Britain: barbarism on the streets – mobilise to smash the far right!

Far-right rioting has spread across Britain, with fascist gangs launching pogroms against Muslim and Asian communities. Appeals for ‘calm’ will not suffice. To eradicate this scourge, organised workers and youth must take militant mass action.

[Originally published at communist.red]

Barbarism hit the streets of Britain over the weekend, as lynch mobs marauded around towns and cities across the country, targeting migrants, Muslims, and other minorities.

Following last week’s riots in Southport, Hartlepool, Sunderland, and elsewhere, far-right violence spread to dozens of other locations on Saturday and Sunday, including Blackburn, Leicester, Stoke-on-Trent, and Belfast.

Shocking, savage scenes were witnessed in places like Rotherham, Hull, Liverpool, and more, as fascist gangs attacked asylum-seeker accommodation, alongside local Asian shops and residents.

In South Yorkshire, a 700-strong masked mob – wrapped in Union Jacks and waving St. George’s flags – stormed and torched the Rotherham Holiday Inn Express, used to house refugees.

Footage from Hull showed thugs pulling a man out of his car and smashing it up, because of the colour of his skin. In Manchester, far-right hooligans beat up a black passer-by, while the police watched on from the sidelines.

These explicitly racist attacks came on top of a wave of rioting and looting, leaving a trail of destruction in its wake in town centres and working-class communities.

Establishment to blame

These far-right rampages have caused alarm and fear amongst British Muslims and other groups being targeted by these pogroms. More widely, ordinary workers and youth are wanting to know how to fight back, in order to eradicate this menace that is running amok in our neighbourhoods.

These explosive events are not exactly what ‘Sir’ Keir Starmer and his cabinet had in mind for their first month in power / Image: The Communist

This maelstrom of violent disorder is also causing panic amongst the ruling class and its representatives. These explosive events are not exactly what ‘Sir’ Keir Starmer and his cabinet had in mind for their first month in power.

The party’s main electoral pitch was that an incoming Labour government would restore stability for British capitalism, after years of Tory chaos.

Indeed, while fires rage across the country, Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been meeting with Wall Street bankers to promote the UK as an investment opportunity for American billionaires.

But the bosses and their champions will not get the stability they crave. Instead, Britain’s rotten establishment is reaping the whirlwind for its endless migrant bashing, Islamophobia, and culture war campaigns.

These ladies and gentlemen can decry the terrifying violence that has erupted over the last week all they like. And they can point the finger at demagogues like Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson for stirring up these ‘protests’.

But they and their decrepit system are responsible for spewing racist poison into society from the top, and for creating the fertile soil of poverty, deprivation, and misery in which the far right thrives.

And this includes Starmer’s Labour, which has constantly aped the Tories and Farage when it comes to the question of migration, with disgusting promises to ‘stop the boats’ and deport Bangladeshis.

The whole lot of them are to blame for this potential inferno. And there is no chance of the arsonists putting out the flames that they have fanned and stoked.

Neither Starmer, nor the police

The new PM and his ministers have pledged to come down hard on far-right “extremists”, with Home Secretary Yvette Cooper promising to deliver “swift justice” and “take whatever action is needed to keep streets safe”.

Already, almost 400 arrests have been made relating to the rioting seen over the last week.

Similarly, having whipped up hatred and xenophobia against asylum-seekers during their time in office, a host of former Tory home secretaries have lined up to hypocritically condemn the violence that is now playing out across the UK.

‘Dame’ Priti Patel, for example, one of the key architects of the Tories’ ‘hostile environment’, denounced the “extraordinary criminality” being perpetrated. And outgoing head of the Home Office (and Conservative leadership candidate) James Cleverly asserted that rioters “should expect to be met with the full weight of the law”.

But more police, faster convictions, and tougher sentencing will do nothing to eliminate this far-right threat. And not only because the apparatus of the British state – from courts to prisons – are already bursting at the seams.

The police – capitalism’s ‘armed bodies of men’ – exist to protect the ruling class’ property and privileges, not working-class communities. Their job is to uphold the broken status quo that has given rise to this far-right scourge.

And as a key pillar of the capitalist establishment, the police are themselves racist and abusive to the core, as seen recently at Manchester airport.

Neither Starmer’s government nor the police can be relied upon to defend us against the far right. In fact, any beefing up of the state’s powers today will be used against the working class and left-wing activists tomorrow.

Organisation and mobilisation

Faced with this Islamophobic intimidation, and real danger of physical harm, local Muslim and Asian communities are taking matters into their own hands.

Videos from Stoke, for example, show a large group of youth defending the local mosque and chasing the far right away. Similarly, in Blackburn, Middlesbrough, and elsewhere, Muslim residents have organised patrols to protect against racist gangs.

In Bristol, meanwhile, local activists were able to push back EDL supporters who were trying to attack a refugee hotel. And in many cases, volunteers have come out in the aftermath of these riots to offer solidarity and support: cleaning streets; boarding up broken windows; and repairing damage to mosques and shops.

Unfortunately, however, these courageous efforts have largely been spontaneous, with little involvement or backing from the labour movement.

The establishment and its mouthpieces are cynically trying to equate these two camps: on one side, the forces of reaction, who are spreading bigotry and carrying out racist assaults; on the other, ordinary communities mobilising to defend themselves.

Appealing for ‘calm’, these hypocrites denounce aggression ‘on both sides’. But besieged communities have every right to defend themselves against this fascist threat by any means necessary. Local residents are completely correct in confronting the far right head on, and driving them off our streets.

Scandalously, even so-called ‘left’ leaders have criticised local Muslims and Asians for militantly mobilising against the far right, with reports of counter-demo organisers raising criticism about the use of fighting tactics.

We must be clear, however: in this context, with reactionary thugs on the rampage, pacifist pleas for ‘moderation’ and ‘unity’ will only play into the far right’s hands, leaving them unimpeded to torment minorities and wreak havoc.

Instead of leaving self-organised Asian groups isolated to fend for themselves, the labour and trade union movement should be offering their full support to this fightback: calling on activists to join these grassroots initiatives; providing material and financial resources; and helping to establish defence committees that can protect anti-racist protests and targeted buildings.

This should be linked to the organisation of proper anti-fascist campaigns in every town, borough, and city.

As a first step, local meetings should be called of trusted activists from the workers’ movement, Palestine encampments, solidarity groups, Asian youth, and revolutionary organisations, in order to discuss, decide, and carry out concrete points and tasks.

This includes gathering information and intelligence about the far right’s plans; mobilising workers and youth en masse in response to any threats; and carrying out any other political and technical tasks needed as part of this struggle against the fascists and the far right.

Class struggle

On this basis, the far right could easily be stopped in their tracks, turned back, and sent running with their tail between their legs – just as was seen with Mosley’s Blackshirts at the Battle of Cable Street in 1936.

And with reports of widespread attacks on migrant-related targets across the county planned for this coming Wednesday, it is vital that the movement acts quickly to extinguish this far-right blaze before it grows and spreads.

These far-right mobs are a genuine threat. And left unchecked, they will become emboldened.

At the same time, they are relatively small in their numbers. If the full weight and strength of the organised working class was mobilised against them, they could be smashed to pieces.

The labour movement and the left must take up this mantle.

Unfortunately, however, this is not the perspective or approach of the trade union leaders, or of campaigns like ‘Stand Up To Racism’. Instead, they hope for a quiet life; for order to be restored, economic growth to resume, and working-class communities to gain a few extra scraps from the richman’s table.

Their entire strategy is based on moralistic appeals to open borders and welcome refugees, not on mass action and united class struggle. Their outlook, meanwhile, is restricted by their woolly, reformist politics; by a utopian belief in a ‘nicer’, ‘kinder’ form of capitalism, which they hope will deliver the goods for the working class, the vulnerable, and the oppressed.

Such ideas and illusions offer no solution. Instead, they merely sow confusion, disarming and disorientating workers and youth – precisely at a time when clarity and audacity is required.

Fight for revolution

What is needed is a revolutionary programme, combined with militant, class-struggle methods.

This is what comrades of the Revolutionary Communist Party have been pushing for in local anti-racist movements across the country (see reports below).

Whether it be these racist riots in England, the rise of Trump in the USA and Le Pen in France, or the genocide in Gaza and the escalating conflict in the Middle East: we must understand what these events represent.

Only by correctly diagnosing the disease can we hope to find the necessary cure.

All of these horrors are a reflection of the same underlying process: the impasse, sickness, and decay of capitalism, in Britain and globally; the collapse of the liberal centre ground, and the growing hatred towards the establishment that defends it; and the resultant polarisation in society, with volatile swings to the right and the left, as the masses grasp for a way forward.

As long as capitalism remains, with reactionary opportunists like Farage able to prey on working-class concerns around jobs and housing, the racist far right will continue to fester in society’s open wounds.

To weed out the far right and fascism, once and for all, we must uproot the rotten system in which they spawn. This means getting organised, building the forces of communism, and joining the fight for revolution.

The alternative is clear: either the struggle for socialism is successful, or the barbarism of racist reaction and imperialist war will continue to plague the planet.

That is the essential meaning of recent events, in Britain and internationally, which we must understand and act upon.

Sheffield

The far right called a protest in Sheffield on Sunday. Only a small handful turned up, however, and these were turned away by a much larger counter-protest.

Many speeches were given about the need to mobilise in large numbers to stop the fascists, and commenting on the tragic situation that was unfolding in Rotherham at that very moment.

Some speakers called for working class unity, arguing that the rich were the cause of the problems facing society, not migrants.

An RCP comrade made a speech explaining the real basis for the rise in the far right. They pointed the finger firmly at the establishment, including the current Labour Party leadership and previous Tory government, whose rhetoric around migrants fans the flames of hate and links small boat migrants with terrorists.

To defeat the far-right, it is the entire establishment that must be brought down also.

As our comrade was speaking, a large, hundred-plus delegation from the Asian community turned up to support the counter-protest. It was at this stage that the police felt the need to come out in force with their riot gear in hand. Previous to this, the police had decided to sit in their vans while a few far-right idiots attempted to attack counter-protestors with large sticks.

There was a clear difference in tactics from the organisers of the counter-protest, compared with the organised group of Asian men. The organisers appealed for people to keep together and stay in the square, while the group of Asian men preferred to take the action to the far-right thugs. This led some in the crowd to say that they were being too violent; that they were “idiots” for wanting to take on and fight the fascists.

RCP comrades, by contrast, took an active approach in engaging with the organised group that turned up. We had good conversations about Bangladesh, the real meaning of communism, and the need for class unity against the rich across all ethnic and religious lines.

It is clear that these young men have begun to organise themselves. When speaking, they explained their motivation: to defend those in their families at home who were scared to come out, or who had been told to stay home for their own safety. They informed us that they have created their own security network – groups stay in cars around mosques in case of any attack.

In times of need, organic organisations like this spring up. It shows what the working class is capable of. This is what is needed on a huge scale to overthrow the entire capitalist system.

We need and will continue to talk to those who are being radicalised by these events. We need to build an organised, revolutionary party to defeat the far-right threat and the capitalist system that breeds this.

Manchester

In Manchester, six comrades met for a briefing before joining the counter-demo to politically prepare and discuss safety. Several bystanders joined and listened, and we had some great conversations and got a couple of people’s contact details.

The demonstration started and the mood was clearly different from any we’d been to before. It was run by Stand up to Racism (SUTR), but dominated by trade unionists who gave some solid speeches.

Outnumbered, the reactionary mob left. But the police brought out mounted units and kettled us. They treated us far more severely than they had the reactionary mob.

I was unsure of how this would go. But during a quiet moment I gave a speech targeting the reactionary role of the police, aiming fire at the Starmer government and its anti-migrant rhetoric, pointing out that they were more comfortable with the far right on the streets than the organised working class.

This got a fantastic response. It was a very short and simple speech, and we then led chants of “shame on the GMP [Greater Manchester Police]!” and “no trust in Starmer!”, which were taken up. From this point we set the tone and the political line of the demo.

We learnt that when people hear political clarity, it has a serious impact. And we learnt that fighting to get our politics out in front works. On this basis we can make a name for ourselves.

Sunderland

On Saturday, the atmosphere of relative calm and normality stood in stark contrast with the scenes of chaos the night before. Thanks to a cleanup effort by the local community, most of the debris had been cleared by lunchtime.

But the scars of far-right violence could still be seen around the city centre. A Citizen’s Advice office was torched and smouldering, broken windows dotted the high street, and a heavy police presence continued to linger.

Rioters also turned over and burned a car, looted a vape store, and targeted the Masjid e Anwaar e Madinah mosque in the Millfield area on Friday evening.

That one of the worst of the riots so far took place in Sunderland is no accident. Despite investment in a few multi-million pound developments, living standards have continued to decline. It was hard to tell whether shops were boarded up due to the riot, or years of neglect.

The intense anger with this state of affairs was evidenced by the damage to a police office and the Council’s opulent new City Hall. The Labour-controlled local authority has cut public services to the bone while supporting business and funnelling Levelling Up funds to expensive vanity projects.

In the words of one young worker: “People are sick of the way the country is run… [but] they’ve been force fed lies by people like Nigel Farage, Tommy Robinson, and the Tory Party who were never on their side to begin with. The elites, the rich – it’s their fault why this has happened.”

We spoke to a woman who pointed out that ordinary Sunderland residents will be made to foot the bill, even though many rioters were from outside of the area. “I wanted to go down there and whip their balaclavas off myself,” she said.

This demonstrates the will of the working class to fight fascist thuggery on the streets. But the labour leadership have sat on their hands and refused to harness this mood. Even as rumours circulate of a second pogrom gathering on Saturday evening, Sunderland TUC had only a meek statement to offer: “Let’s all come together and fix this.”

We say:

• No trust in Starmer or the racist police!
• The bosses and bankers are to blame for our crumbling NHS, not migrants!
• Fight the far-right with a mass mobilisation of the working class!

Newcastle

Five comrades held a stall today with copies of The Communist and other literature. We decided to sell in a different spot to our usual, as it’s busier, and we were aware that the far-right types might be feeling emboldened after rioting last night in Sunderland.

The general mood was one of disgust at the riots, and people were very receptive to our points about the establishment blaming the crisis of capital on immigrants. We found a lot of people didn’t know what people were rioting about.

We did encounter two fascists. One got quite angry and shouted at us, but we managed to shut down the conversation quickly and he left.

One person we spoke to, a 64 year-old labourer, said:

“These rioters are horrible, vicious bastards. But no one seems to be speaking about the riots that happened in Leeds the other week. That wasn’t about Muslims. The whole country feels like it’s boiling over. The Tories have been shite, but Labour aren’t going to change anything either. This country needs sorting out, something needs to change”.

Hull

There was a large far-right mobilisation in Hull over the weekend. Three of our comrades went along to the counter-demonstration, which was politically weak and small in number.

Since the trades council had been suspended previously, sectarian activists took charge by force, as they had brought a microphone just to shout very politically weak slogans and play music to “calm the situation”.

When our comrades tried to give a political speech, we were rebuffed these organisers. So we went around with The Communist instead to chat with those in attendance and made five sales.

But after thirty minutes the police line broke, the counter-demo was encircled and attacked, and the police told everyone to flee. One comrade was slapped across the face. Another was pushed around by the far right thugs.

It was a big defeat for the left in Hull today, and the far right have been emboldened. They marched to a local hotel where asylum seekers are being housed, smashed its windows, and chanted racist remarks. We can expect that they will be back.

Playing music to ‘calm the situation’ clearly had no effect. We looked weak and the counter-demonstration was smashed.

Liverpool

Around 300 people mobilised for a counter demonstration at the Pier Head in Liverpool. Before the demonstration itself, RCP comrades and sympathisers met to discuss the fundamentals of Marxism and we made a plan to collect quotes and reports for The Communist.

We then marched down and saw speeches being given by local trade unionists and SUTR who had organised the rally. This modest counter demonstration was outnumbered by the far-right; they were violent from the start, throwing flares, coins, bottles, and other debris, some narrowly missing children on our side. If it hadn’t been for the police line, the far-right would have caused serious injury to the counter protestors.

Things escalated when masked hooligans charged at us, forcing us to retreat. These thugs then attacked a woman protesting, attempting to wrest a megaphone from her before being arrested.

The protest quickly descended into hooliganism and violence. Local youth began throwing chairs and debris at the police. A glass bottle narrowly missed our comrades.

Saturday felt like a defeat for the left in Liverpool, compared to last time when the English Defence League didn’t make it 50 yards from Lime Street Station. We were outnumbered, out-muscled, and the rioting that came off the back of the political confrontation seeped into the wider city.

Men giving out Qur’ans on Lord Street were attacked, and a vape shop owned by an immigrant had the windows smashed in. Speaking to members of the public in the evening they condemned the violence and the targeting of Muslims.

We left the protest together and began to reflect on the day. The one positive is that we, through the chaos, convinced our two sympathisers to join and help us build the revolutionary party here in Liverpool.

Cardiff

Four comrades attended a local counter demonstration against a far-right demonstration planned to take place outside the Senedd.

Those organising the far-right demo initially called it off two days before it was supposed to go ahead. The counter demo went ahead as planned anyway.

Police presence was relatively high at first, suggesting they expected a higher turnout of the far right than showed up in the end.

Around 200 counter demonstrators attended at its peak, with Palestine solidarity activists giving speeches.

Notable speeches included one Unison representative, who correctly identified the need for the labour movement to cut across the culture war fuelling the far right.

A Black Lives Matter activist also spoke, and identified capitalism as the root cause of discontent in society. This received the best cheers.

No speaker, however, suggested how this fight against the capitalist system and its reactionary poison could be carried out, and by who.

For the time being, the counter demonstrations didn’t seem to attract many new people, with the usual faces in attendance. Luckily, only around 15-18 older far-right activists arrived, huddled together in a tiny group next to the counter demonstration.

Nottingham

Tensions across Nottingham reached a fever pitch this weekend, with comrades of the RCP joining the counter-protest against the far right, who mobilised in the city.

The counter-protest was mostly composed of youth, in very respectable numbers – especially considering the demo had only been organised the previous day.

When the throng of fascists emerged, their presence was laughable. To consider that all the far right in Nottinghamshire could scrape up was a puny gaggle of drunk racists was embarrassing.

While these fascists waved their flags and delivered a pitchy trumpet solo of “Rule Britannia”, the counter-protest trumped them, both in numbers and in volume.

As the afternoon progressed, the far right grew violent, hurling glass bottles and pork towards the Muslim youth, who were bravely facing down these racists directly (through a barrier of passive and largely useless police officers).

Yet when some of the counter-protesters began to return these projectiles across the barricade, the SUTR organisers began a chant of “don’t throw back!”

One comrade even heard a Labour Party organiser grumbling about how the entire counter-protest should be dispersed, as he could not stop the youth from defending themselves.

These reformist ‘leaders’ expect us to simply suffer in silence, ignoring direct physical threats. But there can be no ‘peace’ with the far-right mob. We fight for revolution!

Leicester

In Leicester city centre, counter-demonstrators first gathered to give speeches near the clock tower where the far-right planned to gather.

I spoke about how both Labour and the Tories are awful on immigration and contribute to whipping up racist and anti-immigrant sentiments, which the far right then feeds off. I said that the labour movement must unite to crush this resurgence before it can take root.

We then marched to and occupied the clock tower before the far-right could arrive. When they did, there couldn’t have been more than fifty. We outnumbered them by double.

Before the police formed a barrier, three separate fascist thugs tried to intimidate protestors, including one guy who tried to snatch the megaphone from a girl before being pushed back by the crowd.

They initially tried some Nazi salutes and to sing some songs too, but were shouted down at every attempt. Very quickly their numbers dwindled and only a handful stuck around to the bitter end.

The demo had been called by SUTR, but the mood was extremely militant with a strong youth presence. This included a group of 12-14 year-olds who told me they were there to say “fuck racism”.

I tried to speak to as many people as I could, and many agreed with the points I was putting forward. Several bought a copy of the paper or wanted to find out more about the RCP.

We were far better organised than the far right, with banners and placards everywhere, and chants and speeches throughout. Morale was very high, spurred on rather than dampened by the behaviour of the reactionaries.

Eventually the police dispersed both crowds, but we occupied Leicester’s clock tower for two and a half hours, preventing the far-right gang from claiming it. I definitely came away feeling the far-right had been utterly humiliated.