The racist Scottish Defence League took a trip to Kilmarnock this morning and were met with fierce opposition from local people and anti-fascists from across Scotland.

Although the SDL claim to be protesting against Islamic extremism and in support of free speech, their past record shows that they’re nothing but a bunch of racists and hooligans.

The SDL planned to assemble at the Rabbie Burns statue at Kilmarnock Cross at 11am and then march across town to spread their message of hate and intolerance.

Anti-racists occupied the space from 10am to ensure that the SDL didn’t get a foot in the door. There was a heavy police presence who pushed us into a small area of Kilmarnock Cross and didn’t allow us freedom of movement. We heard from various sources that the SDL had been herded into a nearby alley. A few of our number managed to break off and sneak away for a look, by following the sound of their vile chanting. As we approached we saw that the small number of SDL protesters were entirely surrounded and outnumbered by police.

At the SDL events in Glasgow and Edinburgh at this stage in the day, due to pressure from huge numbers of anti-fascists, the police stopped the SDL from having freedom of the streets and prevented them from their spouting racist abuse, by keeping them in one location and then removing them in buses.

This was not the case in Kilmarnock, however. Despite the SDL seeming quite happy to stand where they were and shout horrible things whilst waving Union Jacks, the police approached the group and told them that they would facilitate their “peaceful” demonstration, had identified and were happy with where the SDL wanted to go, and then invited them to march to Kilmarnock Cross.

Separated by only a few metres and a couple of lines of stony faced cops, the SDL shouted anti-Muslim slogans and made violent and threatening gestures at the assembled group of anti-racists, whilst we told them what we thought of them (and reminded them that even their own organiser thinks they’re all “wankstains”).

This went on for around 30-40 minutes – far longer than the SDL have ever been given free reign before. The SDL were eventually escorted away from the town centre. Rather than bothering to protect the people of Kilmarnock from the racist scum, the police instead focused all of their efforts on preventing us from pursuing the SDL. They were ultimately unsuccessful, as a small group of anti-fascists broke free and ran through multiple police lines to maintain a presence outside the hotel that the SDL had ended up in.

When we approached the hotel, a huge number of police officers swarmed around us and tried to pack us tightly into a small space on the pavement and didn’t allow us to move. The sun was blazing hot and we were stranded without food or water as the police desperately tried to persuade us to abandon our outpost and join the tokenistic rally in favour of multi-culturalism, organised by local trade union and political bureaucrats, that was being held near by.

Some of those anti-fascists who hadn’t managed to run past the police lines had been herded into the rally in park, where they discovered around 35 people nonchalantly lying in the sun, without even any speakers or political message being espoused. The speaker and the singer that were booked had both neglected to attend. One councillor made a half-arsed attempt at a speech and waffled a wee bit about how multi-culturalism is good. (Aye, that’s all well and good, but how come you’re too feart to say that racism is bad?) Whilst the fascists were being given free reign to roam the streets of Kilmarnock, the smug folk in the park were patting themselves on the back and talking about organising dancers and singers for a pro-multi-cultural event two months away in August.

Some anti-racist campaigners, frustrated at the lack of action, called on the people at the park to join the others outside the hotel in taking action against the fascists. Six polis on bikes immediately sped towards the group attempting to make their way to the hotel and LIED to their faces, telling them that the SDL were absolutely not in that hotel on that street. A couple of undeterred demonstrators pressed on, followed by the cops on bikes, only to be denied access to the street by more cops. Errr… but if the SDL aren’t there, as your colleagues claimed, how come we’re not allowed down this street? Confronted by their own lies, the police then attempted to intimidate the protesters and demanded their names and all of their personal details.

We continually faced harassment from both the police and the few SDL members who dared to show their faces outside of the hotel to attempt to goad us. After it became clear that the SDL were being allowed to leave the hotel in small groups unescorted by the police, we attempted to follow them down the street to ensure that they were contained and not posing a threat to local people. The police reacted forcefully and physically prevented us from moving. After a heated argument they realised that if the SDL were being allowed to disperse and go home, then they would have to allow us to the same.

As we walked down the street, we saw that a group of unaccompanised fascists had walked right past a few of the protesters that they had been threatening earlier on that day, as the police continue to hassle and harass us. It was potentially a very dangerous situation, that thankfully passed without violence from the racists. Understandably, we were a little shaken up and pissed off at the way the police failed to protect peaceful protestors from potentially violent thugs.

We were talking amongst ourselves about the scandalous behaviour of the cops, when one of our number said something about a “fat jolly policeman”. He was immediately grabbed by the arm and pushed against a wall and told:

“If you say anything else, it’ll be the last thing you say today. Do you understand me?”

When the shocked protestor failed to answer immediately, the cop pushed him further the wall and repeated the questions, whilst his colleagues tried to block anyone else from seeing what was going on.

The police turned their video camera on the protestor and pressured and intimidated him into providing them with his personal details, whilst refusing to answer any of his questions. After being asked multiple times if he was being threatened, arrested, detained… the police said that he was required to give his details because he was a suspect. A suspect of what, exactly? They refused to say until they had been asked a dozen times, and it was clear that the rest of us were not going to leave – they then claimed he was suspected of breach of the peace. Pfft. The police forcefully pushed the rest of us away, in order to better intimidate the lone protester, despite the fact that he had been nothing but respectful – even apologising to the police, saying: “I’m very sorry if I caused any offense to you in the heat of the moment.”

It was a beautiful sunny day in Kilmarnock, there was great participation by local people and we had a degree of success – the fascists’ attempt to spread their message of hate was drowned out by our songs, and we certainly showed them that they were not welcome in Kilmarnock.

There are some things that could have made the day a lot better -  if there had been more protestors willing to confront the SDL, and if the police had stop trying to restrict us whilst the fascists do what they wanted, for example.

No doubt the SDL will proclaim today as a success,  but to the vast majority of the people of Kilmarnock, they came across as nothing but a bunch of pathetic racist thugs.

One thing’s for certain, it was a confidence booster for the SDL, and they’ll be back.

What are you gonnae do about it? Wherever they rear their ugly head, we need to be there to let them know that their racist rhetoric is not welcome in Scotland.

Not now, not ever.

The last time we saw the Scottish Defence League – a few dozen thugs, football hooligans and out and out racists – all the way back in February, they were being bussed away by Lothian & Borders Polis, en route to being dumped in a field somewhere near Linlithgow. As the cavalcade of 500 cops and 40 SDL aboard a couple of doubledeckers swept by us, the hundreds of anti-fascists who’d been keeping them penned inside a pub all day said their farewells with chants of ‘The SDL are finished, the SDL are finished, na na na naaa’.

And for all intents and purposes, they were. Edinburgh was their second attempt at a demo, and an even bigger failure than their first ‘protest’ in Glasgow last November. After that, all they could scrape together in terms of a public assembly was a minuscule photo-op in Lockerbie, a ‘vigil’ that most of their own supporters were not even made aware of. More recently, however, they’ve threatened to arrive in Kilmarnock, penned in for Saturday 19 June.

However, over the past two days, the SDL have been plunged into yet another crisis. Their main organiser in Scotland, ‘Gusty’, has walked out on the “wank-stains” , “wankers” and “mouthy c*nts” that apparently make up a large element of the SDL’s support – a shocking new revelation of the far-right’s composition in itself! Clearly, there’s a huge amount of frustration within the SDL, particularly among their inner core, at their failure to replicate the EDL’s successes down south. There’s a number of reasons for this – the still relatively prevalent sectarianism within Scottish football that overrides any of the ‘casuals united against a common enemy’ pish that’s the backbone of the EDL. The SDL knows this, and, for all their rhetoric about just being  against ‘militant Islam’, have consistently tried to sidle up to organised loyalism. This too has failed, and the SDL have yet to make any signficant inroads into the Orange movement. However, perhaps most importantly, the SDL have been given no room in which to grow by anti-fascists. From day one, mass anti-fascist street mobilisations have effectively put a stop to any SDL aspirations of becoming a movement with any kind of momentum. Few, if any, EDL members will be making the trip up to Kilmarnock this weekend, given that those that did were less than happy with their SDL experience in Edinburgh.

This Saturday has the potential to be decisive in seeing off the SDL for good. The organisation is now leaderless, without direction, and lacking any solid base of support beyond a few keyboard warriors, has-been casuals and NF-wannabes. However, there is no room to be complacent in this. The SDL have effectively been handed over the town centre of Kilmarnock by East Ayrshire Council and the police – who’re denying the trade union led ‘Kilmarnock & Loudoun United‘ demo the right to assemble there. Meanwhile, the SDL are being allowed to hold what they claim is a 45 minute, peaceful static demonstration. If this works for them, they’ll keep doing it – in small and medium sized towns across Scotland. While their Glasgow demo in September has been thrown into disarray by their organiser leaving, others have mooted the possibility of demos in places including Perth, Alloa and Stirling.

The type of non-violent direct action that was so successfully used against the SDL in Edinburgh can now be used to finish them off forever. This is why we need anti-fascists from across Scotland  to come to Kilmarnock this Saturday and stop the SDL for good. No Pasaran!

ASSEMBLE 9.30AM AT KILMARNOCK CROSS, SAT 19 JUNE
Kilmarnock is 40 mins by train from Glasgow Central – trains at 0807, 0837 and 0912

Earlier today I travelled down to Ayrshire to help local SSP members spread awareness of an important date for all anti-fascists in Scotland: Saturday the 19th of June. This is when the drunken far-right morons of the “Scottish Defence League” are planning on bringing their wee roadshow to Kilmarnock, under the guise of protesting against the building of a new Mosque in the town.

We were well-received by local people who are concerned at the prospect of neo-nazis descending upon their town. Today’s response showed that if the SDL do try to spread their Islamophobic bile in Kilmarnock, they will not be well received by the vast majority of people. Women and men of all age groups expressed concern at the Defence Leagues’ history of violence. There is a feeling that the last thing the place needs is idiots trying to stoke up racial tensions, when the real problems facing many people are unemployment and poverty – and the misery caused by these economic problems. Amusingly, one woman asked “huv ye no seen The Scheme?” adding that “things are bad enough here without nazis trying to stir up trouble”.

We were only able to run the stall for about an hour and a half, at which point we had handed out all of our 600 leaflets and sold all our copies of the Scottish Socialist Voice. I knew the SDL were unpopular, but I was taken aback by the full extent of people’s antipathy towards them! It is important that such revulsion is turned into action: we must take to the streets to stop them being allowed to run rampant for the day. The SSP, working alongside the recently-formed Scottish Anti-Fascist Alliance, will be helping to co-ordinate anti-racist mobilisations which will block the SDL’s attempts to take over the town.

As with previous demos, it is likely there will be more than one type of anti-fascist activity on the day. Full details will emerge in the next week or so, but my guess is that there will be a seperate ‘non-confrontational’ rally in defence of multiculturalism, which will be held in a different location from the fash’s gathering. At the same time, there will be a continuation of the tactic successfully employed to nullify the SDL on 2 previous occasions: direct action to prevent them from operating freely. This means physically occupying the space they would wish to claim as their own, and when you find out where they are, you get there to oppose them.

I was particularly glad to be able to speak to one local resident, who expressed concern that there could be riots because “two sides” would antagonise each other. He identified as being against racism and fascism but was worried about the potential for trouble and whether we’d make it worse by organising a counter-demo. My argument was that to do nothing would almost ensure that violence would occur, because when the Defence League have had free rein, they have chanted racist abuse, assaulted members of the public and committed acts of vandalism on Asian-owned businesses.

The only way to stop it is to stand up to it. In Glasgow last November and Edinburgh in January, we outnumbered them by ten-to-one, meaning they could not have their way and the police were forced to act, on both occasions busing them out of town. In Edinburgh, they didn’t even make it out of the pub. The guy expressed doubts about the police, but my take on it is that if our numbers are sufficient and we are determined, the cops are more or less forced to act. It is the best way to make sure major disturbances do not occur. I think I managed to talk him round.

Meanwhile, the English Defence League were on the march in Newcastle today. SSY member Liam T was down there chasin’ aboot efter thum. This BBC report makes it seem like a relatively quiet day. Good to see us represented down there. Liam’s report will follow soon. On a side note, the Apprentice Boys of Derry were also marching in The Toon today. It must’ve been a nice treat for them not to have been the most reactionary force in the city for a change.

Today also saw the EDL gracing the front page of the Guardian. There’s a fairly helpful article and video if you follow the link. Along with the recently-screened Young, British and Angry, the evidence is stacking up that – SHOCK HORROR – they’re not moderates concerned with preserving the British tradition of liberty after all, but are in fact the type of knuckle-draggers who have acted as the BNP’s base of support for yonks. Of course a simple bit of logic helps you realise there’s something fishy about the claim that they’re not against all Muslims (‘just the radicals/militants/extremists’ apparently), but then they don’t want a new Mosque… for anyone… in a town with no history of problems with radicals. Hmmm.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be down in Killie a bit more to help the local SSP and the new contacts we’ve made. If we put the work into organising this, it could be a really successful day and possibly signal the death-knell for the floundering SDL.

Keep Kilmarnock nazi-free!

¡No Pasarán!

Remember the Scottish Defence League? Not very keen on Islam, quite like sitting in pubs, don’t want to surrender to the IRA, seem to always end up on a bus filled with riot cops… yeah, that lot. The ones we chased out from Glasgow in our thousands. Then Edinburgh.

Well, they’re claiming to be back. On top of a planned ‘official’ demonstration in Glasgow this September, when they’ve applied to the council for a march from Blytheswood Square to the cenotaph in George Square, they’ve announced their intention to hold a demo in Kilmarnock, Ayrshire next month, on Saturday 19 June.

Details are thin on the ground at the moment, and it remains to be seen whether this will turn out to be as much of a farce as their supposed ‘Lockerbie demo’, which turned out to be a carload of them driving in for an afternoon, somehow managing to escape the attention of the world’s media, anti-fascists, the police and indeed, local residents, taking a couple of pictures to prove they were there, then going home.

The SDL have however been mooting the possibility of a demo in Kilmarnock for a while, hoping to capitalise on a proposed new Muslim centre and Mosque in the town.

One thing is clear: if the SDL do go ahead with their demo in Kilmarnock, they will not go unopposed. As in Glasgow and Edinburgh, the SDL will be denied freedom of the streets, in their bid to intimidate minorities and spread division. They shall not pass.

Noted hip hop artist and twat Sean Combs

While Diageo is still set to close it’s bottling plant in Kilmarnock, rip the heart out of the community, condemn hundreds of families to unemployment it’s comforting to know it’s not all doom and gloom for the employees of Diageo’s multi billion food and drinks empire.

Sean Combs, Aka Puff Daddy, aka P.Diddy is set to make a cool $100 million in an advertising deal with Diageo

“Diddy has agreed to take on responsibility for Diageo’s Ciroc vodka brand in the United States, as part of a 50-50 joint venture with the London-based multinational that could net the hip-hop entrepreneur over $100 million. Ciroc is made from grapes in France, which is unusual given that vodka sources are traditionally starch-based such as potatoes or corn.”

Lets not forget that the bottling plant in Kilmarnock is not inefficient or unproductive. It has created massive wealth for Diageo. The reason the plant is threatened with closure is to protect “future profit levels” for Diageo.

Profit levels that have been consistent at £2 Billion a year for them in the past decade.

20,000 march to defend jobs from Diageo’s greed

If Diageo can afford to lavish $100 million on P.Diddy they can afford to maintain an already profitable plant in Kilmarnock – if they refuse to stop the closure, the plant should be taken over with the jobs and profits secured for the local community – not Diageo or massive celebrity advertising!