UKIP MS NEIL HAMILTON HAS A LONG CAREER OF SIDLING UP WITH PROMINENT FASCISTS, INCLUDING GIVING HIS SUPPORT TO NOTORIOUS EDL THUG TOMMY ROBINSON AND FAR RIGHT PENALLY AGITATORS.
HAMILTON’S NAME BECAME SHORTHAND FOR CORRUPTION DURING A LANDMARK BRIBERY CASE IN HIS CASH-FOR-QUESTIONS SCANDAL.
NOW HE’S THE LEADER OF UKIP AND SEEKING A NEW VOTER-BASE FOR MAY 2021 SENEDD ELECTIONS AS SUPPORT FOR HIS BREXIT CAUSE FADES AWAY.
By Mark S Redfern
Neil Hamilton has been a feature of British politics since the early 1980s, when he became a Conservative MP for the Tatton constituency in Cheshire. But in the time since, he has gone from right wing eccentric and corrupt, money-grabbing MP to Welsh parliamentarian, interim leader of UKIP and a vocal promoter of far right and even fascist figures.
Today, Hamilton is desperately trying to whip up hatred against refugees and asylum seekers to boost his chances of getting re-elected to The Senedd in 2021. But a detailed look at his career, what he stands for and where he is now will alarm anyone opposed to racism.
The MS for the Mid and West Wales region likes to make out he’s not part of a corrupt political establishment, but he became a household name for sleaze and backroom dealing.
In 1994, in what became known as the cash-for-questions affair, he took bribes in return for asking questions in parliament on behalf of wealthy clients and introduced a lobbying firm to a tobacco giant for a £6,000 “commission” fee.
When the story broke in The Guardian newspaper, Hamilton tried to sue. The “Neil Hamilton Fighting Fund” that was used to finance the prosecution was stumped up by a gang of millionaires with axes to grind against the source of the story, Mohamed Al Fayed. One of these was Taki Theodoracopulos who since has loudly declared his support for the Greek fascist party Golden Dawn. Hamilton lost the case & later had his appeal thrown out.
His relationship with far right and fascist supporters goes much further than getting money from them, however.
Most recently, the UKIP MS has been seen at anti-refugee protests in Penally, Pembrokeshire to try and drum up hatred against asylum seekers who have been put in an army camp by the UK Home Office.
The protests have been organised and supported by a network of far right and fascist activists from Britain and internationally, including by some whose members have called for the burning down of the camp. A recent voice.wales report carried an eye-witness account from a young woman who was told her children would be raped by one of these activists outside the camp.
Hamilton has been actively promoting one of these groups in particular, Voice of Wales (VoW), who were until recently called Leavers of Swansea and who have been at the forefront attacking refugees in Penally. Our investigation into the group has revealed a cesspit of racism within it.
In a promotional video filmed outside the camp, Hamilton said: “They [asylum seekers] shouldn’t be here anyway because not a single one will have a right to asylum in the UK because they have to seek asylum in the first safe country to which they come from their own country.”
The statement is a lie, but this is not the first time Hamilton has tried to evade the truth in relation to racism.
He was accused by the BBC back in August 1983 of making a Nazi salute whilst on a parliamentary visit to Berlin. Even though he won libel damages in court over the report, the then-Conservative MP would later admit in a Sunday Times column that he did in fact make the salute but “somebody on the trip clearly did not share our sense of humour.”
In 1998 Hamilton was pictured giving a speech to the pro-Apartheid South African group the Springbok Club, headed up by a neo-Nazi ex-National Front activist and who wish for a return to the brutal apartheid system, where black people were made to live as second class citizens in service to the white population.
His action went hand-in-hand with his comments writing off the African National Congress as “a typical terrorist organisation” and going on to attack the BBC over their decision to broadcast a 1988 gig in Wembley paying tribute to Nelson Mandela.
A strange leadership struggle has placed Hamilton as the de facto leader of UKIP since September 2020 after the previous head, Freddy Vachha, was ousted due to a complaint of bullying.
But even before this, Hamilton was showing his true colours within UKIP during an internal debate as to whether to accept the notorious far-right, and some would say fascist, activist Tommy Robinson into the party.
The furore in the party eventually led the UKIP leader at the time to quit, but Hamilton was enthusiastic about being seen alongside Robinson at a march in December 2018. Robinson is a former BNP member who founded the violent, anti-Muslim English Defence League. He has tried to intimidate journalists by turning up in gangs late at night and banging on their doors and windows. He even stormed the offices of a Welsh newspaper, according to anti-Fascist group Hope Not Hate.
Plaid MS Leanne Wood said at the time that Robinson was an “Islamophobic far right bully” and that Hamilton “has no shame, but his sharing of a platform with such a reprehensible and dangerous character brings shame on this Senedd and brings shame on Wales.” Robinson – who’s real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon – recently left Britain complaining he was being bullied.
Hamilton also welcomed so called ‘alt-right’ personalities into the party in 2018, among them a man accused of sending rape threats to an MP, a man with links to a racist online forum, and another personality who defended paedophilia.
This group of candidates was heralded by the UKIP MS who said he will “look forward to them developing truly dank memes that will trigger lefty luvvies”, a gimmick to try and beckon young recruits into the new incarnation of the party.
During his time at UKIP, Hamilton has been instrumental in turning the party further to the hard right and linking up with violent activists on the ground. Even though this strategy has had little success to date, he is hoping it will pay off next year.
As the Brexit cause loses its importance to the far right as an organisational tool, the Black Lives Matter protests have served as a more recent target for Neil Hamilton. He went as far as branding George Floyd – the Black man who was murdered by a white cop kneeling on his neck – a “career criminal, armed robber, and drug dealer” and he ominously said about the ensuing protests against the police: “political violence breeds counter-violence.”
Hamilton regularly attacks the Black Lives Matter movement online, even applauding F1 drivers who refused to take the knee with Lewis Hamilton in July this year.
He is no doubt angry that the movement against racism under the BLM banner took Wales by storm in May and June, and amassed huge levels of support from across the whole of the country.
But anti-refugee racism in particular has been normalised in our society. Just in the past couple of weeks news broke that the Tory government may try to use nets or a wave machine to push back boats of desperate asylum seekers, even though a 16 year old boy from Sudan died in August trying to get to Britain. As long as this situation continues, Hamilton will feel there is a chance to capitalise on it. He remains a threat to the anti-racist cause in Wales.
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