of the Victorian Pentonville
prison to detain unconvicted asylum-seekers. However, a wing of
Rochester prison in Kent will be reopened as a detention centre
run by the immigration service. The report by the Chief Inspector
of Prisons had found desperation and self-mutilation to be common
amongst the unconvicted asylum-seekers at Pentonville and
concluded that it was an inappropriate place for detention.
Meanwhile, the Home Office has revealed that since the passing
of the Asylum Act, increasing numbers of asylum-seekers and
immigrants are held in UK prisons - a figure of 9000 in 1993
(Guardian 29.3.94).
Home Secretary cleared of contempt of court
The Home Secretary and his predecessor have been cleared of
contempt of court in trying to deport a young Indian woman
despite her status as legal guardian of her younger sisters and
five brothers. Lawyers for Dalvinder Kaur of Nottingham claimed
that the Home Secretary `rode roughshod' over a 1991 High Court
order making the children wards of court in their sister's care
(Guardian 17.5.94).
Policing
Policing and immigration London immigration raids
The Immigration Service and the Metropolitan police carried out
dawn raids on over 100 addresses in London in one of the largest
immigration swoops ever to take place in the UK, codenamed
operation Elgar and aimed mostly at Nigerians and Ghanaians.
Seventy arrests were made. Twenty-four people were found to be
illegal immigrants (Guardian 28.4.94).
Refugee status used to extract confessions
Two Sri Lankan Tamil refugees, convicted of the murder of three
Tamil men in a firebomb attack on an east London house in 1988,
had their convictions quashed by the Court of Appeal. The Labour
MP Jeremy Corbyn who campaigned for the release of Sam
Kulasingham and Prem Sivalingham said that `the police used the
immigration status of suspects to extricate evidence from them.
The men were thre