This article was originally published on August 11, 2023.
Legal experts have assessed the content and are now pursuing legal action against a number of parties. The article that is the catalyst for at least two ongoing documentaries and a series of national and international articles can now return.
Weymouth & Portland is a community with a proud armed forces tradition – not least in relation to our role in defeating the Nazis in WWII. So how is it that a section of our community has been radicalised into racism and hatred? How is it that so many people have been persuaded to hate a group of people they’ve never met? And how is it that people have aligned themselves with exactly the kind of Far Right ideology that their brave forebearers fought against?
Here, we try to answer those questions and, in doing so, expose how three key elements – fear, grievance and racist hatred – have been utilised. For the first time, we will publish people’s own words – including many appalling examples of racism – and document some of the key actors in a sorry campaign of hatred.
Some Background
On 5th April, 2023, the Home Office confirmed plans to house 506 people seeking asylum (safety) in the UK on a barge, the Bibby Stockholm, at Portland Port. The privately-owned Portland Port had agreed to a lucrative contract with the government to house the barge without undertaking any public consultation. Because y’know….. capitalism. Money (for the few) talks and human rights walk – as do the feelings of local people.
The Langham family who owns the Port made 19 donations to UKIP totalling over £70,000 and have connections to this Conservative government. Former investment banker Jill May, sister of the late John Langham, was re-appointed to the BoE’s Prudential Regulation Committee in 2021 by Rishi Sunak. She is currently listed as owning 11.68% shares in Langham Industries Ltd. As expected, May and Langham family members own the majority of shares. The deal to house the barge is worth a reported £2.5 Million.
The barge itself has been modified to change its capacity from 220 people to 506 plus up to 40 staff! The refugees will share small rooms with bunk beds. The government ordered the small TV screens to be disconnected. Held in a secure port, the barge is, without doubt, a quasi-prison. It was even described as such by South Dorset MP Richard Drax whose family made their own fortune from the slave trade. Drax had very little warning from his own Party about the barge – perhaps indicating the contempt they have, even for their own MPs – and his protestations have been ineffectual.
It seems everyone is against the barge! Local MPs, Dorset and Portland Councils and Councillors, human rights groups and anti-racist groups such as Stand Up To Racism Dorset, and a campaign now known as ‘No To The Barge’. The NTTB campaign began as a Facebook group named ‘Portland Immigration Barge Discussions (aka Barge Bitchin)’. Later, the ‘Barge Bitchin’ was dropped and, in mid-June it was changed to ‘No To The Barge’. It is this Facebook group (and its associated real-life campaign) that has been home to appalling levels of racism and Far Right activity.
Fear
The initial and abiding reaction of people on the NTTB group is based upon fear and the spreading of fear. Some of that fear is based upon a lack of experience of diversity: Portland is a small community of 13,500 people, 96.5% of whom are white. The Muslim population is just below 1%. It is in this environment that people on the NTTB group have spread disinformation and fear.
Most of that scaremongering is based around the notion that people seeking asylum are all (or mostly) criminals, rapists and murderers. The idea that those to be housed on the barge pose a particular threat to women and children is highly prevalent. “Lock your daughters up” was the early cry! As more and more Far Right supporters from around the UK have joined the group, the comments are increasingly about how Muslims are preparing to start a ‘religious war’ and will slaughter us all. There has been a continual avalanche of posts and comments which have whipped up the fear to frenzied levels.
Here are some examples from the NTTB group (all quotes as written):
Julie Croley (who carried a ‘Stop The Invasion’ placard at the campaign’s events and whose husband Mike Croley regularly wears a ‘White Lives Matter’ T-shirt) talks of impending “sexual harassment, attacks and rapes”, of an “Islamic invasion” and states “We’re being turned into an Islamic country”
Bert Travers: “take lots of photos/videos of any potentially dangerous looking situations (chatting young girls up, near schools, causing trouble etc etc”)
Karen Lewis: “get CCTV on your bodies”
Darren Ozzy: “I want to see a weekly migrant victim death count just like we did with covid” and asks “What are the shops going to do when the attacks, rapes and murders begin?”
Stuart Chiswelstaff Breckell: “Would you put 506 wolves in a field with 13,535 sheep and hope for a happy ending”
Portia Duvall warns of “the violent sexual assaults on women and children on the streets”
Fifi Fitzsimmons posts about “rapists” and “men that will beat a child or a woman” and adds “We are doomed”
Julie Anderton: “There will be murders, rape and pillage!” “These 500 men will require 500 young, local ladies. They will take by force.” “Local lads will start fights with them but these migrants use knives.” “They will force their lifestyle on us including their religion. They hate us! THEY HATE US!”
Michelle Varney warns of “muggings” and Michael Mccarthy talks of “rape, robbery, muggings, attacks”
Mark Paul: “How many rapes, sexual assaults and murders need to happen?”
Steve Moore: “A high percentage will be potential groomers….. paedophile migrants. Keep your kids SAFE”
Lee Calvert: “What these retards don’t understand is we have 500 men! Coming from rapey stabby countries”
Micky Biggs: “These are pouring into Europe every day thousands of them not a woman or child in sight. Mostly ex prisoners and criminal economic migrants”
Elaine Bearne (as Fanny Adams): “The illegals steal pets”
Chaz Charlton: “heard they are putting a temporary musque in the bowl up the grove”
Sandra Willis Smith declares there are “no go zones for white people happening up and down the country” and that the asylum seekers “have all tested positive for HIV”
Margit Cotton: “We’re being invaded,” “50 years from now we’ll be a Muslim country”
Micky Greeno: “This country has to stop this onslaught and invasion”
Phillip Davies declares we are being “Invaded by a Muslim army”
Chris Leggy Legg: “This is an army of fighting aged men”
Jackie Teague: “These men are gathering an army under the guise of asylum”
Sue Ayton warns we will be “killed off by these illegals”
Darren Jenkins: “For all we know they could have been chopping off heads a few months ago”
Allen Varney: “All ready for when they take over…. Only a matter of time”
Ally Carroll: “We have a religious war brewing,” “these illegals, 606,000 in UK up to last year, are part of a global organised invasion,” “certainly a move to destroy against the indigenous peoples of GB”
Colin Waller: “They are foot soldiers waiting for the call from Islam”
The fearmongering is amplified by numerous people including Adrian Mitchell, Stephen Cobb and campaign leader Alex Bailey posting a litany of screenshots of articles about non-white people committing crime, especially sexual crime. Mitchell posts the same 6 screenshots repeatedly. Of course, they never post any reports of white people committing the same crimes.
At one point, regular group contributors Stuart Chiswelstaff Breckell and Darren Ozzy even discuss how the recent Bournemouth beach tragedy was “almost certainly a migrant attack” and that the media and government are suppressing it!
Shockingly, Asian holidaymakers have been followed and photographed with people stating that ‘they’re here already and staying in B&B’s!’ Bert Travers, sitting at home watching a webcam positioned on Weymouth seafront, posted a photo of Asian men using the toilets! He claimed that one of them didn’t come out and that young girls went in the same cubicle! In the comments, people asked if it was people from the barge!
He posted a screenshot of the two men, which included several children in swim wear!
Gallery 1:
Grievance
Much as it was used by the Nazis in 1930s Germany, the second crucial element of this hate campaign is the fostering of a sense of grievance and resentment – in this instance, towards the asylum seekers.
Weymouth & Portland is suffering. 13 years of Tory austerity has hit hard. Several wards are in the top 10% or top 20% of multiple deprivation. Wages are low and housing and other costs are high. Council tax is one of the highest in the country and families are suffering with the ‘cost of the one-percent’s greed’ crisis. Public services have been slashed and NHS services withdrawn or inaccessible. Portland Hospital has been downgraded, losing its beds, its X-ray department and then its Minor Injuries Unit.
Clearly none of that is the fault of refugees! Those things are the result of government policy: the actions of an authoritarian right-wing government who prioritise only the wealth of their rich friends and donors – increasingly through cronyism and fraud.
This is a government who have neglected its people and, locally, the effects are stark. So, we must ask the question: why is it that the places where the government have chosen to place large asylum detention centres are mostly white, working-class areas where people are suffering from their neglect? Clearly, with a lot of help from their friends in the media – especially the tabloid rags – and with the Home Secretary herself claiming that this is an ‘invasion’ of people coming here ‘illegally’, this putrid government knows it can shift blame from themselves to some ‘poor brown-skinned people’.
And so it is that the NTTB group has been filled with resentment. This resentment often takes the form of outrage ‘no matter what’. There are numerous examples of people being up-in-arms about one thing and when that thing is shown not be true, they are equally outraged by the alternative.
“They’ll get appointments with our already stretched GPs!” *No, GP services to the barge are being provided by a specialist surgery from Bournemouth* “Oh right, so they get specialist GP services on tap!”
“They’ll have nothing to do and will therefore commit crime!” *No, a range of activities will be provided through the voluntary sector* “Oh right, they get free activities. Our children don’t get free activities!”
“They’ll be hanging around at bus stops on Portland. They’ll be attacking our women and children there!” *No, there will be special buses which will take them from the Port* “Oh right, they get a free taxi service, do they?!”
“They get £20-a-day of taxpayers money!” *No, they get £9.58 per week (around £1.37-a-day) and it comes from the Foreign Aid budget* “Oh right, if that’s all they get, they’ll be committing lots of crime!”
“Lots of them can’t even speak English!” *Well, for those who don’t, English lessons are available* “Oh right, they get free lessons. You can’t make it up!”
There are many more examples of this outrage no matter what. And there’s even denial…..
“They’ll commit loads of crime!” *Crime statistics show that asylum seekers commit crimes at a considerably lower rate than the general population* “That’s because the police and the government cover it up!” And then Adrain Mitchell will post the 6 screenshots for the hundredth time!
NTTB campaigners constantly say it’s not about racism; it’s about concern over public services, like the NHS. However, when campaigner Sammy Wallace was interviewed by the BBC, the conversation went like this:
SW: We’ve not got enough NHS, dentists, doctors: we just haven’t got it, so we’re all struggling
Reporter: If those services were improved, would it be alright?
SW: (wry smile) No…. no…. no
Reporter: So it’s about something else?
SW: It’s about the men
It cut off there, but presumably the next question was: “The area has thousands of holidaymakers descending here every summer and cruise ships regularly dock at Portland Port carrying several thousand at a time. What is it about *these* men?
Concerns about affordable housing, low wages, disappearing local services and the state of the NHS are entirely legitimate. Blaming refugees is not.
Racism
Members of the group are forever claiming there is no racism in the group and it’s not about racism. They are lying and they know it. There are literally thousands of examples of racism in the group, so I’ll merely share a small percentage and let the reader decide.
Beforehand, it’s worth noting that the default name in the NTTB group for the people seeking asylum is ‘illegals’. That’s when they’re not being called ‘economic migrants’, ‘gimmegrants’, ‘criminals’, ‘enemy invaders’, ‘things’, ‘rapists and paedophiles’, ‘rapefugees’, ‘scum’, ‘vermin’, ‘channel rats’, ‘sub-human’ and even ‘uncivilised, sub human channel rats!’
But yeah, Alex Bailey and Dean Guile have declared there’s no racism here, so…..
Alex Bailey: “500 plus fighting age men of unknown origin and criminal past” (alongside a Far Right Britain First video he posted!)
Adrain Mitchell: “Illegal dust mites”
Gary Knight: “Dirty lowlife scum. Terrorists, rapists, murderers, pedo’s the fucking lot of them. Dirty cuntz. Send the fuckers back”
Ladette M Squiggleton: “infestation”
Mark Paul: “Illegal migrants flooding into the UK”, “being over-run by alien cultures”
Paul Taylor: “every advert has a black in it or a white woman and a black man. What is going on??”
John Haliwell (in response): “I’m sick of seeing a black every time I switch on the TV. It makes my blood boil.”
(Then Dean Guile states that the ‘racism card’ is so over-used that racism doesn’t mean anything anymore!)
Michelle Varney: “They’re all fighting-aged Asian men”
Mark Paul: “Rapefugees”
Connor Spencer: “Rapists and pedophiles”
Stephen Redpath: “scrounging freeloading invaders”
Micky Greeno: “Freeloading scrounging benefit seeking chancers” (and then he called Rishi Sunak a ‘foreigner’). When Far Right activist Rod Harrison attacks Rishi Sunak, Greeno responds “He’s one of them”.
Graeme Kershaw: “vermin”
Gary C Hazel: “Ukrainians/Russians are evolved humans unlike the barge peeps”
Elaine Bearne (as Fanny Adams) calls Rishi Sunak “Dumb Pak”, “The govt being Muslim are part of whats going on”
Micky Biggs: “Economic gimmegrants”.
Richard Mark Speed: “Scum of the earth”, “human garbage”
(Then Alex Bailey is asked by his mate Jeff Moody on GBeebies about accusations of racism and he responds: “Those words, those terminologies, are never on my mind”)
Britishoscar JJ: “500 plus males with 3rd world brains”
Roger Forbes: “this scum”
Holty Bfc: “I would rather house 500 stray dogs than them”
Jay Capaldi: posts a video of a sickeningly racist song
Mark Pickering: “Paedophiles”
Aly Carroll: “Boat illegals”, “freeloading illegal gimmegrants”
Joe Kelly: “Stealth invasion”, “invading army”, “scum” and “fucking gimmegrants”
Jon Burt: “My daughter was seeing a Nigerian and yeah I gave it the ‘Here boy go dig the garden will ya’ and so on which was having a bit of a giggle with him (now deemed really racist)”
John Burt (again): When someone posts about the company the Home Office secured the barge from having historic links to the slave trade, Burt responds “gonna be having some more ethnics on board again then, maybe they should be treated the same.”
(Then Dean Guile insists racism is not a thing any more….. again)
Alan Croley (on a post about sewerage): “Serve it to them at dinner time”
Tracie Hobden: “When are the things actually arriving”
Beverly Ann Gardiner: “I don’t want the things in this country at all”
Jack Williams: “Need to shout go home f’ing invaders”
Carla Capaldi: “Yes f@&) off back then”
Mathew Barnes: “Yup off they fuck back to the mud huts”
Tracey Bailey: “Who the hell do they think they are in our country”
Nicky Cee: “very soon it’s going to be overrun with vermin”
Terry Topper Brown (on a post about fire regulations): “Let em burn”
(Then Alex Bailey and the other campaign leaders all say ‘there’s no racism here’)
Sue Bailey (Alex’s mother): “the gov’t will go down in history as the murderers of the GB race”
Kim Elizabeth Rye: “a bunch of scrounging chancers who are not refugees”, “foreign criminals”
Cindy Lou: “these animals”
Helen Mcginlay: “That’s what they do live in the fields and make a fire kill some animals and cook them”
Stuart Chiswelstaff Breckell: “channel rats”
Carol Hobday: “They shit on pavment”, “wors than rats”, “animals”, “stink” and “eat scraps”
Daz Dolbear: “channel rats” (at least 20 times, usually with a rat cartoon/emoji), “uncivilised channel rats”, “dangerous channel rats”, “sub human channel rats” and eventually “Since when have these uncivilised subhuman channel rats been human beings”
Readers may well know the effects of such dehumanising language:
“Remember, it didn’t start with gas chambers. It started with politicians dividing the people with ‘us vs. them.’ It started with intolerance and hate speech, and when people stopped caring, became desensitized, and turned a blind eye, it became a slippery slope to genocide”.
(Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum)
The NTTB campaign leaders – including Alex Bailey, Kate Robson, Steve Coggins, Stephen Cobb and Susan Pheonix – claim it’s not about racism and protest that there’s no racism to be seen. They know full well that their group is an absolute cesspit of racism (and increasingly, Far Right engagement), and they have, essentially, done nothing to stop it. They are complicit!
Shame on them! They bring shame to our island!
Gallery 2:
Threats
A consistent feature of the NTTB campaign group is the threats made in relation to the barge and its inhabitants. Some may say that such threats are meant as ‘jokes’ but they add to the environment of hatred and animosity.
Stuart Chiswelstaff Breckell and Peter White both suggest adding a hand grenade to the refugee ‘welcome packs’ being made by locals.
Dan Boorn suggests buying “lots of plant fertiliser and reading many websites” adding “We shall fight them on the beaches, inshallah”
Andrew Long: “Wonder if that old Sherman tank at the D Day centre would start up” to which Allen Varney responds “hopefully with a couple of shells inside”
Colin Campbell: “Portland is luckily infested by divers. Most of us are ex-service. What security is in place to protect the barge. Asking for numerous friends….”
Sue Ayton declares that she’s “not worried about the barge going up in smoke with them on it”
When Mark Peters asks “Will they be allowed to get off and roam the island!!!!” Darren Ozzy replies “If they do then it is fair game”
Mark Loader suggests sinking the barge (when it’s full) and Stepehen Guest suggests towing the barge to Lulworth ranges.
Jennifer Brookes: “Anybody got a speedboat and a Molotov cocktail. On a dark night.”
Richard J Taylor: “Anybody got the Royal Navy’s phone number maybe they can sink the damn thing”
Sandra Willis Smith: “Just cut the holdings let it float out to sea if we’re lucky the winter storms will do the rest for us”
Verity Jane and Aly Carroll discuss how plans and plots should be discussed in person, rather than online where there are ‘spies’ and ‘police’.
Nicholas Hough: “Bomb the fuckers”
Daz Dolbear: “I think I will be carrying some weapons with me out and about as long as I can split a couple of their heads in two during the melly I’ll be happy”
John Jeffries (on a post about the proposed waste incinerator): “Could use the incinerator for the immigrants”
I’ll just repeat that for anyone that missed it……
“Could use the incinerator for the immigrants”
The threats haven’t stopped at the asylum seekers. Abuse and veiled threats have been hurled at anyone who dares to challenge their racism as well as local anti-racists and Councillors.
Darren Ozzy (real name Darren Johnston) and Micky Greeno have been particularly abusive to several local women, sometimes in public, sometimes sending vile private messages and saying they know where someone works.
Micky Greeno: “That (woman’s name) freak gets her moneys worth out of that Primark dress she wears”
Darren Ozzy (Johnston): who shared screenshots of people he states are “in favour of the barge” alongside veiled threats and sent this: “Maybe ask around, see how quiet I am when confronted, give it a try next time you see me, see how quiet I am when I actually know who the fuck you are”, “Can’t farm Facebook likes when you’ve been raped and killed” and “Are you just gagging for a bit of dark meat now no white man would touch you with a ten foot barge pole?”
Chris Leggy Legg named two Portland women in a false and antagonistic diatribe about Stand Up To Racism Dorset.
Toby Carter: “Where do you live, Traitor?”
Paul Wagstaff: “You are a traitor to your country and it’s people”
Joe Kelly: “Cunts like you need to fuck off to Middle East countries ya fucking prick”
There have been disgusting and ill-informed attacks on Councils, individual Councillors and Stand Up To Racism Dorset members – in many cases, the very people who have, over many years, campaigned to save Portland Hospital, oppose the proposed waste incinerator, prevent public service cuts and keep affordable and social housing for local people.
Anyone challenging the racism online gets instantly labelled a ‘troll’, ridiculed, abused and, very often, removed from the group by that bastion of free speech Alex Bailey! I myself was removed by Bailey some time ago for daring to speak out.
Most worryingly, a local 15-year-old girl has recently been called the ‘n-word’ on snapchat and, on the bus, a woman looked at her and said: “bet you’re from the barge!”
Gallery 3:
No To The Barge and The Far Right
The first six weeks of the NTTB’s existence saw predominantly local people join the group, albeit that links to, and videos from, Far Right groups were sometimes posted. The last eight weeks has seen a considerable increase in people joining from around the UK, many of whom are also in various Far Right groups. It has also been noticeable that many of the most vocal group members have moved to the area from elsewhere in the UK, including Alex Bailey who moved to Weymouth from Dover last year. Many of these prominent members have stated that they moved here “to get away from them” as one person put it!
In June, Hope Not Hate published their latest exposé on ‘self-proclaimed migrant hunters’:
https://hopenothate.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Migrant-hunters-resource-final-version-updated-June-23.pdf
It’s worth noting that:
Page 2 – Patriotic Alternative – leafleted Weymouth in June.
Page 3 – Britain First – the recent threatening letters sent to businesses and Councillors were signed from Britain First. The fascist group have denied involvement.
Page 4 – Voice of Wales – there has been loads of interaction between them and NTTB/Alex Bailey. Stan Robinson and James Harvey (two VoW leaders) came to Portland for several days and met with, and interviewed, Bailey. They have since conducted a second interview. Robinson is posting on the NTTB group.
Page 5 – Alek Yerbury – Fellow Far Right activist Rod Harrison has been posting on the NTTB group for weeks and now Yerbury is posting. Yerbury has also posted the NTTB group link on another Far Right group. How sad that a proud military town is now giving any credence to a man who styles himself on Adolf Hitler!
Page 7 – Amanda Smith (aka ‘Yorkshire Rose’) – posted to the NTTB group recently and Alex Bailey commented underneath that he had sent her a Direct Message.
NTTB members have posted links to, and articles and videos from, at least 16 different Far Right and extremist groups. I will not name them here. However, by example:
Mike Croley posted David Lane’s ’14 Words’, the most popular White Supremacist slogan in the world. He also describes Far Right Patriotic Alternative as ‘Awake, not woke!”
Aly Carroll posted links to, and content from, several Far Right groups
Chris Leggy Legg posted a video of Stephen Yaxley Lennon (aka Tommy Robinson)
Verity Jane posted several Britain First videos…. and Alex Bailey and Darren Reynolds also posted one
Joanne Barlow, Andy Long, Elaine Bearne and others posted racist Far Right videos
Julie Button posted from a Far Right group and Lisa Flann and Elaine Bearne shared posts by Alek Yerbury
NTTB Campaign admin Steve Coggins’ Facebook ‘likes’ include the Anti-Islam Alliance
Stephen Cobb states that he’s heard ‘Tommy Robinson’ is bringing a bus load of people to the NTTB protest (he didn’t) and then stated: “Shame Tommy Robinson has not got time to visit us”
Along with other new members, Far Right activist Rod Harrison is invited to the NTTB protest by Steve Coggins. After joining the group, Harrison posts 19 times in one week – the most prolific poster. He regularly reposts Alek Yerbury posts from Far Right groups
Janet Rosemary celebrates Enoch Powell’s ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech
Gary C Hazel posts about the Far Right ‘Great Replacement Theory’, the “genocide of the British People” and calls for “Civil War”
Mike Croley, Kim Gray, Robert House, Kevin Samuel Furniss and others post about the Far Right ‘Kalergi plan’. There are lots of Far Right conspiracy theories around ‘Great Replacement’, ‘Agenda 2030’ and secret UN/WEF plans for a ‘New World Order’ – all relating to the ‘replacement of white people’
Along with other new members, Steve Coggins welcomes Hitler-wannabe Alek Yerbury to the group. His first comment is to attack Stand Up To Racism
Stan Robinson from Far Right Voice of Wales posts regularly to the group
Anti-migrant campaigner Katie Elizabeth Rye from Dover encourages NTTB to join forces with other anti-migrant groups online, saying: “form yourselves into a much larger and much more threatening identity”
Facebook even joins in. Based on NTTB’s strong links with Far Right groups, it suggests to me that I ‘might like’ a Far Right group where Yerbury is an admin. I don’t!
Worryingly, given their racism and proximity to the Far Right, the NTTB campaign has begun recruiting candidates to ‘replace those Councillors who they feel have not supported them.’ It is no coincidence that they have abused Councillors and misrepresented their words and actions to aid their electoral ambitions. They say they are looking for people who will “help them to achieve their goals.” I trust my fellow Portlanders will reject hate at the ballot box.
Gallery 4:
Alex Bailey
The NTTB campaign’s main leader so far has been Alex Bailey. Whether he has aspirations to be a Far Right activist is unclear, but his willingness to be close to the Far Right is now evident. His running of the NTTB campaign bears a very close comparison to Hope Not hate’s description of Patriotic Alternative’s modus operandi.
He appears to be a keen liar, deliberately and constantly referring to the local Stand Up To Racism group as ‘the racism group’ and a ‘hate group’ and claiming their protesters are ‘bused in!’ When NTTB regular Simon Avery told a SUTRD protester; “When you get raped, I’ll laugh my ass off”, the comment was caught on film and went around social media to widespread condemnation. Bailey declared that he’d ‘looked into the man and he was nothing to do with their group!’ Avery had been a member of NTTB for over a month, had posted regularly and was at their protest! Avery left the group for two days….. and then returned.
When Bailey had a falling out with Julie Croley, she declared publicly that he ‘was Far Right’ and intends to use the campaign to gain support for when he stands as an electoral candidate. He then kicked her out of the group and told everyone she was unable to continue due to illness. Bailey certainly has a politician’s knack for narcissism, deceitfulness, and self-promotion. One would hope the electorate has had enough of that!
Interestingly, it seems there is further dissent within the ranks. NTTB candidate organiser Antony Nailer recently criticised Bailey for not attending their first meeting (because he was being interviewed by a Far Right group), for deliberately pushing his post down their page and for his ‘self-aggrandizement.’ There are growing whispers that the people of Portland are cottoning on and feel he has been using them for his own ends. Whilst not living on Portland, he constantly says he is ‘giving us our voice.’ It remains to be seen how long we’ll believe him.
The backlog of asylum cases that has created the problem in the first place is a (conceivably deliberate) failure of government. Poor people escaping war, persecution, imprisonment, and torture are not to blame. The blame lies squarely with a government who care for refugees about as much as they care for our communities.
When I stated at the start that our community had been ‘radicalised’ through fear, grievance and hate, there is some truth to that. How else would a community so proud of fighting fascism in WWII be openly greeting fascists and their dangerous ideas? However, the fact is that it is actually just a very small section of our community. Most people on Portland (and in Weymouth) are not racist and the community at large has been doing amazing things to welcome and support refugees. The majority of people, including those in the NTTB Facebook group, are decent, kind, charitable and welcoming and believe that refugees are human beings who, like all of us, deserve to live in safety.
Gallery 5:
Liz Bladon
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