1993 Millwall by-election

Millwall is located on the Isle of Dogs in London, England. Historically, it had been an area of working class residents mainly employed in the many docks on the Isle of Dogs but the closure of the docks in the 1960s had led to high unemployment and deprivation in the area.[1] The borough of Tower Hamlets had a long history of activity by the far-right, including previous organisations such as the British Brothers' League, the British Union of Fascists, the British League of Ex-Servicemen and the British Movement.[2] Race tensions in the area became heightened when a boy named John Stoner was involved in an incident at Morpeth School in Bethnal Green with a group of Asian students. On 24 February 1990, 300 White residents participated in a protest led by John's grandfather, John Happe. Although Happe expressly condemned the BNP, around 50 BNP members attended and began to become better-known in the area.[3] The BNP used the slogan "Rights for Whites", a slogan that had been in use since at least the protests against the Notting Hill Carnival in the 1970s.[3] This slogan proved successful. In one occasion, a group of mothers protesting against the closure of a nursery in the Park ward began to chant "Rights for Whites" on the prompting of some BNP members at the protest.[4] Eventually, the BNP registered on the 1993 ballot paper as "Rights for Whites - British National Party".[5] In the years 1990-3, the BNP concentrated on door-to-door canvassing rather than on mass demonstrations, to avoid the potential for violent clashes with other protesters.[6]

The majority of housing in the borough of Tower Hamlets was owned by the council at the time, so housing was a major issue in local politics.[7] At the time, the Liberal Democrats had a "bottom-up" strategy for local elections, where the local party determined its own strategy with little direction from headquarters.[8] As most of the Asian residents in Tower Hamlets supported the Labour Party, the local Liberal Democrats increasingly became the party of local White residents.[7] Roger Eatwell has used the phrase "syncretic legitimation" to the favouring of "local people" by the Liberal Democrats that led to greater acceptance of the BNP's racism.[9] For example, the Liberal Democrats' leaflets in Millwall had said that Labour's policies for positive discrimination meant "NO to Island Homes for Island People" (the Isle of Dogs is known locally as "the Island") and implying that the Liberal Democrats favoured the White community.[9] In November 1981, a local Liberal Democrat councillor had travelled to Bangladesh and was quoted as telling local people that there was "no room left for immigrants".[9] Another councillor hung a Union flag in a proscribed place from his office in Globe Town and made a stance of refusing to take it down.[9] The BNP themselves said that the local Liberal Democrats had "transformed themselves from being composed of a small group of early yuppie outsiders, to being the party of the local frustrated housewife".[7] In time, the Labour Party felt obliged to defend themselves against perceptions of favouring Bangladeshis and also began to use similar language about favouring locals.[10]

As the governing party on the council, the Liberal Democrats had instituted a "Sons and Daughters" scheme that, by prioritising housing applications for those whose parents were already in social housing nearby, favoured White residents. Only 8% of applicants were Bangladeshi, whereas 69% of homeless people in the borough were Bangladeshi.[7] However, the BNP criticised this scheme. In both the 1992 and 1993 local by-elections, the BNP's leaflets stated, "The Liberals' Sons and Daughters scheme is just a con - Bangladeshis are still put first in housing in Liberal Neighbourhoods like Bethnal Green and Poplar."[11] Between the 1992 and 1993 by-elections, a new housing development on Masthouse Terrace in the Millwall ward was opened, and there was local anger that 28% of places were given to Bangladeshis.[11] After their 1993 victory, the BNP said in a statement, "The Liberals repeated last year's shabby trick of playing the 'race card', by trying to pretend that they were against immigration. The trick failed, as local whites had heard it all before, and this time were not taken in."[11]

The next year Cllr Chapman resigned, leading to another by-election in the same ward. The British National Party's campaign emphasised 'Rights for Whites' through canvassing and leafleting, while the Labour Party campaign focussed on preventing the election of the first BNP councillor.[15]

After a recount, Beackon was declared the winner with a majority of just 7 votes.

Party leader John Tyndall said that the result was the BNP's "moment in history" and claimed that 800 new members were recruited immediately afterwards. He later denied "hyping up" the victory.[16]

There was widespread condemnation from politicians, religious leaders and the media of the result. Many explanations were offered to explain why the residents of Millwall would vote for a neo-Nazi party, including the manipulation of the racial issue by other local parties, the parochialism of the Isle of Dogs and the changes that the area was experiencing as many residents were in poverty but also close to the prosperity of the new Canary Wharf development. The Home Secretary at the time, Michael Howard, said that he "deplored" the outcome, with the Environment Secretary John Gummer describing the BNP as a "thoroughly nasty party".[17] One journalist in Time Out referred to voters in the Millwall ward as "a peculiar breed: insular, proud of their docklands heritage and identity as a community, and notoriously suspicious of 'outsiders'."[18] Copsey has argued that these analyses appear "naïve" given subsequent victories by the BNP in Blackburn, Burnley, Stoke-on-Trent and Barking and Dagenham.[16]

Roger Eatwell included the result in an analysis of far-right successes across Europe, and formulated a three-dimensional "efficacy-legitimacy-trust" model. The model gives three main reasons why voters choose the far-right: they see an extreme force as having an efficacy for making changes; they gain legitimacy from the use of racial politics by other parties, as occurred in the prelude to the Millwall result; and they have lost trust in the established parties.[19] Coswell criticises this model as not explaining why there was such a big increase in the BNP vote between 1992 and 1993. He points out that, despite a lack of "efficacy" from Beackon after his election, his vote still increased between 1993 and 1994, and he was only defeated because mobilisation by the Labour Party led to an exceptionally high turnout.[20]

Beackon gained a reputation as a poor representative after his election, often expressing ignorance about the council's debates or how the bureaucracy operated.[20] Beackon lost his seat in the next election after a large increase in turnout increased the actual BNP vote, but increased the Labour vote further to retake the seat.[12] The British National Party performed strongly in 1994 in general, but subsequently became divided over the behaviour of its military wing, Combat 18 - a body that Beackon was responsible for and which made up much of the local party membership in Millwall.[21] Combat 18 began to use violence against members of the BNP who were perceived as not genuine supporters of the neo-Nazi movement, such as Eddy Butler and Tony Lecomber.[22] The BNP would not win any elected seats again until they won three in Burnley in 2002.[23]

Beackon did not re-stand for election until 2008 when he took 17.8% of the vote in Orsett ward on Thurrock council.[24]

• Copsey, Nigel (2004). Contemporary British Fascism: The British National Party and its Quest for Legitimacy. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-1-4039-0214-6.