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Where next for the BNP's amoeba-like Solidarity union?

Lancaster UAF | 17.07.2007 14:41 | Anti-racism | Repression | Social Struggles | Liverpool

Hey, let's make another one!

Following the fraudulent Extraordinary General Meeting held by the breakaway Solidarity union on Sunday, there is speculation about what will happen to both it and the original Solidarity from which it split. Both organisations are claiming the name, both are carrying on business as usual and both are purporting to be the Solidarity. Confusion is rife. To avoid making it worse, we'll refer to them as Solidarity A and B, A being the original union and B being the one stolen by Nick Griffin and Pat Harrington.

In a typically BNP-style News Bulletin, Solidarity B printed this little gem on its website yesterday;

'Solidarity members have reclaimed their Union at an Emergency General Meeting. The meeting heard how all members of Solidarity had been notified of the meeting called constitutionally by 2/3rds of the membership. Notices were published on the Union website, text messages sent to mobiles and email and postal bulletins sent.'

So two-thirds of the membership called for the EGM, did they? We're assured by three correspondents (writing to us completely independently as far as we can tell) who are all in the union, that they were not contacted in any way at all, either by text, post or phone, and if they had been they would certainly have voted against the changes. One wonders how this two-thirds figure could be proven and whether the BNP actually bothered to get in touch with anyone it thought might possibly be in opposition to its great takeover plan.

One of our correspondents also asked exactly how many people attended the EGM - an interesting question which we would love to have answered. Perhaps Harrington (who has posted on here using the apt name 'doublethink') would like to post some details.

'Those who may have been frightened to attend had been offered personal guarantees of their safety and dedicated security to allay their fears.'

This is clearly BNP-inspired 'by implication' bullshit that ranks alongside the fake assassination attempt on Nick Griffin as entirely stupid and completely unnecessary. The BNP is always claiming threats and intimidation, though it's usually alleged that it's 'reds' that have carried them out. Who is it this time - Tim Hawke and Clive Potter?

Regardless of all this, Nick Griffin has, using a couple of other people, regained control of what he sees as his union. Yes, Griffin, not Harrington. In fact, Griffin's grubby, chubby mitts are all over this fiasco, as you can easily tell when you consider how Solidarity has been snatched from those who wanted it to be almost an ordinary union (even though it would be supportive of the far-right) and placed in the hands of those who simply wish to exploit it for their own ends.

Though starting off on the wrong foot with a sacked General Secretary, rumours of financial mismanagement at best and theft at worst, the very clear theft of the membership list, the Paypal account and the website, Solidarity B is patently going on to better things, with a completely illegal EGM and the unconstitutional election to the Executive of two people who were either not members at all or certainly hadn't been for three months, Lindsey Nieuwhof and Simone Clarke.

Lindsey, you may recall, is the wife of Lambertus Nieuwhof, the new(ish) BNP web guru and school-bombing terrorist who, at Harrington and Griffin's instigation, locked Potter and Hawke out of the Solidarity website. Simone Clarke is the ballet dancer everyone made such a fuss about a few months back - generally disliked in the BNP because her (ex?) partner and the father of her child is Cuban-Chinese and they just don't like that sort of thing.

All this, though a laugh for us opponents of the BNP and its allied idiots, is really beside the point. This whole fiasco was all caused when Potter and Hawke decided there was something dodgy in the accounts so rightly suspended Harrington pending an investigation. Since then a takeover has been engineered in collusion with the BNP through theft after theft - surely making the whole Solidarity B formation non-financial fraud on a fairly grand scale? If we were in the same unhappy position as Potter and Hawke, we would immediately begin seeking advice for a legal challenge to the ownership of Solidarity via the High Court.

Naturally, there is a financial angle to all of this. Well there would be - Nick Griffin's involved. Apart from the poor bloody members of Solidarity B, who are about to be ripped off for every penny they can spare via all the schemes that Griffin and Harrington will think up between them, another body from Harrington's Third Way mob has suddenly popped up from nowhere with a nice little potential earner...

Much more here:  http://lancasteruaf.blogspot.com/2007/07/where-next-for-amoeba-like-solidarity.html

Lancaster UAF
- e-mail: lancaster.uaf@zen.co.uk
- Homepage: http://lancasteruaf.blogspot.com/

Comments

Hide the following 3 comments

Fighting Fund

21.07.2007 10:32

Perhaps you could start a Fighting Fund for the fascists Hawke and Potter to take Harrington to Court? I'm sure that many anti-racists would far prefer a Union that bars black and asian people as advocated by Hawke and Potter. It would certainly be easier to pigeonhole, label and oppose.

John Carpenter


Out-classed and out-gunned

25.07.2007 14:51

The EGM was reported in the Brentwood local newspapers. Prior to the EGM it was advertised on the main Solidarity website. A screenshot of this very page was also used on the site maintained by Harrington's opponents Hawke and Potter. How then can their supporters claim to have been unaware of the bulletin even if they did not get the bulletins, emails and text messages that every other Solidarity member was bombarded with by Harrington? Like it or not Harrington has the support of the Solidarity membership. Hawke is unknown and Potter is lacklustre and frankly depressing to listen to. Whether you love or hate Harrington few deny that he is ruthlessly effective. You have only to look at the way he has crushed Hawke's and Potter's attempted coup to see that.

Potter and Hawke, on the other hand, can scarcely string a coherent sentence together. Their pseudo website is full of spelling and gramatical errors - as is every ranting bulletin they post. It really shows how our education system has failed. Even when they make allegations against Harrington it is very difficult to even comprehend their meaning - so badly do they express it. Most of the content on their pseudo-site is factional and negative. Why on earth would anyone be interested in even reading it? Who would possibly be attracted to join these losers and moaners?

Their design skills are also laughable. The pseudo-site looks childish with cut and paste pictures and bitmap images that take ages to down-load. Hawke claims to be qualified in IT but you certainly don't get that impression from his design. It is a mess. Even some of the links don't work properly.

Potter is now a laughing-stock following reports in the Mirror at the weekend that his 'girlfriend' is some kind of asexual God freak with a strong interest in Wacko Jacko! No wonder he looks frustrated and depressed in the picture.

Frankly, they may just as well give up now before they get themselves into a lot of bother. Clearly they are out-classed and out-gunned.

Objective opinion


Building a legal scaffold

31.12.2007 15:33

It seems that Harrington and his Third Way borgs have been busy working away in the background to build a legal scaffold on which to hang Potter and Hawke:-

 http://www.ipo.gov.uk/tm/t-find/t-find-number?detailsrequested=C&trademark=2462460

I wonder how long before the writs start to fly? I wonder what else his vindictive, mad-eyed henchmen have been up to?

The Cat in the Hat


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