1 00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:03,080 I think part of the problem we have is just how politics have 2 00:00:03,080 --> 00:00:05,400 shifted over the last kind of few, few years. 3 00:00:05,640 --> 00:00:09,920 So views that are now probably considered fairly mainstream 20 4 00:00:09,920 --> 00:00:12,680 years ago, 30 years ago would have been seen as extreme. 5 00:00:12,760 --> 00:00:16,640 There is this ecosystem now where 20 years ago, 30 years 6 00:00:16,640 --> 00:00:19,720 ago, there was literally a social and economic consequence. 7 00:00:19,720 --> 00:00:22,080 But for being a far right activist, you lost your job, you 8 00:00:22,080 --> 00:00:23,800 got shunned by your family and your friends. 9 00:00:24,000 --> 00:00:26,320 Now you earn a good living and buy a good living. 10 00:00:26,720 --> 00:00:29,960 I mean Tommy Robinson, where wherever his money goes down 11 00:00:30,040 --> 00:00:33,360 directly into his bank account or to other accounts, we'll earn 12 00:00:33,360 --> 00:00:40,040 millions every year. Hello and welcome to Ways to 13 00:00:40,040 --> 00:00:41,920 Change the World. I'm Krishna Guru Murphy, and 14 00:00:41,920 --> 00:00:44,800 this is the podcast in which we talk to extraordinary people 15 00:00:44,800 --> 00:00:47,280 about the big ideas in their lives and the events that have 16 00:00:47,280 --> 00:00:50,160 helped shape them. My guest today is Nick Lols, who 17 00:00:50,160 --> 00:00:53,200 has spent three decades fighting racism and extremism. 18 00:00:53,520 --> 00:00:57,640 In 2004 he founded the advocacy group Hope Not Hate, which 19 00:00:57,640 --> 00:01:00,600 became instrumental in defeating the far right British National 20 00:01:00,600 --> 00:01:02,680 Party. Under his leadership, Hope Not 21 00:01:02,680 --> 00:01:06,280 Hate has become a leading voice in the UK against hate groups 22 00:01:06,280 --> 00:01:09,560 and far right extremism, whilst Nick himself has become the 23 00:01:09,560 --> 00:01:13,280 target of countless threats. His new book, How to Defeat the 24 00:01:13,280 --> 00:01:16,920 Far Right Lessons from Hope Not Hate tells the story of how 25 00:01:16,920 --> 00:01:20,560 intolerance and hate have grown in Western societies and what 26 00:01:20,560 --> 00:01:23,080 can be done to counter them. Welcome Nick. 27 00:01:23,120 --> 00:01:25,360 I mean you spent a lifetime trying to change the world. 28 00:01:25,560 --> 00:01:29,240 If we allowed you to just change this in one fell swoop, which 29 00:01:29,240 --> 00:01:32,920 lever would you pull? What a question. 30 00:01:37,480 --> 00:01:41,640 I guess what I'd say is we should all be nicer to each 31 00:01:41,640 --> 00:01:43,440 other. If I could change one thing, 32 00:01:43,560 --> 00:01:46,640 we'd be nicer to each other. We have better communities with 33 00:01:46,640 --> 00:01:48,040 better families, better communities. 34 00:01:48,040 --> 00:01:50,960 We have a better society. And things will flow from there. 35 00:01:51,560 --> 00:01:53,520 I could talk about reversing climate change. 36 00:01:53,520 --> 00:02:00,240 I could talk about, you know, alleviating poverty, curtailing 37 00:02:00,240 --> 00:02:02,920 social media companies. But at the heart of it, I think 38 00:02:02,920 --> 00:02:07,800 people are the agents of change and I think that if we can learn 39 00:02:07,800 --> 00:02:11,560 to be better and live Better Together, then things will flow 40 00:02:11,560 --> 00:02:13,680 from there. Those other things you mentioned 41 00:02:13,680 --> 00:02:19,480 are all instrumental in combating hate as well, which we 42 00:02:19,480 --> 00:02:23,440 can maybe come to, but I, I think we have to sort of define 43 00:02:23,440 --> 00:02:25,280 our terms. You know, we live in a time 44 00:02:25,280 --> 00:02:30,760 where the right is on the rise. But certainly in this country, 45 00:02:31,320 --> 00:02:36,000 Reform, Nigel Farage utterly reject the label of being on the 46 00:02:36,000 --> 00:02:37,960 far right or part of the far right. 47 00:02:38,280 --> 00:02:41,560 And lots of similar parties across Europe do as well. 48 00:02:41,560 --> 00:02:44,560 And they say we're not Nazis, you know, don't associate us 49 00:02:44,800 --> 00:02:46,640 with that. We are not racists. 50 00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:51,320 So, so who are the far right? Well, so for us, the definition 51 00:02:51,320 --> 00:02:55,200 of far right is a kind of broad umbrella definition. 52 00:02:55,200 --> 00:02:59,360 And within that you have those kind of radical right parties 53 00:02:59,360 --> 00:03:01,280 who operate in the democratic process. 54 00:03:01,400 --> 00:03:04,000 But then you also have groups and individuals who are far more 55 00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:07,320 extreme, who look towards a more violent, violent answer. 56 00:03:07,600 --> 00:03:10,360 But there's actually they share many things in common. 57 00:03:10,360 --> 00:03:14,520 And why we would say that Nigel Farage and Reform fit into that 58 00:03:14,520 --> 00:03:16,480 radical right. So that's the kind of moderate 59 00:03:16,480 --> 00:03:20,960 end of the far right is because in intrinsically they they hold 60 00:03:20,960 --> 00:03:23,160 a kind of racist, anti immigrant rhetoric. 61 00:03:23,320 --> 00:03:26,440 They demonize the other. They're authoritarian in 62 00:03:26,440 --> 00:03:29,640 outlook. They are, while they engage in 63 00:03:29,640 --> 00:03:32,720 the democratic system, a bit like Donald Trump, actually, 64 00:03:32,720 --> 00:03:35,600 what they want to do is dismantle key pillars of liberal 65 00:03:35,600 --> 00:03:39,520 democracy. And and so I think that, you 66 00:03:39,520 --> 00:03:42,720 know, they want to radically change the society that that 67 00:03:42,720 --> 00:03:46,520 that we live in. And underpinning it is a kind of 68 00:03:47,000 --> 00:03:49,400 racialized identity about nationhood. 69 00:03:50,400 --> 00:03:52,600 It's it's about expelling people. 70 00:03:53,080 --> 00:03:56,040 I think part of the problem we have is just how politics have 71 00:03:56,040 --> 00:03:58,360 shifted over the last kind of few, few years. 72 00:03:58,600 --> 00:04:02,880 So views that are now probably considered fairly mainstream 20 73 00:04:02,880 --> 00:04:05,640 years ago, 30 years ago would have been seen as extreme. 74 00:04:06,080 --> 00:04:10,240 And I'll give you one example. In 1999, the British National 75 00:04:10,240 --> 00:04:15,480 Party had to drop its compulsory repatriation policy because it 76 00:04:15,480 --> 00:04:18,279 decided that couldn't even win it amongst its own supporters. 77 00:04:18,959 --> 00:04:22,520 And now you have politicians, not just Nigel Farage and and 78 00:04:22,520 --> 00:04:26,080 Reform, but you've got other politicians basically talking 79 00:04:26,080 --> 00:04:28,600 about the same thing. About taking away the right to 80 00:04:28,600 --> 00:04:30,280 remain. Yeah, and it is totally 81 00:04:30,280 --> 00:04:33,040 normalized in society. So I think the Overton window 82 00:04:33,200 --> 00:04:36,720 has shifted so much that actually the cordo sanateur that 83 00:04:36,720 --> 00:04:41,360 separated the far right of, you know, 30 years ago and 84 00:04:41,360 --> 00:04:42,960 mainstream society has collapsed. 85 00:04:43,200 --> 00:04:47,960 I mean, again, you know, racism and racist is the other very, 86 00:04:47,960 --> 00:04:52,320 very hot word which again Farage and Reform utterly reject. 87 00:04:53,120 --> 00:04:55,640 And they say, you know, they bluntly say we are not racist. 88 00:04:55,640 --> 00:04:58,480 We've got people of all races in our party. 89 00:04:58,680 --> 00:05:02,760 Zia Youssef, one of their most high profile people, obviously 90 00:05:02,760 --> 00:05:07,600 from an Asian background. If you go to the Hope Not Hate 91 00:05:07,600 --> 00:05:10,400 website, I know you've got a full sort of list of why you 92 00:05:10,400 --> 00:05:14,440 think they are racist, but can you give me some examples of why 93 00:05:14,440 --> 00:05:20,880 you think it's OK to use that word with regard to reform based 94 00:05:20,880 --> 00:05:23,160 on what they're saying? Well, I mean, I think you've got 95 00:05:23,160 --> 00:05:26,680 to look at both the rhetoric and some of their views of, of the 96 00:05:26,680 --> 00:05:31,120 individuals, including at, at, at a, at a senior level, some of 97 00:05:31,120 --> 00:05:34,720 the racist stuff. If you go to reform counsellors, 98 00:05:34,720 --> 00:05:38,640 reform activists, reform politicians, they're littered 99 00:05:38,640 --> 00:05:42,440 with people who've made the most vile and crass racist and 100 00:05:42,440 --> 00:05:46,480 Islamophobic views. But then you've also got 101 00:05:46,480 --> 00:05:51,240 policies as well and you know, a policy of really expelling, 102 00:05:51,240 --> 00:05:55,720 kicking out people, people of colour to me is a racist policy. 103 00:05:56,000 --> 00:05:59,640 So I think that and the conspiracy theories that that, 104 00:05:59,640 --> 00:06:01,560 that, that, that go along with it. 105 00:06:01,720 --> 00:06:05,480 Now sometimes when there's media attention, they have to suspend 106 00:06:05,480 --> 00:06:08,560 someone or kick someone out. If they suspend them, they quite 107 00:06:08,560 --> 00:06:10,640 often allow them back in a few months later. 108 00:06:10,640 --> 00:06:14,960 But you know, at the last general election, we helped 109 00:06:14,960 --> 00:06:20,680 identify the sorry reform had to had to get rid of 160 candidates 110 00:06:21,160 --> 00:06:22,960 because of racist things that they were saying. 111 00:06:23,240 --> 00:06:26,240 So it's not the odd bad apple. You know, there are many people 112 00:06:26,240 --> 00:06:28,160 and of course there. Was also the Channel 4 News 113 00:06:28,200 --> 00:06:29,560 investigation. Exactly. 114 00:06:29,840 --> 00:06:31,400 Undercover with the reform campaign. 115 00:06:31,480 --> 00:06:34,600 And, and, and I think that, you know, this is sometimes what 116 00:06:34,600 --> 00:06:37,320 they're caught in public. I think that many reform 117 00:06:37,320 --> 00:06:40,880 members, and not all of them, of course, but many reform members 118 00:06:41,480 --> 00:06:43,880 will make jokes, will share racist things. 119 00:06:43,880 --> 00:06:47,080 They will, you know, be abusive, particularly when they aren't. 120 00:06:47,200 --> 00:06:49,280 They think that they aren't being being watched. 121 00:06:49,280 --> 00:06:52,760 And how important is it do you think that you, you you are able 122 00:06:52,760 --> 00:06:57,600 to use those words and those labels in the fight against what 123 00:06:57,600 --> 00:07:01,000 you say is the far right, you know, because you know, they are 124 00:07:01,000 --> 00:07:05,120 quite skillful, I think now at at making it very difficult and 125 00:07:05,120 --> 00:07:10,280 a bit unacceptable to brand them anything other than a mainstream 126 00:07:10,280 --> 00:07:11,520 right wing party. Yeah. 127 00:07:11,520 --> 00:07:13,880 I mean, look, I think, I think we have to use these words 128 00:07:13,880 --> 00:07:16,040 carefully. I think we can't just throw, 129 00:07:16,160 --> 00:07:19,840 throw labels around. And also partly because the 130 00:07:19,840 --> 00:07:22,680 people that we need to engage with don't often see that as 131 00:07:22,680 --> 00:07:23,240 well. Yeah. 132 00:07:23,240 --> 00:07:26,520 But I mean, we, we, we've just completed a poll of 45,000 133 00:07:26,520 --> 00:07:28,440 people, biggest poll I think ever. 134 00:07:28,920 --> 00:07:33,880 And almost 50% of people see reform as a far right party. 135 00:07:34,200 --> 00:07:36,440 Now, obviously that means a lot of people don't. 136 00:07:36,680 --> 00:07:40,960 But I think for us, we, we, I mean, for a long time, and that 137 00:07:40,960 --> 00:07:43,640 was part of the reason we set up Hope Not Hate 20 odd years ago, 138 00:07:43,880 --> 00:07:46,760 that just calling people racist, calling people fascist didn't 139 00:07:46,760 --> 00:07:49,480 actually work. You had to, you had to both 140 00:07:49,520 --> 00:07:52,520 understand why people were supporting the these groups and 141 00:07:52,520 --> 00:07:55,920 you had to talk to them at a level that they understood. 142 00:07:56,160 --> 00:08:00,760 It's pointless just demonizing reform as racist or far right to 143 00:08:00,760 --> 00:08:03,120 people who don't think that because it isn't going to work. 144 00:08:03,200 --> 00:08:06,600 We need to find other tactics. We need to give examples of 145 00:08:06,600 --> 00:08:08,480 that, for example. Because people who support them, 146 00:08:08,560 --> 00:08:11,200 a lot of people who support them, would also utterly reject 147 00:08:11,200 --> 00:08:15,200 the idea that they were racist. You know, and you're talking 148 00:08:15,200 --> 00:08:18,120 about a party that is leading in the polls right now. 149 00:08:19,400 --> 00:08:21,520 Now you you've talked about some of the polling that you've 150 00:08:21,600 --> 00:08:23,400 carried out. And I suppose we, this is not 151 00:08:23,600 --> 00:08:26,080 literally carried out by hope not hate as it is commissioned 152 00:08:26,400 --> 00:08:28,200 by home and by proper pollsters. Yeah. 153 00:08:28,400 --> 00:08:29,040 Yeah. So what? 154 00:08:29,040 --> 00:08:34,559 What sense do you have of whether racism is is growing in 155 00:08:34,559 --> 00:08:37,720 Britain or not? Well, I mean, I think that it is 156 00:08:38,840 --> 00:08:43,880 probably two things. I think it is clear that opinion 157 00:08:43,880 --> 00:08:48,480 towards immigrants, people of color, particularly Muslims, has 158 00:08:48,480 --> 00:08:50,400 worsened over the last 12 months. 159 00:08:50,640 --> 00:08:54,440 Now that's perhaps unsurprising given the political rhetoric. 160 00:08:54,440 --> 00:08:57,080 Everyone's talking about them in very negative terms. 161 00:08:58,120 --> 00:09:02,160 But what I would say, and and this is I guess gives me hope 162 00:09:02,560 --> 00:09:08,040 that actually the British public are in a more nuanced and I 163 00:09:08,040 --> 00:09:11,640 would say sensible position on many of these key issues than 164 00:09:11,640 --> 00:09:13,920 you would imagine from the political and particularly the 165 00:09:13,920 --> 00:09:18,040 social media narrative. Even on immigration, of course, 166 00:09:18,160 --> 00:09:21,840 the majority of British people do not want people coming in who 167 00:09:21,840 --> 00:09:24,600 shouldn't be here. They want to know who's here and 168 00:09:24,600 --> 00:09:27,160 they want to find a way to get rid of people in a in a quicker 169 00:09:27,160 --> 00:09:29,160 way. The hotels people are people. 170 00:09:29,160 --> 00:09:32,400 People don't like that. But even despite everything 171 00:09:32,400 --> 00:09:35,640 we've had over the last few years, but the Rwanda plan, the 172 00:09:35,640 --> 00:09:39,960 small boat stuff, the majority of British people still want 173 00:09:39,960 --> 00:09:43,320 Britain to abide by international rules and look 174 00:09:43,320 --> 00:09:47,280 after people seeking asylum. The majority of British people 175 00:09:47,520 --> 00:09:51,000 want to live in a multicultural society and see the benefits of 176 00:09:51,000 --> 00:09:52,720 it. The majority of people, and 177 00:09:52,720 --> 00:09:55,720 we're talking about almost four and five, four and five people, 178 00:09:56,600 --> 00:09:59,960 want the government to do more to improve community cohesion. 179 00:10:00,200 --> 00:10:04,120 So there is a narrative going around partly put by people 180 00:10:04,120 --> 00:10:06,880 like, you know, Nigel Farage, certainly put by people like 181 00:10:06,880 --> 00:10:08,800 Tommy Robinson. But then you've got this radical 182 00:10:08,800 --> 00:10:12,600 right ecosystem that the country is at war, it's heading to civil 183 00:10:12,600 --> 00:10:14,560 war, communities can't live together. 184 00:10:15,040 --> 00:10:17,640 That's not the real experience of British people. 185 00:10:17,880 --> 00:10:20,280 And I think one of the things, and I think this is one of our 186 00:10:20,280 --> 00:10:24,120 big challenges, there is an, an absolute disconnect with 187 00:10:24,120 --> 00:10:27,840 people's lived experience. So that overwhelmingly people 188 00:10:27,840 --> 00:10:30,800 think their communities are safe and friendly and people get 189 00:10:30,800 --> 00:10:33,520 along. They like the diversity to what 190 00:10:33,520 --> 00:10:35,120 they think is happening on a national level. 191 00:10:35,160 --> 00:10:37,360 And that's obviously what they're getting through the 192 00:10:37,360 --> 00:10:39,760 media, social media and, and politicians. 193 00:10:40,800 --> 00:10:44,120 So I, I think that, you know, one of the things that both in 194 00:10:44,120 --> 00:10:47,160 the book and I've been arguing with politicians, you know, and 195 00:10:47,160 --> 00:10:50,880 particularly Labour stop running after the right wing media 196 00:10:51,360 --> 00:10:53,040 because that's not where the British public are. 197 00:10:53,360 --> 00:10:55,280 The British public want to central debate about 198 00:10:55,280 --> 00:10:57,800 immigration. They have some concerns, but 199 00:10:57,800 --> 00:11:01,000 they also see the benefits and they want immigration to work 200 00:11:01,000 --> 00:11:06,600 for Britain. And I I think that we need we we 201 00:11:06,640 --> 00:11:08,400 we lack the courage of conviction of some of our. 202 00:11:08,400 --> 00:11:09,520 But how? How do you do that? 203 00:11:09,520 --> 00:11:14,160 How do you address the concern without being accused of running 204 00:11:14,160 --> 00:11:18,080 after the rights? Well, I, I think partly it's by 205 00:11:19,400 --> 00:11:22,040 talking about the concerns in a broader context. 206 00:11:22,320 --> 00:11:24,520 The problem is at the moment, the whole narrative. 207 00:11:24,560 --> 00:11:26,320 I mean, I, I can't remember the exact figure. 208 00:11:26,320 --> 00:11:31,800 I think like 4% of people who arrive in this country come, 209 00:11:31,800 --> 00:11:34,400 come via small boats. I mean, it's a tiny proportion. 210 00:11:34,680 --> 00:11:39,440 And yet if you take the media or social media narrative, you'd 211 00:11:39,440 --> 00:11:42,480 think it's everything. And I think the problem is the 212 00:11:42,480 --> 00:11:46,800 politicians, they talk about the problems without also talking 213 00:11:46,800 --> 00:11:49,000 about the benefits. And I think that's where the 214 00:11:49,000 --> 00:11:51,440 British people are. Yes, they see problems and 215 00:11:51,440 --> 00:11:54,120 problems that need to be addressed, but they also think 216 00:11:54,120 --> 00:11:57,760 actually we have a duty, not just because of the law and 217 00:11:57,760 --> 00:12:01,400 international law, but as you know, part of British values is 218 00:12:01,400 --> 00:12:04,560 about looking after people. But also they see that a 219 00:12:05,280 --> 00:12:08,400 immigration has contributed to the society and also as a 220 00:12:08,400 --> 00:12:12,080 country with a the increasingly elderly population, we actually 221 00:12:12,080 --> 00:12:16,920 need immigrants as well. Well, yes, except having the 222 00:12:16,920 --> 00:12:19,480 thing that has changed there that the basic economic 223 00:12:19,480 --> 00:12:22,920 arguments for immigration, which was always that they contribute 224 00:12:22,920 --> 00:12:26,000 to growth. You look at all the OBR, you 225 00:12:26,000 --> 00:12:29,360 know, you know, growth predictions, it's all based on 226 00:12:29,360 --> 00:12:32,040 assuming a certain amount of immigration. 227 00:12:32,600 --> 00:12:37,240 The opponents of immigration now have, you know this, you know 228 00:12:37,240 --> 00:12:41,080 what they think is a sort of a sort of a hammer blow, which is 229 00:12:41,080 --> 00:12:45,240 per capita growth down. Yeah, but I mean, I, but I mean, 230 00:12:45,240 --> 00:12:48,400 I, I think also that we're in a situation where lots of people 231 00:12:48,400 --> 00:12:51,680 can't work, for example. So how can they be economically 232 00:12:51,680 --> 00:12:53,280 productive if they aren't allowed to work? 233 00:12:54,440 --> 00:12:57,360 So, you know, but I think it's more than just about economics. 234 00:12:57,360 --> 00:12:59,840 It's, it's about contribution to society as well. 235 00:13:00,200 --> 00:13:06,760 And I think that, you know, just the very fact that go anywhere 236 00:13:06,760 --> 00:13:09,040 in the world and people talk about Britain and they'll talk 237 00:13:09,040 --> 00:13:11,800 about the multiculturalism and warts and all, and there's 238 00:13:11,800 --> 00:13:14,520 always been problems, but warts and all, it's been a success 239 00:13:14,520 --> 00:13:17,720 story. But now, partly because of Tommy 240 00:13:17,720 --> 00:13:23,000 Robinson and his world and and that media ecosystem, the whole 241 00:13:24,000 --> 00:13:27,360 concept of a multicultural society is now questioned. 242 00:13:27,440 --> 00:13:29,840 Who is British? You know, you've now got 243 00:13:29,840 --> 00:13:33,280 genuine, you've got mainstream politicians or political 244 00:13:33,280 --> 00:13:36,560 commentators trying to say that people who were born here are 245 00:13:36,560 --> 00:13:39,760 not British because their grandparent parents or 246 00:13:39,760 --> 00:13:41,800 grandparents weren't, weren't, weren't born here. 247 00:13:41,800 --> 00:13:46,120 So I think that there is against all that. 248 00:13:46,120 --> 00:13:48,880 It's unsurprising that there's growing concern because people 249 00:13:48,880 --> 00:13:51,000 are feeling that this is a big problem. 250 00:13:52,040 --> 00:13:56,440 But actually, despite all that, the British public are still in 251 00:13:56,440 --> 00:13:58,640 a better place. I mean, we we focused a lot on 252 00:13:58,640 --> 00:14:01,400 reform for obvious reasons, but actually the Tommy Robinson end 253 00:14:01,800 --> 00:14:05,200 of the far right is really where you have spent, you know, your 254 00:14:05,200 --> 00:14:08,920 your life, you know, campaigning, fighting, you know, 255 00:14:09,840 --> 00:14:12,440 you know, literally sort of political St. battles. 256 00:14:12,520 --> 00:14:14,680 I don't mean fist fights, but I mean all of that happened some, 257 00:14:15,800 --> 00:14:18,320 but I mean that that's been sort of very on the streets kind of 258 00:14:18,320 --> 00:14:23,320 activism and things have changed quite dramatically, haven't 259 00:14:23,320 --> 00:14:25,160 they? As you say, in terms of the the 260 00:14:25,160 --> 00:14:29,560 mainstreaming of of a lot of these attitudes, The the book is 261 00:14:29,560 --> 00:14:34,360 sort of a very, very detailed account of how you fought 262 00:14:34,360 --> 00:14:37,720 campaign after campaign in in different areas. 263 00:14:40,040 --> 00:14:45,080 Do you think the battle has moved away from the streets and 264 00:14:45,080 --> 00:14:51,880 activism into online? It, it certainly shifted, but 265 00:14:51,880 --> 00:14:55,440 it's not moved away as in it's not happening there. 266 00:14:55,720 --> 00:14:57,920 And I think, I think The thing is, you know, and in a way, 267 00:14:57,920 --> 00:14:59,840 going back to your first question, there is no simple 268 00:14:59,840 --> 00:15:02,720 answer to anything. You know that there is clearly 269 00:15:02,720 --> 00:15:06,400 the Internet and the online space has transformed the 270 00:15:06,400 --> 00:15:10,080 fortunes of the far right. You know, not only when I first 271 00:15:10,080 --> 00:15:14,760 started in the late 80s, unless you literally knew someone who 272 00:15:14,760 --> 00:15:16,800 was in the fascist group, you could never join. 273 00:15:16,800 --> 00:15:19,640 There was no website, there was no office. 274 00:15:19,640 --> 00:15:22,160 You couldn't buy something in a, in a, in a shop. 275 00:15:22,160 --> 00:15:24,960 You had to know someone. It was a very violent world 276 00:15:24,960 --> 00:15:28,560 then. But I, I think and so, so the 277 00:15:28,560 --> 00:15:31,560 Internet and, and in a way, the far right have been much better 278 00:15:31,840 --> 00:15:34,760 at utilising new media platforms, partly because 279 00:15:34,760 --> 00:15:37,560 they've had to, because they've been taken off certain 280 00:15:37,560 --> 00:15:39,040 platforms, they've created their own. 281 00:15:39,240 --> 00:15:42,240 Partly you've got super rich people in the US literally 282 00:15:42,480 --> 00:15:44,400 providing them with, with platforms. 283 00:15:44,400 --> 00:15:48,360 But you know, there is this ecosystem now where 20 years 284 00:15:48,360 --> 00:15:51,680 ago, 30 years ago, there was literally a social and economic 285 00:15:51,680 --> 00:15:53,120 consequence. But for being a far right 286 00:15:53,120 --> 00:15:55,800 activist, you lost your job, you got shunned by your family and 287 00:15:55,800 --> 00:15:58,000 your friends. Now you earn a good living and 288 00:15:58,000 --> 00:16:01,440 buy a good living. I mean, Tommy Robinson where 289 00:16:01,440 --> 00:16:04,160 wherever his money goes directly into his bank account or to 290 00:16:04,320 --> 00:16:06,800 other accounts will earn millions every year. 291 00:16:07,240 --> 00:16:08,760 I mean, that's it. That is the scale. 292 00:16:08,960 --> 00:16:12,680 But I, you know, we, we cannot ignore the street as well. 293 00:16:12,680 --> 00:16:17,000 Because I think what we've seen over the summer with the rising 294 00:16:17,000 --> 00:16:20,720 rhetoric around hotels, the protests, the flags, which is a 295 00:16:20,720 --> 00:16:26,800 kind of driven by Tommy Robinson's gang, the consequence 296 00:16:26,800 --> 00:16:28,800 of that has been rising racism in society. 297 00:16:29,480 --> 00:16:34,120 Now I have many friends who are kind of British, Indian or 298 00:16:34,480 --> 00:16:36,440 British, British Muslims, whatever. 299 00:16:36,600 --> 00:16:40,320 They're all feeling scared. And they're people who probably 300 00:16:40,640 --> 00:16:42,960 haven't felt like that before. They heard stories from their 301 00:16:42,960 --> 00:16:45,080 parents, from their grandparents about the 70s. 302 00:16:45,440 --> 00:16:48,480 We haven't gone back to the racial violence of the 70s, but 303 00:16:48,480 --> 00:16:51,680 the atmosphere of intimidation, the atmosphere that you're not 304 00:16:51,680 --> 00:16:56,200 wanted, the confidence of the right is now palpable. 305 00:16:56,400 --> 00:16:59,240 And So what happens online happens offline. 306 00:16:59,560 --> 00:17:02,000 And that I would just give give you one example up in Burnley, 307 00:17:02,200 --> 00:17:04,920 done a lot of book work and I talked about Burnley a lot in in 308 00:17:04,920 --> 00:17:07,720 my book, there's this particular estate on the poorest 309 00:17:07,720 --> 00:17:11,560 communities in Britain. There was a weekend in August 310 00:17:11,560 --> 00:17:15,000 where on face, on the local Facebook groups, people are 311 00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:17,040 offering flags going to put these flags up. 312 00:17:17,040 --> 00:17:21,839 We've got 400 flags, put them up within 72 hours of the flags 313 00:17:21,839 --> 00:17:24,319 going up on lampposts. And one of the poorest estates 314 00:17:24,319 --> 00:17:27,400 in Burnley, one of the poorest estates in Britain, 6 houses 315 00:17:27,400 --> 00:17:30,880 were attacked. Now actually none of them had 316 00:17:30,880 --> 00:17:33,760 asylum seekers in, they were, they were people of colour. 317 00:17:33,760 --> 00:17:37,240 Sometimes it's it, it makes race couples live there. 318 00:17:37,560 --> 00:17:41,920 But that is the atmosphere that people who are racist and are 319 00:17:41,920 --> 00:17:45,480 violent are feeling encouraged. And the rise of intimidation, 320 00:17:45,720 --> 00:17:48,680 the rise of threats. The other thing that we've seen 321 00:17:48,680 --> 00:17:52,120 this summer is a coordinated attempt by the far right to 322 00:17:52,120 --> 00:17:55,920 harass, bully, threaten people in the progressive world, 323 00:17:55,920 --> 00:17:57,920 particularly in the volunteer charity sector. 324 00:17:58,240 --> 00:18:01,840 So I think that, you know, online, offline, it's all 325 00:18:01,840 --> 00:18:03,840 connected and we have to fight on every level. 326 00:18:03,840 --> 00:18:07,240 Just on flags, I mean, what's your understanding of of how the 327 00:18:07,240 --> 00:18:09,480 flags have happened? Who's funded it? 328 00:18:09,600 --> 00:18:11,880 Who's been doing it? What's really going? 329 00:18:11,880 --> 00:18:16,480 On so there is a small group based up in the Oldbury, 330 00:18:16,480 --> 00:18:20,560 Birmingham, Snevik area, a group of Tommy Robinson supporters, 331 00:18:20,560 --> 00:18:22,920 some of the people really closely aligned to him, some of 332 00:18:22,920 --> 00:18:25,040 the people who who are part of his security team. 333 00:18:25,360 --> 00:18:28,880 They were the original people behind Ray Rays the colour. 334 00:18:29,160 --> 00:18:33,800 So the the the X account that's it's run by them the the 335 00:18:33,800 --> 00:18:36,120 promotion, the fundraising to do flags. 336 00:18:36,400 --> 00:18:41,520 Obviously it it, it kind of expanded out and both networks 337 00:18:41,520 --> 00:18:43,480 and individuals started putting out flags. 338 00:18:43,480 --> 00:18:47,960 But the point of it was for those people organizing, it was 339 00:18:47,960 --> 00:18:52,640 about trying to assert an aggressive identity. 340 00:18:52,920 --> 00:18:56,920 Those people, I mean, like one of the main people behind it has 341 00:18:56,960 --> 00:18:59,640 a conviction for his part in a racist manslaughter. 342 00:19:00,240 --> 00:19:02,640 You know, these aren't just ordinary people who just feel 343 00:19:02,640 --> 00:19:05,320 proud of their country. There is a political point to 344 00:19:05,320 --> 00:19:05,880 it. They are so. 345 00:19:05,880 --> 00:19:08,280 There's a massive naivety in mainstream media around this, 346 00:19:08,280 --> 00:19:09,800 isn't there? Because, because it, you know, 347 00:19:09,920 --> 00:19:12,280 because you know, it goes way beyond that group. 348 00:19:12,560 --> 00:19:15,000 Ordinary people start putting up flags as well because they think 349 00:19:15,000 --> 00:19:17,320 it's a good idea. Newspaper columnists start 350 00:19:17,320 --> 00:19:19,760 saying, well, why shouldn't we be proud of our country? 351 00:19:19,760 --> 00:19:21,440 Genrich runs around with his set bladder. 352 00:19:21,440 --> 00:19:23,800 And it and it and it and it and it becomes one of these things. 353 00:19:23,800 --> 00:19:25,760 Well, well, who? Who doesn't want to fly a flag? 354 00:19:27,200 --> 00:19:29,760 Where, where, where in where? In fact, what you're saying is 355 00:19:30,040 --> 00:19:34,120 there is actually quite an organized and deliberate 356 00:19:34,560 --> 00:19:36,880 campaign with a name. Yeah, totally. 357 00:19:37,120 --> 00:19:41,240 And and it's all about, you know, probably predicting how 358 00:19:41,240 --> 00:19:43,840 people will react to it. Some people will take it down. 359 00:19:43,840 --> 00:19:45,960 That causes conflict. People get angry. 360 00:19:46,400 --> 00:19:50,560 But also it's that kind of it was all part of the summer about 361 00:19:50,600 --> 00:19:55,000 reasserting our identity as in quite a defined thing of what 362 00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:57,920 Englishness is. Now, obviously they would say 363 00:19:57,920 --> 00:19:59,680 they're not and anyone can be English. 364 00:19:59,960 --> 00:20:03,440 But actually, you know, for them, not everyone can be 365 00:20:03,440 --> 00:20:05,760 English. And it's the same people who 366 00:20:05,760 --> 00:20:08,840 were who've been behind raised the flags, who have recently 367 00:20:08,840 --> 00:20:12,880 been in France trying to, you know, stop dingies who you know, 368 00:20:12,880 --> 00:20:16,600 who doing all that. So it is a coordinated group or 369 00:20:16,640 --> 00:20:21,200 a small group of very political people who are Tommy Robinson 370 00:20:21,200 --> 00:20:23,920 security team. Now the the international links 371 00:20:23,920 --> 00:20:24,960 are also interesting, aren't they? 372 00:20:24,960 --> 00:20:30,360 Because, again, they are much more organized now, and much 373 00:20:30,360 --> 00:20:34,040 better funded and much more linked than most people would 374 00:20:34,040 --> 00:20:36,200 ever have imagined. Well, I mean, it's one of the 375 00:20:36,200 --> 00:20:39,520 strange irony is because the kind of left historically always 376 00:20:39,520 --> 00:20:42,160 seen themselves as the internationalists and, you know, 377 00:20:42,480 --> 00:20:44,360 care about this struggle or that struggle. 378 00:20:44,840 --> 00:20:49,080 And yet it is the right who are much more internationally 379 00:20:49,080 --> 00:20:52,240 linked. But both in terms of ideas, in 380 00:20:52,240 --> 00:20:54,560 terms of people, and increasingly in terms of money. 381 00:20:54,840 --> 00:20:57,040 One of the things that we've been seeing, and not just about 382 00:20:57,040 --> 00:21:00,680 Elon Musk, but one of the things that we've been seeing, let's 383 00:21:00,680 --> 00:21:03,360 say on the kind of extreme right of the kind of Christian world, 384 00:21:03,680 --> 00:21:07,760 literally millions are coming in from the US now to push social 385 00:21:07,760 --> 00:21:11,120 conservative agendas. And, and what we're seeing, 386 00:21:11,120 --> 00:21:13,400 particularly in the Catholic Church, the rise of what we call 387 00:21:13,400 --> 00:21:15,800 post liberalism. So it's the ideas around JD 388 00:21:15,800 --> 00:21:21,000 Vance which coincides with some of the kind of anti Muslim 389 00:21:21,000 --> 00:21:23,320 rhetoric of Tommy Robinson, that there is a clash of 390 00:21:23,320 --> 00:21:26,840 civilizations happening and that people can't be together because 391 00:21:26,840 --> 00:21:29,600 Islam is a supremacist religion etcetera. 392 00:21:29,840 --> 00:21:32,720 And that causing it all is liberalism. 393 00:21:32,960 --> 00:21:35,480 Soft liberals who like immigration and multicultural. 394 00:21:35,480 --> 00:21:37,960 Who are naive about? Exactly, exactly. 395 00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:41,320 So you know, what we're also seeing is converging of 396 00:21:41,600 --> 00:21:46,800 religious, political kind of views. 397 00:21:46,960 --> 00:21:49,880 And I think the other thing that's completely different, I 398 00:21:49,880 --> 00:21:53,000 I've been around long enough, I remember, I remember the day of 399 00:21:53,000 --> 00:21:56,040 the Oldham riots in 2001. I was in Oldham on that day 400 00:21:57,360 --> 00:22:01,240 following this kind of gang, this far right gang, Combat 18, 401 00:22:01,240 --> 00:22:04,480 who had linked up with hooligans who were trying to instigate all 402 00:22:04,480 --> 00:22:08,800 day long, trying to instigate. Police stood down 5 PMA few 3 403 00:22:09,240 --> 00:22:11,920 taxi loads ran down the street attacking agents in the house. 404 00:22:12,040 --> 00:22:13,480 That triggered the riots in Oldham. 405 00:22:14,000 --> 00:22:18,080 But see, back in those days people saw everything on a very 406 00:22:18,080 --> 00:22:20,560 local basis. It was a gang thing in Oldham as 407 00:22:20,560 --> 00:22:22,320 well. It was about drugs, it was about 408 00:22:22,320 --> 00:22:25,960 whatever us, our area of town against your area town, they 409 00:22:25,960 --> 00:22:28,760 would put out the call on what they had those days, bulletin 410 00:22:28,760 --> 00:22:30,800 boards. Come and join us, come and join 411 00:22:30,800 --> 00:22:32,560 us. No one ever did because it was 412 00:22:32,560 --> 00:22:37,480 an Oldham problem. Whereas now people all over the 413 00:22:37,480 --> 00:22:40,080 country, all over the world see themselves as part of the same 414 00:22:40,080 --> 00:22:43,800 cause and they will rise up as part of the same call and travel 415 00:22:44,040 --> 00:22:46,760 and travel. And you know, and we see that we 416 00:22:46,760 --> 00:22:49,920 see this internationally. So they are, you know, they, 417 00:22:49,960 --> 00:22:53,160 they don't read all the kind of, you know, the theoretical texts 418 00:22:53,160 --> 00:22:55,960 of post liberalism or whatever. But like the the Civil War 419 00:22:55,960 --> 00:23:00,280 theory, which is now just everywhere on the right and the 420 00:23:00,280 --> 00:23:03,240 Telegraph right articles is civil war coming, etcetera. 421 00:23:03,800 --> 00:23:07,280 You know, 2020 odd years ago, these were just a handful of 422 00:23:07,280 --> 00:23:10,360 people in the anti Muslim world who talk about civil war. 423 00:23:10,840 --> 00:23:13,400 And now it's just commonplace. Now people don't know the kind 424 00:23:13,400 --> 00:23:16,160 of they'll take bits of it and translate it to their daily 425 00:23:16,160 --> 00:23:18,520 lives. Why is this your fight? 426 00:23:20,360 --> 00:23:24,000 Part, well a large part of it was because my own upbringing. 427 00:23:24,280 --> 00:23:28,360 So my mum came to Britain from Mauritius in 1961. 428 00:23:29,480 --> 00:23:31,520 What's her ethnicity then? Mixed. 429 00:23:32,200 --> 00:23:36,320 So there's her mum's side of the family came from the Creole 430 00:23:36,320 --> 00:23:40,040 slaves and her dad's side of the family came from the French and 431 00:23:40,040 --> 00:23:43,040 it was mixed. But of course in you know, and 432 00:23:43,040 --> 00:23:48,920 she's in the 1970s. I grew up in Hounslow, W London 433 00:23:49,480 --> 00:23:52,920 and obviously I mean back then it was a very white place, but 434 00:23:52,920 --> 00:23:55,040 the National Front were on the March and I was, I grew up in a 435 00:23:55,040 --> 00:23:57,160 kind of political house. We'd all watch the news together 436 00:23:58,240 --> 00:24:03,600 and even as a kid and I remember seeing the National Front part 437 00:24:03,600 --> 00:24:07,000 of the political broadcast, John Tyndall, the National Front 438 00:24:07,000 --> 00:24:09,640 leader. And I had no idea how big or 439 00:24:09,640 --> 00:24:15,840 small they were saying that all people who weren't born in 440 00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:17,480 Britain will be sent back in six months. 441 00:24:18,240 --> 00:24:20,320 And I was petrified. I was petrified. 442 00:24:20,320 --> 00:24:24,160 And they say I had no idea they would get 1% of the vote, but I 443 00:24:24,160 --> 00:24:26,160 just heard this bloke say it. My mom was going to get sent 444 00:24:26,160 --> 00:24:28,240 home. I then we then moved to 445 00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:30,600 Shrewsbury, which was again an even whiter area. 446 00:24:31,160 --> 00:24:34,960 And you know, in the early 80s there was racism in the football 447 00:24:34,960 --> 00:24:37,040 grounds, there was racism on the streets. 448 00:24:37,040 --> 00:24:43,680 The British movement were around and I was always, you know, I'm 449 00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:47,520 not dark and I've never kind of experienced the racism of some 450 00:24:47,520 --> 00:24:50,920 of my friends and some of my family or whatever, but I was 451 00:24:50,920 --> 00:24:53,480 always really conscious of it. And so when I got involved in 452 00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:56,360 politics in the mid 80s, anti apartheid movement, I used to 453 00:24:56,360 --> 00:25:00,400 hitchhike down to London to join anti apartheid at 15-16 years 454 00:25:00,400 --> 00:25:03,120 old, anti apartheid activities in London. 455 00:25:03,120 --> 00:25:04,960 Then there was a minor strike, Red Wedge. 456 00:25:05,600 --> 00:25:09,640 I got involved in politics but anti racism and anti fascism was 457 00:25:09,640 --> 00:25:11,720 always a thing I gravitated towards and. 458 00:25:11,840 --> 00:25:14,480 I think people don't, people don't realize what it was like 459 00:25:14,760 --> 00:25:17,800 in the 70s and 80s. I mean, I, I grew up a few miles 460 00:25:17,800 --> 00:25:22,200 outside Burnley. I, I wouldn't go into Burnley on 461 00:25:22,200 --> 00:25:27,600 a Saturday if I could avoid it. Or, you know, we'd stay well 462 00:25:27,600 --> 00:25:30,880 away from the football crowd. I mean, and I, you know, I mean, 463 00:25:30,880 --> 00:25:32,800 now I've got season tickets to my local club. 464 00:25:32,800 --> 00:25:35,880 I mean, the idea of actually going to the football for a 465 00:25:35,880 --> 00:25:40,560 young brown boy was inconceivable. 466 00:25:40,680 --> 00:25:42,520 Well, and, and The thing is as well, yeah, because 467 00:25:43,160 --> 00:25:45,480 understandably, people talk about the racial violence, but 468 00:25:46,680 --> 00:25:49,560 it's the impact it had on everyone, you know what I mean, 469 00:25:49,560 --> 00:25:53,000 of people of color, the fear and as you, I mean, even Shrewsbury. 470 00:25:53,000 --> 00:25:57,480 I mean, you know, Shrewsbury is a polite market town, but I 471 00:25:57,480 --> 00:26:01,120 remember going to football in the early 80s and you know, and 472 00:26:01,160 --> 00:26:05,400 again, it might have only been 20 or 30 people, but it was in 473 00:26:05,400 --> 00:26:09,000 the main kind of shed end of, of Shrewsbury ground would sing 474 00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:11,880 racist songs, vile, vile racist songs actually were. 475 00:26:12,040 --> 00:26:14,720 I'm a Leeds fan myself. I mean, Leeds have got its own 476 00:26:14,720 --> 00:26:18,240 history of racism. But I mean, again, it wasn't a 477 00:26:18,320 --> 00:26:21,920 lot of people, but there's no people of colour there. 478 00:26:22,360 --> 00:26:25,080 And you know, it, it, it was frightening. 479 00:26:25,080 --> 00:26:28,200 And I, I, I think that of course, we've not gone back to 480 00:26:28,200 --> 00:26:31,960 that, that level and Britain has changed massively since then. 481 00:26:32,400 --> 00:26:38,880 But over the last six months I have spoken to and I've, I hear 482 00:26:38,880 --> 00:26:42,960 stories, people are feeling scared again now and people are 483 00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:47,440 feeling less confident about going out on their own or going 484 00:26:47,440 --> 00:26:49,480 out in the evening. And even the flags I've got, 485 00:26:49,480 --> 00:26:54,080 I've got a friend, early 30s, works in the city, not 486 00:26:54,080 --> 00:26:56,360 necessarily interested in politics, family friend. 487 00:26:57,200 --> 00:27:02,440 And she had, she comes from a British Indian background. 11 488 00:27:02,440 --> 00:27:04,720 morning, she woke up to see a flag outside, literally outside 489 00:27:04,720 --> 00:27:07,320 the house in the lamp post. And she felt scared. 490 00:27:07,480 --> 00:27:09,200 She's a professional. You know what I mean? 491 00:27:09,200 --> 00:27:13,080 Who, whose life and who you know, racism is just not part of 492 00:27:13,080 --> 00:27:14,680 her life. Racism is something her parents 493 00:27:14,680 --> 00:27:17,280 told her about. And suddenly she just felt 494 00:27:17,280 --> 00:27:19,760 intimidated. Isn't the other thing that has 495 00:27:19,760 --> 00:27:25,640 shifted, though, that, you know, racism is, is very different. 496 00:27:25,640 --> 00:27:29,920 You know, it distinguishes now between racial groups and some 497 00:27:29,920 --> 00:27:35,240 racial groups are OK, you know, with some racists, you know, 498 00:27:35,240 --> 00:27:41,600 there, there's a lot of anti Pakistani feeling, a lot less 499 00:27:41,600 --> 00:27:48,160 anti Indian feeling because it's tied up with anti Muslim hatred. 500 00:27:49,000 --> 00:27:53,040 And Indians are sometimes bizarrely seen as allies. 501 00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:56,000 You know, I in fact, it's also works the other way. 502 00:27:56,000 --> 00:27:58,720 I've been in India and people have come up to me and talked to 503 00:27:58,720 --> 00:28:02,640 me about their support for Tommy Robinson because he's anti 504 00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:05,360 Muslim in their eyes and they they were Hindus and were 505 00:28:05,360 --> 00:28:08,240 therefore also anti Muslim. So there are weird alliances 506 00:28:08,240 --> 00:28:09,600 being set up as well. Aren't they? 507 00:28:09,640 --> 00:28:11,880 There are. And I also think it's reflective 508 00:28:11,880 --> 00:28:14,200 that and this is something that's gone, I think kind of 509 00:28:14,200 --> 00:28:16,880 largely unnoticed in the political world, the rise in 510 00:28:16,880 --> 00:28:19,920 faith identity, which is now playing out in politics. 511 00:28:20,560 --> 00:28:23,400 So it's increasingly playing out in how people vote as well. 512 00:28:23,560 --> 00:28:27,840 So there has been partly partly in terms of the Hindu community, 513 00:28:27,840 --> 00:28:32,200 partly because of Modi in and you know that rise of kind of 514 00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:38,200 Hindu nationalism, you've had growing conflict or tensions 515 00:28:38,200 --> 00:28:41,280 between Hindu and Muslim communities, between Sikh and 516 00:28:41,280 --> 00:28:43,640 Hindu communities. So it's working on these 517 00:28:43,640 --> 00:28:46,280 different ways. And obviously that's been Co 518 00:28:46,280 --> 00:28:49,880 opted by people like Tommy Robinson say these are our 519 00:28:49,880 --> 00:28:52,960 friends, these are our enemies. But what I'd also say though, 520 00:28:52,960 --> 00:29:00,400 that amongst I say, general racists, a black person is a 521 00:29:00,400 --> 00:29:02,560 black person, a brown person is a brown person. 522 00:29:02,600 --> 00:29:03,800 You know, they don't always make that. 523 00:29:03,960 --> 00:29:06,120 They, they might say, oh, well, they're not so bad. 524 00:29:06,120 --> 00:29:10,480 But actually, you know, how many, how many British Indian 525 00:29:10,480 --> 00:29:13,080 people are getting abused and feeling scared now because of 526 00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:15,680 the situation? So I, I, I think that, I mean, 527 00:29:15,680 --> 00:29:18,840 you know, so you know, the whole debate is Rishi Sonnet British, 528 00:29:19,640 --> 00:29:21,960 you know what I mean? So, so yes, I agree with you. 529 00:29:21,960 --> 00:29:25,280 There has been that splintering of communities. 530 00:29:25,280 --> 00:29:28,360 And and also is that is that also a splintering of allyship 531 00:29:28,920 --> 00:29:32,480 between different groups because, you know, as as woke 532 00:29:32,720 --> 00:29:37,800 ISM has been undermined and sort of disrupted over the last few 533 00:29:37,800 --> 00:29:41,360 years, different groups being picked off on them. 534 00:29:41,480 --> 00:29:43,760 Yeah, no, totally. Both different groups have been 535 00:29:43,760 --> 00:29:47,440 picked off and also groups are trying to avoid being caught up 536 00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:49,400 in something. You know, so for example, let's 537 00:29:49,400 --> 00:29:56,280 say the whole grooming situation, I, I remember this. 538 00:29:56,280 --> 00:30:00,000 So this is going back probably certainly to Rotherham. 539 00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:02,080 I think it before, I think it was before. 540 00:30:02,320 --> 00:30:04,680 But you know, so for example, the, you know, when the I member 541 00:30:04,680 --> 00:30:06,600 of press release, one of the main Hindu community 542 00:30:06,600 --> 00:30:09,760 organizations, this, you know, we're attacking the media for 543 00:30:09,760 --> 00:30:11,240 saying Asians. So it's not Asians, it's 544 00:30:11,240 --> 00:30:13,840 Muslims. Then you had the Bengalis and 545 00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:16,360 East London put out statement. It's not us, it's them. 546 00:30:16,680 --> 00:30:20,280 So there's some of that. But I I also think that this is 547 00:30:20,280 --> 00:30:25,440 a long term consequence of in the in the 1970s, that was a, 548 00:30:25,680 --> 00:30:30,160 you know, a big movement, kind of quite a secular cross faith 549 00:30:30,160 --> 00:30:34,640 movement about blackness and the youth, Asian youth movements, 550 00:30:34,640 --> 00:30:39,000 things like that. That class came before race and 551 00:30:39,000 --> 00:30:47,120 religion, and that collapsed in the 1980s, partly because of 552 00:30:47,600 --> 00:30:49,920 youth unemployment and the collapse of kind of, you know, 553 00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:52,800 of Thatcherism. It also collapsed as a 554 00:30:52,800 --> 00:30:56,200 consequence of religious communities because they were 555 00:30:56,200 --> 00:30:59,560 losing their young people, you know, so there's, I think what 556 00:30:59,560 --> 00:31:02,800 we're seeing now is also a consequence of 20-30 years of 557 00:31:03,040 --> 00:31:05,720 kind of religious communities trying to reassert their 558 00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:08,000 identity on, on their communities as well. 559 00:31:08,360 --> 00:31:10,520 You are very critical though of your own side and of 560 00:31:10,520 --> 00:31:14,200 progressives on some of these key issues and, and and the 561 00:31:14,200 --> 00:31:18,840 grooming gangs is is one that you really go into in the book 562 00:31:18,880 --> 00:31:22,000 and you say that the progressives got this wrong, 563 00:31:22,000 --> 00:31:25,680 but. I mean, I think, I think one of 564 00:31:25,680 --> 00:31:28,560 one of the key things that underpins, I think my own 565 00:31:28,560 --> 00:31:30,120 thinking is that we've got to be humble. 566 00:31:30,440 --> 00:31:32,680 We're losing if we have an understand. 567 00:31:32,680 --> 00:31:35,560 So if we're losing, obviously what we're doing is sometimes 568 00:31:35,560 --> 00:31:40,640 wrong. On the grooming thing, I can, I 569 00:31:40,640 --> 00:31:42,960 get really frustrated because I cannot understand how we got 570 00:31:42,960 --> 00:31:46,320 ourselves into the situation. And I look at Labour, how Labour 571 00:31:46,320 --> 00:31:47,760 got themselves into the situation. 572 00:31:48,160 --> 00:31:52,080 To me it's quite simple. Grooming and sexual exploitation 573 00:31:52,080 --> 00:31:57,440 is wrong whoever's doing it, and we need to think of the survivor 574 00:31:57,440 --> 00:31:59,520 and victim first and work out from there. 575 00:32:00,120 --> 00:32:05,560 I think that generally the the left generally has been poor at 576 00:32:05,560 --> 00:32:10,320 it, wherever that's been, councils and councillors not 577 00:32:10,320 --> 00:32:15,880 taking a grip of the situation, wherever that's how we become so 578 00:32:15,880 --> 00:32:18,840 defensive about all this will be used by the far right or 579 00:32:18,840 --> 00:32:21,080 whatever. We forget about the people 580 00:32:21,080 --> 00:32:26,400 who've been abused. And I think that clearly there 581 00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:29,360 are, there have been some issues in areas about nighttime 582 00:32:29,360 --> 00:32:32,920 economies or, you know, vulnerable women. 583 00:32:32,920 --> 00:32:35,440 I mean, many of the people who've been abused are 584 00:32:35,440 --> 00:32:37,600 vulnerable people. The police haven't believed them 585 00:32:37,600 --> 00:32:39,840 because, you know, a lot of them are in care. 586 00:32:39,840 --> 00:32:41,760 They, you know, they don't have stable homes. 587 00:32:41,760 --> 00:32:43,560 So people kind of keep an eye out for them. 588 00:32:43,560 --> 00:32:46,160 They might be involved in petty crime or whatever. 589 00:32:46,160 --> 00:32:50,280 Their stories aren't believed. And I just think that our 590 00:32:50,280 --> 00:32:56,480 failure to tackle it and then is one thing, and then our kind of 591 00:32:56,480 --> 00:33:02,160 demonization or being so scared to address it because, oh, 592 00:33:02,480 --> 00:33:06,160 you're then racist or you're feeding racist narratives has 593 00:33:06,160 --> 00:33:08,440 made the situation worse. And I think we're now in a 594 00:33:08,440 --> 00:33:12,160 situation where in certain communities, it's now a toxic 595 00:33:12,160 --> 00:33:14,440 issue. And we've allowed that to 596 00:33:14,440 --> 00:33:16,560 happen. And I in the book I give an 597 00:33:16,560 --> 00:33:20,040 example which to me was a really vivid example in Rotherham. 598 00:33:21,080 --> 00:33:26,840 So in, in 2014 to 2016 period, there's I think 15 far right 599 00:33:26,840 --> 00:33:29,800 demonstrations in Rotherham. Anyway, there was, there was 1 600 00:33:29,800 --> 00:33:33,600 demonstration that there was some former miners, Maltby 7 601 00:33:33,600 --> 00:33:36,680 miles out of Rotherham. And they were angry, They 602 00:33:36,680 --> 00:33:38,400 weren't angry at the Muslim community, they were angry at 603 00:33:38,400 --> 00:33:42,920 the council, their Labour Party. Now these are people who'd gone 604 00:33:42,920 --> 00:33:46,840 solidly on strike for a year. They were good people, they had 605 00:33:47,040 --> 00:33:52,600 joined with us fighting against the BNP in Maltby but they were 606 00:33:52,600 --> 00:33:53,960 so angry. They wanted to show their 607 00:33:53,960 --> 00:33:56,600 opposition to what the council their the inaction of the 608 00:33:56,600 --> 00:34:00,240 council and the police but they didn't want to join the EDL so 609 00:34:00,360 --> 00:34:02,880 they took a coach and this you know, this is the mindset 7 610 00:34:02,880 --> 00:34:07,080 miles they get coach in to Rotherham and they March at the 611 00:34:07,080 --> 00:34:09,920 back with a distance with the EDL because they don't want to 612 00:34:09,920 --> 00:34:12,400 be the EDL. And they were walking through 613 00:34:12,400 --> 00:34:18,159 the streets, men and women, local people to be shouted and 614 00:34:18,159 --> 00:34:22,400 called racist scum and Nazi scum by protesters who probably 615 00:34:22,400 --> 00:34:25,840 weren't from Rotherham. And they were so angry at this 616 00:34:26,080 --> 00:34:29,360 they thought if that's what you think about us, well sod you. 617 00:34:29,719 --> 00:34:31,560 And they quickened up and joined the protest. 618 00:34:31,560 --> 00:34:32,960 So they were pushed, pushed into the. 619 00:34:33,120 --> 00:34:34,679 Yeah. And we spoke to them after 620 00:34:34,679 --> 00:34:37,480 because we, we, I mean, I, I wouldn't let, I mean, we, we 621 00:34:37,480 --> 00:34:40,000 don't do those kind of counter counter protests or whatever. 622 00:34:40,000 --> 00:34:42,360 But we heard about them being on the demo and stuff. 623 00:34:42,360 --> 00:34:44,800 And we spoke to them a few days later. 624 00:34:44,800 --> 00:34:47,520 We met up with some of them and we just said, look, why, why? 625 00:34:47,520 --> 00:34:50,639 You know, they're going, yeah, but this is your, your, as in 626 00:34:50,639 --> 00:34:53,560 the left's fault because you've a, you failed to deal with the 627 00:34:53,560 --> 00:34:55,560 issue. And then you just shout at us 628 00:34:56,120 --> 00:34:58,920 and we're not racist and we're not Nazi, but you've told us we 629 00:34:58,920 --> 00:35:00,280 are. And you've done nothing to 630 00:35:00,280 --> 00:35:01,520 protect our kids. So how? 631 00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:08,360 How should anti racists on the left approach this new demand to 632 00:35:08,360 --> 00:35:11,520 look at whether particular communities, particular 633 00:35:11,520 --> 00:35:17,080 religions, Muslim Pakistanis on the whole, whether there is any 634 00:35:17,080 --> 00:35:22,760 specific problem culturally or socially, that means they've got 635 00:35:22,760 --> 00:35:26,200 a bigger problem, bigger issue with grooming than any other 636 00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:28,200 social or racial or religious group? 637 00:35:28,560 --> 00:35:32,080 Well, I mean, I, I, I so in the book I support an inquiry. 638 00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:36,920 Now, when I the 1st, when I wrote the book before it got 639 00:35:36,920 --> 00:35:39,640 kind of finally edited, the Labour government hadn't 640 00:35:39,640 --> 00:35:43,080 approved the, the inquiry and I was condemning him for doing 641 00:35:43,080 --> 00:35:45,280 that. What I'd say is we need that 642 00:35:45,280 --> 00:35:48,760 inquiry to happen and it needs to be as thorough and detailed 643 00:35:48,760 --> 00:35:51,040 as possible because we're in that situation that anything 644 00:35:51,040 --> 00:35:55,360 less will this, this will still continue to, to kind of dog us. 645 00:35:55,680 --> 00:35:59,080 But what I'd also say is that we also need to understand that on 646 00:35:59,080 --> 00:36:02,240 street grooming by gangs, which is the particular type we're 647 00:36:02,240 --> 00:36:06,760 talking about here, is one form of grooming, one form of child 648 00:36:06,880 --> 00:36:10,800 sexual exploitation. And I think that we need, but 649 00:36:10,800 --> 00:36:14,600 rather than hiding behind that because some people do, oh look, 650 00:36:14,600 --> 00:36:18,600 you know, what about the 89% of white people or whatever, fine. 651 00:36:19,080 --> 00:36:23,920 But we need to be proactive and say we need to understand all 652 00:36:23,920 --> 00:36:26,280 forms of child sexual exploitation. 653 00:36:26,920 --> 00:36:30,640 And I personally don't believe it is religious. 654 00:36:31,320 --> 00:36:37,160 I think it's about opportunity. It's about, well, just in the, 655 00:36:37,240 --> 00:36:40,360 in the sense of, you know, what's the nighttime economy, 656 00:36:40,360 --> 00:36:42,360 you know what I mean? It's about opportunity, people 657 00:36:42,360 --> 00:36:45,400 on the streets, people, you know, and of course they then 658 00:36:45,400 --> 00:36:47,240 they become criminal gangs or whatever. 659 00:36:47,440 --> 00:36:49,960 But of course there are other groups who do this as well, 660 00:36:49,960 --> 00:36:52,080 maybe in different formats. And we we also have to 661 00:36:52,080 --> 00:36:54,960 understand that, you know, look at the church over the years, 662 00:36:54,960 --> 00:36:56,320 look at the scouts, look at, you know, and. 663 00:36:56,320 --> 00:36:59,440 There was a very big white working class gang recently. 664 00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:01,080 Recently convicted as well. Exactly. 665 00:37:01,320 --> 00:37:04,000 But I mean, we can't dodge. We can't dodge. 666 00:37:04,120 --> 00:37:06,640 We can't large somebody's difficult issues. 667 00:37:06,640 --> 00:37:08,560 Exactly. And, and, but aren't we also, 668 00:37:08,880 --> 00:37:14,000 you know, being a bit silly in a way in that, in that if I go to 669 00:37:14,360 --> 00:37:16,840 Afghanistan, as I have done and made a, made a film about 670 00:37:16,840 --> 00:37:20,440 violence against women and said there is a huge cultural problem 671 00:37:20,440 --> 00:37:24,560 here, you know, in which, you know, young women are being 672 00:37:24,560 --> 00:37:27,080 effectively forced into marriages or abused, you know, 673 00:37:27,080 --> 00:37:30,360 by relatives. And, and, and everybody says, 674 00:37:30,360 --> 00:37:32,280 well, this is, you know, this is, you know, amazing 675 00:37:32,280 --> 00:37:35,280 revelation, well done, You know, and then we we don't go, oh, but 676 00:37:35,560 --> 00:37:39,160 there might be a problem in this country with similar sorts of 677 00:37:39,160 --> 00:37:40,960 people. And so I mean, again, in my 678 00:37:40,960 --> 00:37:43,040 book, I talk about, I think I talk about. 679 00:37:43,560 --> 00:37:48,360 So I, I came across this issue first in 2004 up in Keighley. 680 00:37:48,560 --> 00:37:51,040 So there's a Channel 4 edge of the City series which was 681 00:37:51,040 --> 00:37:55,600 following social Bradford social services and there was 1 episode 682 00:37:55,600 --> 00:37:59,080 about grooming. And at the time it was running 683 00:37:59,080 --> 00:38:01,720 up to the European elections, all out local elections. 684 00:38:02,120 --> 00:38:06,240 And there was a demand which then got accepted that Channel 4 685 00:38:06,240 --> 00:38:09,000 should push back the broadcasting of the program to 686 00:38:09,000 --> 00:38:10,840 after. So following that, we knew Nick 687 00:38:10,840 --> 00:38:12,360 Griffin was going to stand in Keithley. 688 00:38:12,840 --> 00:38:16,440 And I went and met Angela Sinfield, one of the women who 689 00:38:16,440 --> 00:38:18,200 had made a Channel 4 documentary. 690 00:38:18,200 --> 00:38:22,320 And her daughter and her daughter had been when she was 691 00:38:22,320 --> 00:38:28,440 12 years old, had been abused by 29 men, most of them related to 692 00:38:28,440 --> 00:38:30,760 each other. So she got passed around. 693 00:38:32,040 --> 00:38:37,760 And she was 16 when I met her. And she had only recently, her 694 00:38:37,760 --> 00:38:39,400 relationship with her mom had only recently come back 695 00:38:39,400 --> 00:38:42,000 together. But there were real issues here. 696 00:38:42,400 --> 00:38:46,760 And their issues, not just in terms of the abusers, but there 697 00:38:46,760 --> 00:38:50,520 are also issues in the sense of our communities doing enough. 698 00:38:51,040 --> 00:38:53,240 You know, they've been stories in the media, some of these 699 00:38:53,240 --> 00:38:56,960 trials about, you know, a man in his late 60s driving around, 700 00:38:57,400 --> 00:39:00,160 openly driving around with his 13 year old white girlfriend. 701 00:39:00,160 --> 00:39:02,640 And it's like people say this sort of thing. 702 00:39:02,720 --> 00:39:03,920 No one's doing anything. About it. 703 00:39:04,120 --> 00:39:06,360 And, and, and I kind of feel that maybe we're in the 704 00:39:06,360 --> 00:39:08,480 situation where other communities were in maybe in the 705 00:39:08,480 --> 00:39:12,560 1970s where we not that we turned a blind eye, but we 706 00:39:12,560 --> 00:39:14,320 didn't really think about it in that context. 707 00:39:14,320 --> 00:39:17,360 So I think there is some there's some really difficult issues 708 00:39:17,360 --> 00:39:20,200 that that we have to have to address and we can't dodge them 709 00:39:20,200 --> 00:39:22,000 because it would just haunt us forever. 710 00:39:22,040 --> 00:39:25,320 And and similarly when it comes to extremist violence and and 711 00:39:26,080 --> 00:39:28,960 and, and radical Islamist philosophy. 712 00:39:29,480 --> 00:39:32,400 Yeah. Look, I mean, I think that 713 00:39:32,400 --> 00:39:37,720 sometimes, sometimes we can forget our values and our values 714 00:39:37,720 --> 00:39:43,360 have to be consistent. So for example, you know the 715 00:39:43,360 --> 00:39:47,320 English Defence League, you know clearly much of the left would 716 00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:49,640 be energized and come out against English Defence League 717 00:39:50,800 --> 00:39:53,920 and let's say Luton. But of course the other side of 718 00:39:53,920 --> 00:39:57,880 the equation is Al Majaroon and the harassment they were 719 00:39:57,880 --> 00:40:00,120 causing. People forget, I mean there was 720 00:40:00,120 --> 00:40:02,560 a terrorism as well, but what they were doing in Luton as well 721 00:40:03,040 --> 00:40:05,080 and actually they were part of the problem as well. 722 00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:09,960 And it's like how could we go and win support amongst one 723 00:40:09,960 --> 00:40:13,000 group to say don't support the EDL if we're silent about the 724 00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:15,960 other group? And also if you look at spikes 725 00:40:15,960 --> 00:40:20,760 of anti Muslim hatred, spikes in support of EDL and Tava 726 00:40:20,760 --> 00:40:22,920 Robinson. They come about by trigger 727 00:40:22,920 --> 00:40:26,840 events, the Manchester attacks or the Westminster attacks or 728 00:40:26,840 --> 00:40:29,760 whatever. A big Lee Rigby. 729 00:40:30,280 --> 00:40:34,280 And we should we need to be not because just because of tactical 730 00:40:34,280 --> 00:40:38,680 or political reasons, but our values, that the values of ISIS 731 00:40:38,720 --> 00:40:43,360 and Al Majaroon or whatever are totally counter to everything we 732 00:40:43,360 --> 00:40:45,000 believe. And it's like, you know, you 733 00:40:45,000 --> 00:40:48,240 talking about going to Afghanistan, the attitudes of 734 00:40:48,600 --> 00:40:52,520 Anjem Chowdhry and Al Majaroon, the type of what society they 735 00:40:52,520 --> 00:40:54,640 want. It's this type of society we'd 736 00:40:54,640 --> 00:40:58,440 all be horrified by. But again, sometimes we just 737 00:40:58,440 --> 00:41:00,200 don't think about it. And sometimes we're kind of 738 00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:02,880 scared into, oh, yeah. But you'll be playing into a 739 00:41:02,880 --> 00:41:07,280 right wing narrative, you know, this idea that all forms. 740 00:41:07,680 --> 00:41:08,840 And that's where British people are. 741 00:41:09,200 --> 00:41:13,200 British people just want the sense of fairness and actually 742 00:41:13,400 --> 00:41:17,760 the Islamist extremists are as much of A danger to the Muslim 743 00:41:17,760 --> 00:41:20,600 communities as the white extremists are to to the white 744 00:41:20,600 --> 00:41:21,960 communities and we've got to be consistent. 745 00:41:21,960 --> 00:41:24,200 And, and do you think this is, this is doable? 746 00:41:24,480 --> 00:41:26,560 I mean, you know, you, you acknowledge that effectively, 747 00:41:26,600 --> 00:41:30,000 you know, your, your side is sort of losing at the moment. 748 00:41:31,840 --> 00:41:37,640 Do you think this is doable by mainstream politicians who can 749 00:41:37,640 --> 00:41:42,240 turn it around well or Or is it going to be about activist 750 00:41:42,240 --> 00:41:45,080 groups like Hope Not Hate who have to do the heavy lifting? 751 00:41:45,360 --> 00:41:48,960 Well, I think I think a small numbers of people will need to 752 00:41:48,960 --> 00:41:52,760 do the heavy lifting, but actually we need the other 753 00:41:52,760 --> 00:41:56,360 elements to work as well. I was really critical of Keir 754 00:41:56,360 --> 00:42:01,000 Starmer and the government over the summer and even before the 755 00:42:01,000 --> 00:42:07,680 Tommy Robinson demo, I wrote a letter to #10 which then got 756 00:42:07,680 --> 00:42:10,600 leaked to the Guardian. But you know, and I was saying 757 00:42:10,600 --> 00:42:14,160 that your silence is creating a vacuum which has been filled by 758 00:42:14,160 --> 00:42:16,720 the far right. People are getting scared. 759 00:42:17,040 --> 00:42:19,560 People need leadership. And it's not just about 760 00:42:19,560 --> 00:42:23,000 condemning the violence, because the violence is just one element 761 00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:24,680 of it. It's a different world view. 762 00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:29,280 And actually, people need protection by the state, not 763 00:42:29,280 --> 00:42:32,120 just physical protection, but they need to feel that people 764 00:42:32,120 --> 00:42:34,440 will are there to support them and look after them. 765 00:42:34,440 --> 00:42:39,280 Now. Now I think that, you know, Keir 766 00:42:39,280 --> 00:42:43,240 Starmer did his late party conference speech and that was a 767 00:42:43,240 --> 00:42:44,920 sea change from where he'd been before. 768 00:42:45,320 --> 00:42:47,760 As he followed that through is probably another question. 769 00:42:47,760 --> 00:42:49,800 But I'll tell you what has happened, which gives me 770 00:42:49,800 --> 00:42:53,800 encouragement. The day after the Tommy Robinson 771 00:42:53,800 --> 00:42:55,800 demo. Now I, I know the police say 772 00:42:55,800 --> 00:42:59,160 150,000. I've looked at the aerial, the 773 00:42:59,160 --> 00:43:02,200 drone footage, I reckon 300,000 people. 774 00:43:02,240 --> 00:43:08,000 I mean, it was huge, huge and millions more would be watching 775 00:43:08,000 --> 00:43:11,080 it online. And the day after I got 776 00:43:11,080 --> 00:43:16,000 contacted by ACEO of a big charity and he said, look, can 777 00:43:16,000 --> 00:43:17,360 you come on a call with a few of us? 778 00:43:17,360 --> 00:43:18,960 We're all scared. We don't know what to do. 779 00:43:19,960 --> 00:43:23,320 And he said there'll be between 5:00 and 7:00 as CEOs on the 780 00:43:23,320 --> 00:43:27,680 call 3 days later. And I got on the call and there 781 00:43:27,680 --> 00:43:30,640 were 48 people. And this is like all CEOs of the 782 00:43:30,640 --> 00:43:33,520 top charities in Britain. And people are saying, what do 783 00:43:33,520 --> 00:43:36,360 we do? Because people are feeling it. 784 00:43:36,400 --> 00:43:40,520 And also people are feeling that their type of society is under 785 00:43:40,520 --> 00:43:41,800 threat. But do you acknowledge with that 786 00:43:41,800 --> 00:43:45,840 300,000, let's call it, they would have been just like the 787 00:43:45,840 --> 00:43:48,880 miners in Maltby, a lot of people who do not associate 788 00:43:48,880 --> 00:43:50,000 themselves with the far right, no. 789 00:43:50,440 --> 00:43:52,440 Look, I mean, I, I think we've got to be, you know, we've got 790 00:43:52,440 --> 00:43:55,160 to be, you know, people, people are drawn to it for all sorts of 791 00:43:55,160 --> 00:43:57,480 different reasons. People are drawn to it. 792 00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:00,560 They might be racist and might not think it, they might not be 793 00:44:00,600 --> 00:44:03,120 overtly racist and they might be angry about other things. 794 00:44:03,120 --> 00:44:06,120 And this is just our outlook. I've, you know, we've always 795 00:44:06,120 --> 00:44:09,480 taken the view, even going back to the BNP days, you never 796 00:44:09,480 --> 00:44:10,760 attack the people voting for them. 797 00:44:11,520 --> 00:44:15,840 And but going back to the Tommy Robinson demo, so on the stage, 798 00:44:15,880 --> 00:44:19,920 obviously part of our job, we sit there and listen re listen 799 00:44:19,920 --> 00:44:23,080 to all the speeches. Not a single speaker spoke about 800 00:44:23,080 --> 00:44:25,400 small boats. And that was the media narrative 801 00:44:25,400 --> 00:44:26,360 all these people are angry about. 802 00:44:26,520 --> 00:44:27,920 They didn't give a shit about small, sorry. 803 00:44:27,920 --> 00:44:29,400 They didn't care about small boats. 804 00:44:30,480 --> 00:44:35,280 What they talked about was how multiculturalism was a failed 805 00:44:35,280 --> 00:44:38,880 experiment, how Islam was incompatible. 806 00:44:39,040 --> 00:44:42,680 And several speakers spoke about expelling Muslims from Europe. 807 00:44:43,560 --> 00:44:47,280 You had you had this Christian leader from New Zealand who said 808 00:44:47,280 --> 00:44:51,800 that all non Christian Church, Christian places of worship 809 00:44:51,800 --> 00:44:54,520 should be closed down in the UK. You had a great replacement 810 00:44:54,520 --> 00:44:57,760 conspiracy theory stuff. The so the stage was a lot more 811 00:44:57,760 --> 00:45:00,800 hardline. There were people there of all 812 00:45:00,800 --> 00:45:02,240 walks of life. And we have to accept that. 813 00:45:02,240 --> 00:45:03,640 And that should be the warning to us. 814 00:45:04,160 --> 00:45:07,960 But I think that coming out of that, and we're in the process 815 00:45:07,960 --> 00:45:10,960 of doing it now, we're saying, well, actually loads of these 816 00:45:10,960 --> 00:45:14,280 groups, some of the biggest organisations in civil society 817 00:45:14,280 --> 00:45:17,480 say, OK, we can't rely on our leaders anymore because they're 818 00:45:17,480 --> 00:45:21,680 continually letting us down. We need to do it ourselves. 819 00:45:22,240 --> 00:45:25,480 And so probably in the spring, there's going to be something 820 00:45:25,480 --> 00:45:29,720 really massive by civil society and it's going to be positive, 821 00:45:29,720 --> 00:45:32,360 it's going to be based in our communities and it's going to be 822 00:45:32,360 --> 00:45:37,040 ultimately showing that every day people do nice things for 823 00:45:37,040 --> 00:45:39,000 each other, people get along together. 824 00:45:39,720 --> 00:45:42,640 There are many, many issues and issues that have to be 825 00:45:42,640 --> 00:45:46,720 addressed. But fundamentally, the vast 826 00:45:46,720 --> 00:45:51,640 majority of British people want to live side by side. 827 00:45:51,880 --> 00:45:54,760 They enjoy living with people of different backgrounds, different 828 00:45:54,760 --> 00:45:57,560 communities. And, and also what we find is 829 00:45:57,560 --> 00:46:00,520 that, and all the data shows this, the more people who are 830 00:46:00,520 --> 00:46:06,080 involved in community, in their community, the less suspicious 831 00:46:06,080 --> 00:46:08,400 or hostile or afraid they are of the other. 832 00:46:08,400 --> 00:46:11,520 And all the data shows that. So this is about a celebration 833 00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:15,960 of communities in Britain. And I think that we we can no 834 00:46:15,960 --> 00:46:19,320 longer rely on our political leaders to take a lead because 835 00:46:19,560 --> 00:46:22,000 they are failing of all, of all political colours. 836 00:46:22,440 --> 00:46:24,120 And obviously we want them to do stuff. 837 00:46:24,120 --> 00:46:27,320 We want them to come on board. But ultimately, I think there is 838 00:46:27,320 --> 00:46:30,640 power in communities, there is power in civil society. 839 00:46:30,640 --> 00:46:32,720 Some of these big organizations, I mean some of the biggest 840 00:46:32,720 --> 00:46:36,160 charities you can think of saying actually we need to step 841 00:46:36,160 --> 00:46:37,720 up now. And I think that that that is 842 00:46:37,720 --> 00:46:39,400 about to happen. I just finally, I mean, do you 843 00:46:39,400 --> 00:46:41,520 think we're moving into a new gear politically as well? 844 00:46:41,520 --> 00:46:46,160 Because now obviously Donald Trump is warning that we face 845 00:46:46,160 --> 00:46:48,920 civilizational erasure in Europe. 846 00:46:49,880 --> 00:46:54,240 That's going to be, isn't it, the next stage of the debate And 847 00:46:54,240 --> 00:46:57,520 and somehow this has become normal politics. 848 00:46:57,840 --> 00:47:01,520 It has become normal politics and certainly it's a throw down 849 00:47:01,520 --> 00:47:04,640 challenge, but what I'd say is that gives encouragement to the 850 00:47:04,640 --> 00:47:05,520 right. They will love it. 851 00:47:05,760 --> 00:47:07,560 Oh yeah, you know, he's right with this, is what we've been 852 00:47:07,560 --> 00:47:08,160 saying. How long? 853 00:47:09,120 --> 00:47:11,440 But actually what we need to do is that most people in Britain 854 00:47:11,440 --> 00:47:14,720 won't like that. They won't like a Donald Trump, 855 00:47:14,920 --> 00:47:17,680 They won't like an American leader interfering in British 856 00:47:17,680 --> 00:47:20,600 politics or European politics. People don't like Elon Musk 857 00:47:20,600 --> 00:47:23,520 doing that. So actually in every threat 858 00:47:23,520 --> 00:47:26,040 there's an opportunity as well. But what I'm saying, what I 859 00:47:26,040 --> 00:47:29,280 think is important is that we don't just be anti. 860 00:47:29,280 --> 00:47:32,280 And that comes back to why we chose the word name hope not 861 00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:34,880 hate from the beginning. We don't just want to be anti. 862 00:47:35,280 --> 00:47:38,120 It's about values as well. And we, you know, so it's what 863 00:47:38,120 --> 00:47:42,760 what kind of society do we want and what what do we believe in 864 00:47:42,760 --> 00:47:46,200 that brings us together? And I think that we've got to 865 00:47:46,560 --> 00:47:50,160 push those values because values is about belonging as well. 866 00:47:50,160 --> 00:47:54,680 And, and many of the people who are looking to the right now are 867 00:47:54,680 --> 00:47:57,160 doing so because they feel abandoned, They feel scared, 868 00:47:57,160 --> 00:48:01,320 They feel like, I mean, I think the big, the second stage of 869 00:48:01,520 --> 00:48:04,440 globalization is AI. Now the government talks about 870 00:48:04,440 --> 00:48:07,040 it in a positive way. You know, this, this is all 871 00:48:07,040 --> 00:48:08,040 great. We can do this. 872 00:48:08,040 --> 00:48:09,200 We do that. I'm sure you can. 873 00:48:09,680 --> 00:48:11,400 Millions of people are going to lose their jobs. 874 00:48:12,120 --> 00:48:16,720 In our poll of 45,000 people, the one result that startled us, 875 00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:20,600 every time we do one of these big polls, we give people, you 876 00:48:20,600 --> 00:48:23,760 know, 1520 policy options. What would you one thing the 877 00:48:23,760 --> 00:48:27,480 government should do, the number, the second choice 878 00:48:27,480 --> 00:48:29,760 chosen. Sewage is always #1 punishing 879 00:48:29,760 --> 00:48:33,320 water companies always comes up #1 and we put this in as an 880 00:48:33,320 --> 00:48:35,520 afterthought, protecting us from AI. 881 00:48:36,640 --> 00:48:39,200 And it was really stark. No politicians talking about it. 882 00:48:39,920 --> 00:48:42,560 But this is, this is what's coming down the line. 883 00:48:42,720 --> 00:48:45,800 And this is going to disrupt many, many people and also 884 00:48:45,800 --> 00:48:48,000 people who've not been affected by globalization. 885 00:48:48,600 --> 00:48:51,440 And it's, it's underpinning. And you know, my book, I talk 886 00:48:51,440 --> 00:48:54,600 about this, I think quite a lot, underpinning a lot of this, not 887 00:48:54,600 --> 00:48:57,840 just in the UK, but across the West, is economic pessimism and 888 00:48:57,840 --> 00:49:02,600 economic insecurity. And if a government cannot offer 889 00:49:02,800 --> 00:49:06,720 security to people, economic security, and that's not just 890 00:49:06,720 --> 00:49:08,840 about jobs and money, it's about community. 891 00:49:08,840 --> 00:49:11,920 In the gel of community, people will look elsewhere for 892 00:49:11,920 --> 00:49:14,240 protection. And I think we're in that stage 893 00:49:14,240 --> 00:49:18,200 where people feel the politics has failed of all parties and 894 00:49:18,200 --> 00:49:20,280 they're looking for some someone else. 895 00:49:20,280 --> 00:49:24,360 And I think there are huge challenges ahead of us at the 896 00:49:24,360 --> 00:49:26,080 moment. I do not think the political 897 00:49:26,080 --> 00:49:30,240 class has risen to that challenge or even understand it. 898 00:49:30,320 --> 00:49:33,600 They're running behind it. We need bravery. 899 00:49:33,960 --> 00:49:37,280 But actually where things are happening and where I have the 900 00:49:37,280 --> 00:49:41,080 hope is that there are amazing people doing amazing things in 901 00:49:41,080 --> 00:49:44,320 communities up and down the country, often against the odds. 902 00:49:44,880 --> 00:49:48,880 And I think my mission, my hope for Hope, not hate, is that we 903 00:49:48,880 --> 00:49:54,600 can help those people, empower them, upskill them, support them 904 00:49:54,800 --> 00:49:56,840 so they can do stuff on the bigger scale. 905 00:49:57,360 --> 00:49:58,600 Nick Moles, thank you very much indeed. 906 00:49:59,000 --> 00:50:00,960 Thank you for joining us and sharing your ways to change the 907 00:50:00,960 --> 00:50:03,480 world. And that's it for this edition. 908 00:50:03,480 --> 00:50:06,120 You can watch all of these interviews on the Channel 4 News 909 00:50:06,120 --> 00:50:08,480 YouTube channel. Until next time, bye bye.