I have received the following correspondence from Tony Lecomber, as will many others. As an independent blogger I intend to just publish without any comments of my own. It is interesting to see what another "old timer" thinks.

Power Struggles

“Politics is the art of the possible” is an oft-quoted saying that does not tell the whole truth. The whole truth is: “Politics is getting what you want. The art of the possible is merely its constraining factor.” If you’re wondering what famous personage made that quote, then I shall put you out of your suspense – it was me!

Political power struggles arise, essentially, from three causes: personality conflicts, disagreements over strategy/tactics and disagreement over ideology. The first is the most trivial and the third, the most basic. Yet each can bring a movement to its knees depending upon the way a disagreement is handled.

The history of small political parties is littered by this kind of factionalising, tending towards fully-blown splits in a way that the larger political parties seem to escape from. The reason for this is that political activists in a small political party have no incentive to ‘hang together’. They can afford to be politically pure & principled and walk off to establish their own perfectly formed party – the effect of which is to destroy the party that they profess to love. Why would they do that? The answer is that it was never going anywhere anyway. There is no incentive to hold it together.

Nationalism, like the left, has traditionally been beset with splits. Nationalism, like the left, has had no incentive to stay united. Or it didn’t until very recently. Only within the last 5 or 6 years has any kind of incentive been apparent. The change, of course, has come with the growing electability of the BNP. First there were 3 councillors, then 17, then 50 to the point where I’m no longer sure how many councillors the party has.

How to Destroy the BNP – have a split!

It is the electability that is important, not the size of the party. The NF was much larger in 1979 than the BNP is even now. But over a single year, the NF split disastrously into three main factions. By 1981, there were a dozen nationalist grouplets. Nationalism did not fully recover for 25 years. Indeed, in some respects – in terms of size and nationwide coverage – we have still not recovered. Although in other areas – in terms of professionalism, party machine and above all, in electability – the BNP is way ahead.

That split was a disaster for nationalism and may yet be said to be the decisive event that smashed a timely opposition to the destruction of our race and nation.

Politicians in the larger parties, on the other hand, while also prone to internal party politicking, including briefing journalists and the like against the ‘enemy of the moment’ ensure that their tussles almost never result in a fully blown split. The exception that proves the rule was the SDP split from Labour in the early 1980s and which, in time, merged with the Liberals to form the Lib-Dems.

That one example aside, the most usual manifestation of large party tensions is the secret briefing against a particular MP designed to knobble them. But even larger party turmoil is punished – usually by the electorate. It is interesting to note that the one thing that is never punished is open and honest debate – whether it’s a series of meetings as conducted by both Labour and Conservative over the last few years to gauge the public mood, or whether it’s a leadership election campaign as conducted most recently by the Lib-Dems and the Tories. Different policies, different tacks to the ‘right’ or the ‘left’ can be tried out which inform the public and through the media achieve feedback through which the consensus view is arrived at. And if no consensus is arrived at, the losing side shuts up until it can manoeuvre itself to get what it wants (see my political dictum at the head of this article). That is how it works. United we are strong and divided we are weak – most famously demonstrated by Mussolini’s bundle of sticks. Individually they can all be broken, but united together – tied up in a single bundle they are pretty much indestructible.

BNP safe-guard against a split

This theme was recognised by the BNP way back in the early 1980s. The, then, recent history of the NF (at the time, the most powerful nationalist party grouping) informed the BNP as to how to avoid the same mistakes. Debilitating splits within the NF occurred in 1972, 1974, 1976 and disastrously in 1979-1980. These splits occurred because the powerful executive – the Directorate – was able to form factions. The Constitution of the BNP was drawn up to prevent this happening. The flip side was that all power was invested in the Chairman. If the Chairman was not up to the job, then aside from powerful party managers effectively deciding the course of the party over the head of the Chairman, which happened to a degree from 1996 – 1999, the only alternative was to replace him. This is what happened in 1999, by which time the party had become the single largest force in nationalism and had been so for some time.

While this ‘strong’ Constitution worked to keep the party united, it was recognised – chiefly by Nick Griffin – that it had to be modernised to allow greater democracy within the Party, but without a return to the bad old days of factionalising Directorates. Changes to the Constitution and a move towards an Annual Conference and voting membership at the Conference are the result. These changes are ongoing, careful and patient because it is recognised how important it is to get the balance right. After all, a membership surge – which must happen if the Party is to be successful – will swamp the party with thousands of well-meaning novices, which could lead opportunists to capture the party.

Since 1999, aside from a bumpy start, the party hasn’t looked back and has gone on to heights undreamt of in the 1980s and even the 1990s. Mistakes have been made along the way. Of course they have. It would be strange, not to say miraculous, if they had not. Nevertheless, despite the party attracting necessarily independent-minded people which ensures a degree of conflict arising, the BNP has avoided the disastrous splits of yesteryear which occurred so frequently in the NF.

Having myself been out of the loop with regards to the party for a year-and-a-half or so, but continuing to read ID, VoF and check out the party website, I assumed that everything was running fairly smoothly aside from the odd hiccup – although I’m wise enough to realise that I won’t read ‘bad’ news in any of these publications.

I was saddened and, or disturbed to hear that Scott McLean, Ian Dawson, Jonathan Bowden and the Doc have all resigned over the last year or so. While I don’t know all the ins and outs of each one (I accepted at face value the reasons given), I do know the details of one case and tried to help out, which affected only a temporarily successful resolution, soon to be undone.

The Recent trouble

The recent trouble affecting the party is of a far more serious nature. I imagine that I wasn’t the only one to look at the party’s website and think: “What desperately depressing news.”

All anyone wants is for the party to do well and to go forward.

I’m sure that’s what Kenny Smith and Sadie Graham wanted too. However, There's a right way to go about things and a wrong way – and the way that they went about doing it was clearly the wrong way. One side backing Kenny & Sadie are saying that all they were trying to do is get rid of three bad eggs, but to my mind building a web site which seems to undermine the party means that there is far more to it than that.

I don’t know about the claims made against Dave Hannam, Mark Collett & John Walker but not wanting to rely on second hand information or read about it through opposition media and thereby let the enemy do my thinking for me (something some nationalists do tend to), I decided to get it direct – first hand. I tried first phoning one of the protagonists in this saga for a better understanding of the situation, but both landline and mobile phone were not being picked up. Later I phoned another who confirmed that Dave, John and Mark were ‘bad ’uns’, but was unable to offer any details. So I’m still none the wiser.

As a result, I won’t comment on the allegations, but surely if there were problems, these should have been raised openly. If there was no satisfaction gained either privately with the individuals in question or with party Chairman, Nick Griffin or formally through the AC, then someone should have raised these concerns nationally by way of a leadership challenge.

If the Chairman is thought to be wrongly bending over backwards to protect John, Mark and Dave then the Chairman is putting his personal prestige and weight of personality behind them. If he is proven to be wrong in front of the membership, then he will suffer accordingly. Nick Griffin is not a fool and Nick Griffin was only very recently backed by an overwhelming majority of the party membership. Either Kenny and Sadie should have been upfront and taken it to the membership by way of a Leadership challenge, or they should have bided their time – ‘slowly catchee monkey’. Destabilisation and creating a crisis is never the answer.

Along the way there have, apparently, been leaks to the enemy – the targets of these leaks being the three aforementioned. I’m not sure if anyone knows conclusively who has been leaking, but whatever the reason it is inexcusable.

Good people and naivety

Leaks aside; I know Kenny & Sadie to be decent hard-working nationalists who I am 100% convinced, have nothing but the good of the party at heart – and I’m equally sure that goes for the folk that have taken their side in this. But if they wanted to achieve a political outcome, they have gone about it in a very cack-handed and duplicitous manner.

It is evident from these events and the cack-handed way that their political project has been progressed and also events subsequently (I understand that Kenny is texting people the length and breadth of Britain urging them to resign in solidarity) that not a single person involved in this ‘project’ has the experience or wisdom of simply ‘being there’ covering the period 1979-1980 and the subsequent wilderness years of the 1980s. The suggestion from some that they ‘break away’ until ‘Griffin gives in’ and sacks Mssrs Walker, Collett and Hannam is the latest evidence that the people surrounding this project have no earthly conception of what it is that they’re pushing for or any realistic appreciation of the ‘art of the possible’. They appear to be heading towards a fully blown-split.

I have previously seen commentary by far leftists bewailing the failure of their efforts to ‘stop’ the BNP. One of the most astute comments was that while attacks from without were resisted by the party, efforts from within were likely to be more successful and the lefty concerned cheered himself up by recalling that, historically, nationalists always do it to themselves – although the BNP was bucking the trend. No doubt today, he’s a very happy man, although it’s still not too late for everyone to calm down, limit the damage and affect a reconciliation.

While, to my knowledge, no one in the Kenny And Sadie camp, was around in 1979, I was and I can tell you that it was the most depressing and dispiriting time to be a nationalist. Nationalism split asunder and destroyed any prospect for progress for 25 YEARS. I remember some good comrades who battled through the bleak 1980s and who were burnt out during that time, never to see even the relative upturn of 1989 and the early 1990s. Anyone seriously contemplating a re-run of that kind of inter-party warfare should be taken out and shot – which is something I’ve got into trouble for saying before.

Whatever their grievance and however right they are, the tactics adopted by Kenny, Sadie and anyone else involved reveal that they are relatively inexperienced, have not seen the dark days of the 1980s and have been stupid beyond belief. I am not putting them down for inexperience and never having seen the wilderness years, because they can’t be faulted if they weren’t there. In any case, I myself have been stupid beyond belief on occasion, so I know what it’s like!

As it is, what’s done is done.

What Now?

The question is what to do now?

Before answering that question, everyone concerned: Kenny, Sadie, the Chairman, and anyone supporting either one side or the other need to focus on something even more fundamental. The first thing that’s needed is for everyone to calm down and think politically.

What is the primary goal? Answer: for the party to do well. From that question and answer all else should follow. For the party to do well, what must be done? Answer: by everyone continuing to work as a whole for the party i.e. not walking off in a huff – however badly one is feeling. That implies some sort of reconciliation.

I know party Chairman Nick Griffin very well and there is no way that he will be blackmailed into any course of action. All anyone will do by saying: “do this or I resign” is to affect their own resignation. The naivety of those who have said this is astounding. Uncharitable opponents, while no doubt displaying huge grins, are already saying that kind of ‘unpolitical’ demand is proof that people within the BNP have no place getting anywhere near power.

A feeling of the mood and also the naivety mentioned can be gauged from one member who has made a number of demands which include the resignation of the party Chairman. He said:

“Coming to such a conclusion is not easy. I have in the past considered both Mark and Dave to be friends of mine. However, to allow emotional feeling to get in the way of a cause I know to be right would be a great betrayal in itself; a betrayal of the British people and their identity. I can honestly say that at no point could I, or would I desire to cause harm to the British people’s very salvation.”

Those words are so obviously ‘from the heart’ but at the same time, the harm alluded to in the last line is clearly being effected. That is the tragedy of splits, mini-splits and general inter-party turmoil.

Reconciliation the key

I am firmly of the opinion that a reconciliation would be the best outcome concerned and I note that a well-respected independently-minded party member has offered his services in this regard to be the ‘honest broker’ – the well known blogger, ‘Green Arrow’.

A meeting of some sort would be required in this event and despite their feelings and good intentions, Kenny and Sadie need to show a bit of penitence. As an onlooker for the past 18 months or so I would be sorry to see either of them go because they’ve both done well in their respective departments. Sadie in particular has worked miracles and is widely admired and respected for the work that she’s put in. Kenny I know works just as hard, but back room boys don’t tend to get the same glory! In my opinion, the party needs Sadie and Kenny because we can ill-afford to lose people of dedication and talent. But for that to happen, penitence needs to be shown. At the same time while the sackings were shocking, given the circumstances there was little other alternative.

I note that the party website says that the pair are currently expelled, which is not constitutionally correct. I presume that what it meant was that their memberships have been suspended because there was mention of a Disciplinary Tribunal. If it goes that far – and I would hope that it would not – then I can tell you from personal experience, that a DT is a fair process and the result is NOT pre-determined and I could cite chapter and verse several examples. I would very much hope that the outcome of any DT, if it takes place, is leniency. Indeed, the process doesn’t even have to go that far. And that is why I believe a reconciliation meeting should take place involving all the players but without it becoming a bear garden.

We all make mistakes. Sadie and Kenny have made theirs. If they wanted to achieve a political outcome, they have gone about it in the wrong way. It is still possible for Sadie and Kenny to stay within the party, but for that to happen their needs to be goodwill from all sides with concern for the good of the party as a whole. Only then can the concerns of those involved regarding Dave Hannam, Mark Collett and John Walker be looked at properly. How that is resolved is for those within the party, but Kenny and Sadie need to realise that the Chairman cannot be seen to be giving in to any kind of threat or blackmail.

For the good of the party, everyone should take a deep breath, calm down and do the political thing.

A Lecomber