Badenoch’s New Adviser Was A Neo-Nazi

A lot has been said of Kemmy Bnock of late that she's settled into her role as opposition leader well after a bumpy start and that she has taken the Conservative Party back to its roots. She has the second highest approval rating for all party leaders in England. But it hasn't translated into much success given the Tories lost their deposits in Makerfield in Gen and Denton and were beaten by Restore Britain in the Manchester Mayoral bi-election. But that's not to say she hasn't been without her gaffs from campaigning in the Tory leadership contest on her Twitter beef with Doctor Who and trying to get the government to end Trump's illegal war with Iran. However, I don't think many of us were prepared for the story that broke this week as it turns out that a former neo-Nazi had been selected by Box no Tories to run as a council candidate in the ward of Krukarn South in Somerset. Joshua Bonehill Payne, more famous recently for his allegedly satirical political AI slop account, The Krue Gazette, had previously been convicted on multiple occasions of racially charged offenses from his time as a neo-Nazi activist. In 2015, as part of a group called Liberate Stanford Hill, he promoted plans for a march against what he described as the Jewification of Great Britain, describing himself in an interview with the Hackne citizen as a proud anti-semite. Later that year, he also promoted his intention to attend a similar rally in Gold's Green, claiming he was going to burn copies of the Talmud and posting to his website that the event would be quote an absolute gas. He was subsequently convicted of inciting racial hatred against Jewish people in relation to posters on his website intended for use at the event. But that wasn't his most high-profile conviction. In 2016, he was also found guilty of the racially aggravated harassment of Lucana Burgger, who was at the time an MP for the Labour Party. This included posting on his blog that she was an evil money grabber and posting photos of her photoshopped onto a rat. He's been on somewhat of a redemption tour since his release, saying that he read the Bible in prison and it helped him unlearn his antise-semitism, saying this at a recent event that appears to be a Conservative party function. 10 years ago, I was in Wsworth, Belm Marsh, some of the harshest prisons in this country. And that is because fundamentally I fell into extremism. I started to uptake the ideas of anti-semitism. The very worst the very worst beliefs in this country hating our fellow British citizens. And it was a very dark time for me. A very dark time. But I needed to go to prison. I needed to go to prison to learn to understand that my beliefs, my views were wrong. The time that I spent in solitary, the time that I spent in the block, as they call it, was time for reflection for me. For the first time in my life, I was given a copy of the Bible. And I was able to fully understand the history of the Jewish people, the importance of Israel, and it was revelationary to me. It transformed my life, the time that I spent inside. I realized in around about 2016 that enough was enough. I'd wasted the earlier years of my life, but I was going to spend the rest of my life making a difference. >> He also posted this to Twitter under his pseudonym Kru Man. Reading the Bible is one of the first things to help me come away from this wretched way of thinking. It showed me the truth being that God's covenant with Israel is unbreakable and must be respected. No, I don't know about anybody else, but I tend to not be racist because I believe that all people are equal and not necessarily because a holo book has described its covenant with some ancient civilization. But that's just me. Now, his past as a neo-Nazi activist became widely publicized this week after his selection, but BNO was quick to defend him gunning for a council role, saying this. The Conservative Party believes in second chances. This is not just someone that we've picked up uh who's a convicted uh criminal. This is somebody who is actively working to help communities, especially Jewish communities. And this is what I want to see. I want to see second chances for good people, for people who've learned their lessons, for people who are showing that they know what they did was wrong. And I totally agree with that. Zach Palansky said much the same today in terms of treating people where they are now rather than where they've been before, no matter their mistakes previously in life. But if that is the case, if that is the case, why do the Tories spend so long attacking Lou Hag over a spent conviction for what was a pretty minor case in my opinion of insurance fraud? Why was this somehow a huge deal for Lou Hake having a cabinet position as transport secretary and now coming back in to government under Andy Burnham when that's significantly less bad than going to prison for racially aggravated harassment and being a neo-Nazi? Like if we're going to do this thing where we talk about like the sanctity of forgiveness and the importance of turning people's lives around, which again like it seems like this uh Tory council candidate had done so. Why does that not apply to somebody who's committed a significantly less important offense? Answer on a postcard. Now, that wasn't her only attempt at making a former neo-Nazi more palatable. The Tories even reached out to several Jewish groups asking for a meeting to prove to them that Bonehill Payne was a reformed character. But both the Jewish leadership council and the board of deputies declined to speak with him. They also put out a public statement on the issue saying this. The severity of Joshua Bonehill Payne's crimes targeting Lucana Burgger and others mean that he still faces ongoing legal restrictions. Whilst we do believe in the possibility of rehabilitation, this should not in this case entail selection as a candidate for a major political party and the impact of the decision on the victims ought to be a central consideration. We have agreed to meet the Conservative Party to discuss their decision-making processes and to urge them to rescend this decision. Shortly after, Bonehill Payne announced on Twitter that he was no longer seeking election as a Tory candidate. But Finn not he will still have a future role within the Conservative Party. He's been asked by Kimmy Bnock to instead be part of the Conservatives Culture and Integration Commission advising on counter extremism. I mean this looks to me like this is a significantly more senior role than just dealing with the bins which was in Kemy's own words be his rem as a counselor. What I will say though is that the very first headline on the homepage for said culture and integration commission that he is potentially advising quite literally says quote end identity politics in the state. Surely concern for victims of identity based discrimination which is what anti-semitism is would fall under that banner. seems like they're fine with identity politics for some, but maybe not for others. Dalia, now we all hear about the problems of quote left-wing anti-semitism in the media, in the discussions in the press, in terms of what the political parties talk about, like the problems of anti-semitism in Britain right now. And yet, of course, we see this as a very clear case of an incredibly uh obvious form of right-wing anti-semitism, clearly a reformed characters we see now. has previously had also said things about like uh like hoaxes about Asian people and and Somalis I believe on his website too and yet those things don't come up. >> Yeah. I mean it's a classic case of uh identity politics uh for thee but not for no for me but not for thee and anti-semitism crisis for thee but not for me. Um so look I mean here's the story. Okay. So, a a man with with a neo-Nazi past, you know, a self-described uh former anti-semite has declared himself reformed of those beliefs and the Conservative party have hired him in quite an important advisory role on the basis that he is reformed from his extremist um past. And you know, I want to be be fair here. I I can believe that someone who has been radicalized into far-right politics can see the error of their ways and can move past that and can actually play an important role in understanding how far radicalization happens and can be part of the efforts to combat uh farright extremism. So, I'm not in principle against someone with that past who has genuinely shown a change playing a role in in figuring out how we combat rising far-right extremism. Um, and I would be willing to believe that this could be one of those cases if he hadn't just swapped one far-right dog whistle for another far-right dog whistle. Because when you actually listen to how he he talks about it, he describes anti-semitism as a scourge kind of washing up on our shores. You know, he uses a very deliberate choice of language there to to say washing up on our shores um and threatening our fellow British countrymen. Uh the implication there is this thing that we're seeing a lot which is this idea that anti-semitism is an imported problem that it is something that immigrants bring with them that it's one of the many bad things and all of the the various ills in British society being an imported problem um from immigration and of course what he kind of conveniently forgets there is that anti-semitism is is a deeply European um invention. It's one of the oldest, most deeply rooted traditions of of the European far right to be particular. You know, it didn't wash up on the shores. It was already here. Um, but another problem I have with it is that he's only apologizing for one part of his past as far as I can see. You know, I I looked for evidence that he had apologized um for example for creating a hoax missing poster uh claiming that a six-year-old girl had been kidnapped by an Asian grooming gang. I looked for evidence that he had apologized um for spreading a rumor that a pub in Leicester had banned military personnel from patronizing their pub for fear that it would offend immigrants. Um as far as I can see, he has not apologized for it. And if he has apologized for it, he's certainly not apologized for it with the fortitude and publicity um that he has apologized for his um previous anti-semitism. Um you know, he has kind of directly and very emphatically apologized for that. But he has not apologized for sewing hatred and division and actual material threat um against black and brown people specifically. The implication here is is Muslims and he's joining a party, the Conservative Party, that in my view holds extremist and bigoted positions on immigration and and Muslims. So this isn't really a rehabilitation story. It's more like a lateral move um within a very similar genre of politics. Um, and it actually kind of symbolizes a more broad um, trend that is happening inside the European far right that I've been sort of observing for a while now, which is a split over who the real enemy is. you know, you have these kind of old school uh far-right populists or or you know, white supremacists like Nick Griffin who for them, you know, still anti-semitism is very much like the core of the project. And you know, they talk a lot about sort of Jewish cabals and Jewish, you know, supremacy and all of these things. And even sometimes that can skirt into looking like solidarity with the Palestinians, but it is absolutely not. it is driven by hatred and it should be rejected from from our movements. Um but then there's a younger faction within the European far right and in the American far right that has shifted its target to Muslims entirely. Um and in doing so they've actually built this very strong allegiance with Israel and this idea of of a Judeo-Christian heritage that they are defending um against Islam. And so I am seeing this as kind of emblematic of a shift within the far right um for around you know basically what politics of bigotry they view as their most electable form of of of bigotry. Um so for me the the problem here is that yes he might have said that he is sorry for the anti-semitism but he's not sorry for the other forms of bigotry that he has from my view from what I can see um spread and that to me isn't a hier isn't an accident it's actually indicative of a hierarchy of what kinds of bigotry are getting a pass um in the contemporary in this contemporary political moment. If you could just bring up the graphic from earlier, Alex, the one from the Conservative Party's Commission. Yeah. So, I want to get your opinion on this, Daria, because it's interesting here is that they're talking about like ending identity politics, but they're also talking about like stopping multiculturalism in schools, like clearly caring about that stuff. That seems like identity politics to me. And also about tackling is extremism. That that feels pretty identity politics coded. and in supports of like one set of rules for everybody which would preclude I know a hierarchy of racism for example and meritocracy uh and indeed of course like protecting free speech but of course they would in it seems to as far as they're concerned in the way they've responded to this believe that some things aren't free speech in terms of like racist speech but I would agree with what's your I'd not seen this before today Dalia what's your take on this proposed kind of discussion from the Conservative party that this guy's going to be involved in >> well I mean it's the kind of classic attempt to create a raceneutral language around things that are are deeply racial. You know, the stuff around mecracy. I mean, who can argue with the idea of meritocracy that you know, regardless of who you are or whatever that you can you can achieve and you can you can have opportunities um opened up to you. But in the context in which we currently exist, that term is being used as a dog whistle about this idea, this kind of DI scare which implies that or tries to construct this narrative that black and brown people are getting special treatment in Britain at the expense of of white people. that, you know, black and brown people are being fraudulently hired into important roles in the government in in um in various institutions that they are getting unfairly and unduly promoted that they're being treated more uh softly by the police. Even though all of the data, like any data that you can take seriously, any data that is not just a hunch that people have demonstrates that if you are black or brown in this country, you're more likely to be poor. You're more likely to be overpoliced. You're more likely to be in shitty housing. You're more likely to to be at risk of all these different kinds of vulnerabilities. But it's a kind of remixing of that Enoch pal fantasy of the black man having the whip over the white man. this idea that, you know, not only have we allowed immigration, you know, mass immigration as it were. Not only have we allowed black and brown people to to come into this country, but they have taken hold of all of the institutions of this state. And they are using that that incredible power to dispossess and disenfranchise um white people. And that is a very powerful paradigm when at the very same time that you are making those arguments, the material conditions and the social fabric for everyone in this country is being ripped apart by billionaires. So yes, it's it's kind of a distraction um tactic, but it's also not just a distraction tactic. It's also actually part of a very particular kind of politics and a politics that has a vision for the world that is not just about distracting people so that they don't fight the billionaires. That's part of it. But it's also creating a society that is racially hierarchized. And the irony is that the way that it's being done is through spreading this moral panic or spreading this falsity that black and brown people are being given an easy ride by the economy, an easy ride by the political system that they are in control of the state, they're in control of of the economy. Um, and that's why white people are experiencing dispossession when in reality we're all experiencing dispossession at the hands of a different minority, which is the billionaire class. They're the ones who have closed our community centers. They're the ones that have turned our housing market into basically a casino. They are the ones that have destroyed our NHS that are p privatizing it through the back door. Um, but this politics gains a lot of traction because it offers a simple explanation for those things. And it offers an explanation that rests on a long history of portraying black and brown people as inferior and as threats to the safety of white people.