Far right hate is spiralling out of control – and politicians aren’t doing enough to stop it

With such negative attitudes towards the political system, it is perhaps not surprising that the far right is effectively mining this anti-establishment seam

One of the lasting memories of 2018 was the first “Free Tommy” demonstration held in London last June. Men, mostly in their 40s and 50s, clambered up the gates at the entrance to Downing Street and threw beer cans while screaming “traitors” at the nearby armed police. Up the road, a group of least 500 demonstrators managed to chase police out of Trafalgar Square.

Ostensibly they were there to protest against the imprisonment of Stephen Lennon (“Tommy Robinson”), but the march actually said a lot about the state of far-right extremism in the UK today.

With over 10,000 people on the streets that day, it was the largest far right demonstration since the 1970s. It also tapped into the growing anti-elite feeling within society, which we’ve profiled in our new State of Hate report, and which resonates much wider than ideological fascism or specific forms of prejudiced politics. Under a false “free speech” mantle, the protest brought together a wide range of individuals, from Trump supporters to hardline nazis, Ukip members and football hooligans.

To understand the attraction of today’s far right, one has to appreciate the growing sense of disconnect between large swathes of people in society and the structures of power. Polling from Hope Not Hate over the last few months has found widespread dissatisfaction with the political system and the main political parties. A Hope Not Hate and YouGov poll taken at Christmas found that 68 per cent of people felt that there wasn’t a political party that spoke for them. This was up from 61 per cent when we asked the same question in July.

A more recent Hope Not Hate poll, taken earlier this month, found that 55 per cent of people thought our political system was broken. Only 34 per cent thought it was working, even if not perfectly.

The way our politicians have dealt with Brexit, or probably more accurately not dealt with it, has deepened the anger at our political class. With such negative attitudes towards the political system and our politicians, it is perhaps not surprising that the far right is effectively mining this anti-establishment seam.

The narrative of “betrayal” and “traitors”, which increasingly dominates the far right’s discourse, is focused heavily towards MPs – and female MPs in particular. Over the past year, numerous female MPs have been targeted by far right activists or generally by angry men.

Last year saw the continuing rise of the anti-feminist movement, too. Growing gender equality has long caused a male backlash in society and this has been reflected in virulent anti-women views and policies of the far right. However, in recent years we have seen the emergence and growing popularity of the men’s rights movement.

One influence on the contemporary far right’s understanding of gender politics is the “manosphere”: a loose collection of websites, forums, blogs and vlogs concerned with men’s issues and masculinity, oriented around an opposition to feminism and, within parts, embrace of extreme misogyny.

Meanwhile, the elevation of Gerard Batten to leader of Ukip heralded its shift to becoming a fully-blown far right party and its adoption of a strongly anti-Muslim agenda.

The shift to the right coincided with a move to street politics, with Batten now a regular speaker on Democratic Football Lads Alliance (DFLA) protests and the appointment of Stephen Lennon as his advisor on grooming gangs.

Polling for our report found that Lennon continues to be the most high profile far-right activist in the UK, with 55 per cent of Britons having heard of him, making him better known than some of our national politicians. Of those, 37 per cent have seen or heard one of his videos on social media. This rises to 57 per cent of 18-24 year olds.

However, people overwhelmingly have a negative impression of Lennon, with just 6 per cent viewing him positively.

In turn, while social media companies are increasingly removing leading far right figures from their platforms, there remains an upward trend in online hate: and Britons are at the heart of it. Five of the 10 far right activists with the biggest social media reaches in the world are British.

While the majority of terror arrests last year were of alleged Islamists, there was a growing number of people arrested from the far right, too, including banned terror group National Action (several members of which were sentenced under anti-terror laws last year). While National Action is no longer an organisational threat, it has been replaced by a number of smaller and, if anything, more hardline groups.

The latest, the Sonnenkrieg Division, is probably the most worrying of all. Hardline nazi in its ideology, it draws on the influence of the Order of Nine Angles, the world’s most extreme satanic-nazi group.

The ONA, whose one-time leader David Myatt was influential inside veteran neo-nazi gang Combat 18 before becoming an Islamist and a key al-Qaeda propagandist, was also influential on National Action.

This trend towards younger, more violent nazis is a very real concern. But our report also highlights the threat posed by Islamist extremists, including Anjem Choudary, released from prison. The mere presence of these people back on the streets is likely to inspire and re-galvanise supporters.

Our study inside State of Hate of thousands of left-wing social media accounts gives a glimpse into the extent of the problem of antisemitism on the left.

While overt antisemitism and Holocaust denial is uncommon, a larger group engage in conspiratorial antisemitism and use antisemitic tropes, especially in relation to supposed Jewish power, and an even larger group are involved in denying a problem exists and dismissing the issue as a right wing and Zionist smear.

The Conservatives have their own issues with anti-Muslim prejudice. Half of the party’s 2017 voters think that Islam is incompatible to the British way of life and 47 per cent think there are no go areas in Britain where sharia law dominates and non-Muslims cannot enter.

From out of all of this, Brexit is clearly going to dominate British politics in 2019 and with a hard Brexit extremely unlikely, a narrative of “Brexit Betrayal” will be heavily used by the far right.

Ukip claims that it will stand 3,000 candidates in May’s local elections, but this is likely to be overshadowed by the launch of Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party.

We are likely to see the continuation of street protests, which will no doubt fluctuate in size and anger depending on events, and a strong far right vote in the European Elections will give a boost to the far right and populist right in the UK.

Nick Lowles is chief executive of Hope Not Hate