Brick Lane challenge

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by Will Adams and Susan Carlyle nto Foot's shoes?

TOTALL TOF OKLANE SNOCRAF NAZISTALL OUT OF BRICK LANE STIC EAT TRAI oppose the Nazi stall....

AS MICHAEL Fc ot's popularity ratings si ik slowly in the sunset, a n ew hatchet man is being groomed for office in the hope of Dry wit THE MARCH last Sunday in protest at the NF bookstall in Brick Lane, East London, was the first coordinated anti-racist fightback, with substantial support from both the labour movement and local Bengali groups.

The local Labour council, having unknowingly granted permission for the bookstall to operate, is refusing to revoke the licence because they maintain the fascists would win on appeal. Evidence of racist material has been sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions, but in any case legal manoeuvres are not the solution, nor a guarantee of justice for the bridging the gap between the soft Left and the overt He is Peter Shore, the tub-thumping nationalist whose enthusiasm for the Falklands war left even Tory backwoodsman Julian Amery gasping for breath, and whose jingoistic opposition to the Common Market is unsullied by any hint of socialist aspiration or rhetoric.

According to the Observ. er, Shore is being promoted by the cabal of right wing union bureaucrats whose expense accounts allow them to dine regularly together at the St Ermin's Hotel in London. And he could also win big votes from the 'left' bureaucrats of the TGWU.

His rivals Dennis Healey - now 65 - and Roy Hattersles, though vicious enough for the right wing, apparently lack the pan•ache to deliver their politics in a way that will be swallowed by the soft left.

And nobody now seems even to remember the name of John Silkin. people who are constantly the target of the fascists' propaganda and the physical attacks that they are feeling confident enough to launch on black people.

A survey of local papers and reports from estates and local schools show the vicious attacks, with knives and iron bars used as weapons.

Some attacks have taken place outside mosques and in areas where Bengalis have traditionally felt safe, like Spitalfields.

The march's route led away from the market area, but some anti-racists stayed behind to ensure the protection of the Trades Council vookstall, and some remained in the neighbourhood after the march ended in case the fascists organised a retaliatory rampage as they have done in the past. However, the hard core of 60 or so fascists removed themselves from the area, probably to maintain a respectable tace and not ieopardise their stall --J-elenIT HEITI BARRE " licence. Legally the stall can be closed if it causes a breach of the peace, but only the police canactivate this clause.

500 marchers was an adequate number, but on the organising committee Socialist Organiser supporters had to argue strongly for the march to go ahead, even if small, and against a proposal to disband it and concentrate numbers in the market around the stalls.

Susan Carlyle, a Socialist Organiser supporter and local Labour councillor, spoke at the end and stressed the need to stay behind as an act of solidarity with the Bengali community and to continue the campaign.

We want to build on this march to rid Brick Lane of all fascist literature sellers and to support the communities under attack as a result of the poisonous racist atmosphere which the Labour council refuses to see itself as responsible for.

Labour Party supporters who have taken a stand against the council must discuss the role of local authorities carrying out racist housing policies where ghettoes are being created, and fight for an open policy of allocations for people of all races on new estates.

The council's unwillingness to act allows the fascists to organise with some kind of legal sanction. The policy of total reliance on legal sanctions is running out of time, and it is an illusion if anyone thinks that it will reverse the racialism generated.

Building a united antiracist movement which involves the unions, Labour Parties, and ethnic and community groups, is a vital necessity in the face of the racist violence. We must ensure there is no return to 1978, when the labour movement lost the fight and black and Bengali people were isolated.

John Harris 'master race' are stil

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NAZISTALL! OUT OF BRICK LANE E2R2 LASE