A STAB IN THE BACK:
HOW NICK GRIFFIN BETRAYED A BNP MEMBER

By Clive Potter



The path of devastation left by BNP Chairman Nick Griffin in his rise to power and his attainment of supremacy within that party has been well-documented. A significant number of BNP officials and senior members have experienced the viciousness, disloyalty and contempt from Nick Griffin and who have since either been expelled, forced to resign or have become so disillusioned that they have either refused to renew their subscriptions or have drifted into a state of apathy and non-activism within the party.

Loyalty is not just bottom-up from the grassroots. It needs to be top-down. It is a mutual contract of service and reward for effort and sacrifice made by the grassroots members in return for seeing the party successful and for its fee-paying and hard-working activists to be treated with respect and honour. Griffin has never honoured his members, whom he sees as little more than a milking-cow for their money to be siphoned off. How much of that money is actually diverted from the needs of the party is unknown but considering that the BNP is supposed to be about winning elections and “making a difference” and a party built up as a campaigning organisation it comes as a surprise to realise that less than 6% of the total income of the BNP is actually spent on campaigning.

The accounts from those who have been mistreated by Nick Griffin, both ex-and non-BNP members, are legion. Both from the time when Griffin helped to run the National Front to his time when he schemed his way into the BNP leadership, Griffin has used people as fodder. His contempt for anyone who disagrees with him or dares to challenge him is well-known.Yet for those sychophants who bow to his every wish and conspire with him to get what he wants, these individuals are kept close to his Inner Circle, some of whom are non-party members or have a history of extremism, terrorist activities or even anti-racistnationalist views. These individuals, whether incompetent or not, are used by Griffin to maintain his rule and they, like the rest of the membership, expendable if they were to clash with Griffin’s ego. Meanwhile,, although those who have something on Griffin, such as Collett and Lecomber, are able to maintain that relationship with him.

I was for several years mesmerised by the skilful, articulate and charismatic leadership of Nick Griffin. His Chairmanship seemed to bring in a modernity and reform of the BNP that I felt was necessary to make it electable. Like others, I ignored the early concerns of financial mismanagement and believed Griffin’s hype against the Edwards’ and Mike Newland’s expulsion from the party, brought about by their principled stand against what they saw was financial negligence – and worse. Like others, I was prepared to believe him for the future of the BNP, and in so doing let down principled comrades who were not prepared to put up with financial skulduggery. To the brave and principled stand of the Edwards’ and Mike Newland I salute you and offer my apologies for my failure to offer you support at that crucial time. Their experience was merely the beginning for a list of individuals who were axed or sidelined by Griffin in his pursuit of power and money within the party which he had schemed to take over.

My own experience of Nick Griffin’s unbridled thirst for power and money crystallised in July 2007 when Nick Griffin he viciously stabbed my Vice-President, Tim Hawke and myselfe (the President) of the independent trade union Solidarity) in the back, in what was a wholesale takeover by Nick Griffin on behalf of his former National Front colleague, Patrick Harrington. Harrington had recently, who had to been suspended from the union on account of union disciplinary allegations. This matter has been fully documented on this blog and elsewhere, but my first experience prior to that was when I had initiated an employment tribunal case against HM Prison Services on 14 September 2005.

This case was launched against the Prison Service as a result of that particular institution discriminating against me as a member of the white ethnic community since I was a member of a white nationalist organisation, namely the British National Party. Although the Prison Service had made its anti-white racist policy operational under a Policy Directive in 2002, that is to bar all members of white nationalist organisations from applying for employment within the Prison Service, I had chosen to seek employment with that institution.

I also felt that BNP members should not be institutionally discriminated against by a State agency who were denying white members of white nationalist political organisations the opportunity of employment. Such an injustice bore all the hallmarks of a Stalinist state. Though members of white nationalist organisations were in effect barred from employment within the Service, non-white members of Black Ethnic Minority organisations, such as the terrorist-linked Sikh Federation and the anti-white, anti-Christian and anti-Semitic Nation of Islam, remained eligible to apply for employment within the Prison Service.

Together with the unrivalled legal services of Lee Barnes I initiated a case of Indirect Racial Discrimination against HM Prison Service, a case which lasted nearly three years and saw various Hearings, including an Appeal Hearing where HM Prison Service attempted to block the case after the original Employment Tribunal in Leicester agreed that the case ought to be heard.

The Prison Service employed every legal tactic they could to prevent the case from being heard, even employing a leading QC from Cherie Blair’s Matrix Chambers to represent themselves. Prison Service.

The level of Institutionalised Racism was brought home when the final Hearing in October 2007 was suddenly cancelled for no apparent reason on the Friday afternoon before the Hearing on the following Monday.

It seemed reasonable to infer that the State had panicked and stitched us up, using the Employment Tribunal Service to cancel the original Panel who had been unbiased and drafting in a new Panel that appeared to be bent, consisting of an Asian Muslim, an Asian Sikh and a token white (obviously pathetically liberal and quisling).

The bent decision by this bent Panel was obvious after the two-day Hearing in February 2008, a Hearing that was marked only by the professional representation from Lee Barnes who ripped into the half-dozen witnesses of the Prison Service and surgically tore to shreds the legal arguments of HM Prison Service as represented by a QC and a Treasury Solicitors Legal Team. Despite this massive defence put up by the Prison Service’s legal team the fantastic hard work of Lee Barnes (who had worked extremely hard on the case and seen through several Hearings) we werewas unable to win through in the end, and my opinion is that this was almost certainly because of the bent tribunal.

Despite the evidence that we submitted to the Tribunal of two false claims that I had submitted in 2007 for employment within the HM Prison Service (as ethnic minority ‘applicants’ posing aswho were members of organisations similar to the BNP), the bent judgment was against us. This shows the bent and corrupt nature of our so-called democratic state in whichwhere it is claimed that we enjoy free speech, civil and political rights and justice. This case knocks the head off that wild claim for good. We now have a society where Institutionalised Racism exists. This racism, that is against whites and the white community, and the political representatives of the white community. It is now legally acceptable to discriminate against whites, white applicants and the white community for jobs, thus leaving whites as second-class citizens below members of foreign ethnic minorities who are given preference above white applicants.

This case is important not just for the exposure of the British State as an Institutionalised Racist State, at war with its own indigenous citizens, but also in revealing the anti-nationalist credentials of the leader of Britain’s most important nationalist political party.

In July 2006, when the case was first heard at the Employment Tribunals in Leicester, Lee Barnes’ successful challenge saw the case scrape through the tribunals and was scheduled to be listed for a full hearing. This was on the proviso that I pay a £500 deposit for the case to go ahead and a fee of £1000 costs to date for the HM Prison Service.

Lee Barnes suggested that I contact Nick Griffin as the case clearly involved the BNP as the HM Prison Service had since 2002 instigated an anti-BNP policy and it was essential to challenge this policy. It was also essential to defeat this discriminatory policy so as to ensure a political strategic goal of encouraging more professional and middle-class people to join the BNP, since if such people felt that their career and employment prospects were barred by their BNP membership the work of the BNP and of British Nationalism would be made much more difficult. Furthermore, Nick Griffin himself had challenged the anti-BNP policy of the Prison Service when it was created, and had published material about it in and had also written directly to HM Prison Service seeking information and asking questions of the policy.

The case needed £1500 to proceed. Without it my access to employment justice was barred and the challenge to this piece of anti-BNP and anti-white policy would be effectively stalled.

I subsequently wrote to Nick Griffin and on 18 July 2006 I received confirmation of my request.



Re: Employment Tribunal Case - Potter v HM Prison Service (No 1901930/2005)
Tuesday, 18 July, 2006 8:55 AM
From:
"BNP Chairman"
To:
"Clive Potter" < >
Cc:
"lj barnes" , "National Treasurer"
Dear Clive

Yes, I think this is very important. Despite the fact that we're as tight
financially this summer as ever, a Trafalgar Club cheque for £1,500 is in
the post. That, however, is all the can possibly be afforded at present and
for some time to come, and must not be taken as an indication that future
financial support will be available, though obviously I hope that, should it
prove necessary and likely to be worthwhile, we will be able to help
further.

Should you in due course be successful and in a position to recover your
costs, we would of course expect the return of this money. Should you lose,
it will be written off.

Please don't hesitate to contact me should you have any queries or concerms.
Good luck with the continued case.

Yours sincerely

Nick Griffin

PS What news on the Christian Council set-up operation?

I subsequently received a cheque from The Trafalgar Club dated 17 July 2006 via Nick Griffin. The co-signatory is unclear but could be Nick Griffin’s father, Edgar Griffin, whom we know as the figure operating the Trafalgar Club accounts.





Unfortunately, this cheque immediately bounced - although some who have had the hindsight of experience with Griffin would say that this was unsurprising.

The cheque above has been stamped “Refer to Drawer Please Represent”, whilst the image of the letter from First Direct dated 31 July clearly shows that this cheque for £1500 had bounced.






What is surprising and of great concern, however, was how the Trafalgar Club funds had suddenly been left with no money. We are fully aware that this Fund is in receipt of substantial donations and a recent TC Dinner would have swollen the funds to quite a large extent.

Where had this money disappeared to? Why were there no funds available to meet the cheque for £1500 which was not in itself a large amount but which was vital if this important legal case was to proceed?.

Only Nick Griffin and his Masonic accountant father, Edgar Griffin, can answer this question. But the fact is that with regards to my own circumstances I could no longer proceed with the case. and Lee Barnes had spent considerable time and effort in working on this case already and we had made a great political and personal investment concerning it.

By the time I received the letter from the bank I had already paid the Employment Tribunal as I obviously expected the cheque to be honoured, plus the fact that the closing date for the submission of the deposit was a tight legal deadline that had to be met.

I therefore found myself seriously out-of-pocket with a £1500 debt that I could ill-afford, let down by my very own Chairman of a political party whose values and principles I had staked my claim on.

Nick Griffin made no apology and made no compensatory action to ensure that the money would be refunded to me. I had initially waited some weeks prior to receiving the cheque from Griffin which placed huge pressures on me as I had to have the deposit/damages presented at the Tribunal within a restricted time-frame. Now I faced considerable financial problems as placed on me by the stupidity and selfishness of the very man whom I had placed my trust in and whose banner I had rallied round to support in this tribunal claim.

It was left to the usual ordinary and decent BNP member to come forward to save the day, offering me the damages as a one-off payment and payment of the £500 deposit that was agreed that I would pay off over time. Without this act of generosity by an unnamed BNP member it is clear that the claim would not have had a had chance of success.

I took this case on not merely because it was a personal claim of racial discrimination and injustice that I needed to tackle head-on, but a case that was central to the rights of BNP members who live and work in a modern liberal western democracy and their right to join a legal political party of their choice without intimidation or restriction. It was also about how a British nationalist party could determine how it operated within the legal sphere and how it could break out of the bondage that the liberal-Left State had tried to impose upon it so that it could function less effectively within a so-called democracy.

The following year, in July 2007, I was expelled from the BNP in an act of pique by Nick Griffin after I opposed his bullying and unwarranted interference in the independent nationalist trade union Solidarity, a nationalist body that I had founded on the instructions and ideas of Lee Barnes. Griffin supported his old-time comrade, Patrick Harrington (who was not even a member of the BNP but a member of a rival party, The National Liberal Party, which later helped to defeat a BNP candidate in a council by-election earlier this year), over those of his own members, Tim Hawke and myself, and purged me from the party (Tim Hawke had earlier resigned). I am still awaiting an Appeal Tribunal to hear my case on this matter. Despite this act of treachery and disloyalty from Griffin I persisted with the tribunal claim as the rights of BNP members meant more to me than the vanity and stupidity of just one bitter man. The values of democracy and free speech were imperative and the cause of white nationalism needed to be driven through by way of legal argument and example. Griffin never showed any interest or gave any kind of support to this case prior to my expulsion in any case.

It has been reported that other BNP members have similarly been placeds in dire situations by the failure of the BNP to act on its promises, or who have failed to have their money owed to them for services to the party returned. This serial failure is due to one thing and one thing only. The failure of the Chairman Nick Griffin to honour his pledges and to respect not only his members and colleagues, but also to even remotely honour his debt to them. We are not always referring to a financial debt necessarily as countless self-sacrificing BNP members whose time and loyalty have been given to the service of the BNP and for the cause of British Nationalism have repeatedly been ignored or treated with contempt or utter disloyalty by Griffin. Nick Griffin is, in essence, a serial traitor both to his own members and to the cause upon which he was elected leader to serve.

But the Griffin Problem did not end there. The case was finally heard in a two-day hearing at Leicester Tribunals Office on 25/26 February, fought by my unpaid and volunteer legal representative Lee Barnes. Lee has details of the Skeleton Argument on his blog spot dated 7 May 2008 (http://leejohnbarnes.blogspot.com/2008/05/clive-potter-case-legal-skeleton.html).

The Final Hearing was the Final Submissions and Judgment and on this occasion attended by myself only and the Treasury Solicitors Legal Team. The not unexpected judgment from the bent Panel was communicated to Lee Barnes on that same day.

As the Legal Unit Director, Lee Barnes communicated the judgment to Nick Griffin but I was not aware that he had done so. However, it was only whilst trawling through the far Left anti-BNP blog of Lancaster Unity that I noticed that someone had made a reference to me and my recently concluded tribunal case, which had remained confidential.


From the blog of Lancaster Unity
May 10, 2008
Councillor in challenge to BNP leadership

Posted by Antifascist 25 Comment (s)

Anonymous said...
Does anyone know what happened with the case that Clive Potter (ex-Solidarity, ex-BNP) took against the Prison Service for racial discrimination? Lee Barnes was curiously still representing him even though Potter has earned the hatred of both the BNP and Squalidarity leadership. What was Barnes up to and how did he get on?
10:52 AM, May 12, 2008



Anonymous said...
Lee Barnes was curiously still representing him even though Potter has earned the hatred of both the BNP and Squalidarity leadership.

What has Clive Potter done to piss off the BNP? I thought Potter was another diehard BNP fanatic trying to prove a pointless point through pointless and frivolous legal action.
11:25 AM, May 12, 2008
Anonymous said...
I think he and Barnes lost the case recently (shock,gasp!) but I haven't heard anything more.

Potter fell out with Griffin by trying to suspend Harrington from the Union. Harrington and Griffin rounded on him. Griffin and Harrington go back a long way.
4:18 PM, May 12, 2008
Anonymous said...
Current gossip says that Potter had costs of over £80,000 awarded against him. Maybe Lee B was playing doublecross for Nick G? On the other hand he could just be crap! Can't see Solidarity or the BNP running appeals!
6:55 PM, May 13, 2008


Clearly someone knew of the case and the fact that it had been heard and lost within the two-days that had elapsed between its conclusion on 9 May and the first posting above on the morning of 12 May.

We assumed that it was the work of Searchlight who we know have assisted HM Prison Service and have co-operated in “Operation Wedge”, an “anti-racist” initiative (see the article on this blog for 30 July).

However, information later materialised that shed new and disturbing light on the origins of this information. Since the information pertaining to the Tribunal case was kept quiet since it was a blow against both the BNP and me, the fact that information had somehow leaked out and had been published, albeit on a blogposting, was unwelcoming. The original posting looks contrived, almost as if it was written with a view to expecting further revelations. Indeed, the anonymous poster soon supplied the far-Left blog with the required information exposing the loss of the case whilst deriding the work of my legal representative, Lee Barnes. The fact that the poster repeatedly made reference to my role within the Solidarity trade union and my problems within that organisation made me very suspicious as to the source.

Four days after the Hearing the poster seemed to know exactly the amount of the costs that had been awarded against me in fighting this claim, £80,000. It seemed that someone had access to confidential information and since I not passed it to anyone I was concerned as to the source and how and why they would post this incriminating material on a far-Left blog.

On 14 May the following article appeared on the Northwest Nationalists blog:


Wednesday, 14 May, 2008

"Lee Barnes, does it again!


Word is just reaching us that, Lee Barnes, has cost another BNP member, now ex BNP member £80,000 with his dodgy legal advice. When will people realise this cretin is an insane wann-a-be with an Internet purchased diploma who doesn't have a clue what he's going on about.

More as we get it
Posted by Tartarus at 2:46 PM 2 comments"



Again, the information provides the identical amount of £80,000 for the costs incurred in the 3-year case as well as using it to attack Lee Barnes. I appreciate that Mr Barnes is a maverick and has upset a number of nationalists but I cannot comment on such matters. However, the fact is that his unpaid legal assistance was crucial to the case and ensured that I had a solid case that in practice fundamentally defeated the HM Prison Service’s legal team.

When I contacted Northwest Nationalists as to the source of the information on the grounds that it was essential to identify the source of this anti-nationalist poison it was discovered that Patrick Harrington was behind it!

RE: URGENT! POSTING ON NWN
Thursday, 15 May, 2008 12:16 AM
From:
"Terry Allen" <>
Add sender to Contacts
To:

Hello Clive,

tartarus got the info from harrington himself, saying that "Harrington has a big gob".

Pete



That would explain the anti-Lee Barnes bias as Harrington never hid his dislike of Lee Barnes when I worked with him on the Solidarity union, even though it was Lee Barnes himself who recommended Harrington in the first place since it was claimed that Harrington had experienced discrimination by leftist trade unions in the past. Harrington was angry that Lee Barnes had attended the first Solidarity AGM in February 2007 and had spoken out against various proposals that he had put forward. Harrington later demanded whether Barnes was actually a paid-up member of Solidarity. Later Harrington attacked him in emails pointing out that Barnes’ affiliation with the BNP had been exposed some time ago and was damaging to Solidarity. He did not want Barnes to be a member of Solidarity’s Executive either and ensured that Barnes role within the Solidarity Executive was sidelined as he was responsible for the AGM’s agenda at the time. Harrington disliked Solidarity’s close association with the BNP and said that it was the “kiss of death”. Yet in early 2007 it was Harrington himself who schemed with Griffin to ensure that he was awarded with a new laptop PC paid for by the Union’s members along with a proposal for a monthly payment of £175 that would include the commissioning of “intellectual” articles in the BNP’s publications. In July 2007 it was Harrington who hijacked the Union alongside Griffin, turning an formerly independent nationalist trade union into a BNP front organisation under the centralised control of Griffin himself.

To use the case as a sounding board to attack another nationalist who had worked tirelessly on a legal case to benefit BNP members and nationalists is disgraceful. To suggest that Barnes was somehow engaged in a deceitful game of “double cross” with Nick Griffin is disgusting and cheap and an insult against Barnes’ integrity. To use this as an excuse to publicly rubbish someone who gave a considerable amount of entirely unpaid legal expertise unpaid is the act of a jealous desperados who are themselves failures and who haves failed to attain a legal qualifications ofn their own accord.

Why Patrick Harrington chose to use this failed case as an excuse to try and expose my own loss in this legal claim and the award of costs against me, whilst at the same time denigrating another nationalist for their legal work, is beyond me. Clearly Harrington is sore regarding Solidarity and the suspension (and later expulsion) by the Solidarity Executive to discipline him back in June 2007.

More importantly, But it is the fact that the only source where Harrington could have obtained the ammunition that he used to attack Lee Barnes and myself was from Nick Griffin himself. Lee Barnes had passed the information regarding the Tribunal judgment and the awarded costs to Nick Griffin as the case involved issues relating to the BNP. It would seem that Griffin, in an act of calculated callousness and betrayal, then communicated that information to his former serving NF comrade Harrington, knowing that he would use it as Harrington is a known prolific blogger and poster on the internet.

Clearly, Griffin knew full well what he was doing. He wanted to embarrass me and to humiliate me by exposing the fact that I had lost an important tribunal case and in the process was awarded costs of some £80,000 against me. The fact that I was representing the BNP and its members (even though I was no longer a member) did not seem to enter into Griffin’s sick mind. As far as he was concerned I was “vermin” and had to have ever dared stand up against his dictatorial and bullying stance. To Griffin it was fitting that I had lost and had lost financially. He had already ensured that the case nearly failed at the beginning and saw to it that “his” money would not be used in this case that had been fought on behalf of the BNP and BNP members. The fact that I am seeking bankruptcy proceedings due to my pursuit of this case on behalf of the BNP and its members does not concern Nick Griffin in the slightest. That shows the level of contempt and political sickness within that individual.

Similarly, Griffin did not care whether his own legal advisor, Lee Barnes, was rubbished as he surely knew because Harrington had always despised Barnes.

Griffin has no friends, only enemies. He trusts no-one and uses colleagues as consumables that can be bought and disposed of when used. No-one is immune to his sociopathic tendencies and his position at the head of a political party is the most ill-fitting of places where such individuals ought to be placed.

Nick Griffin is an enemy of ordinary BNP members and of British nationalism. He simply cannot be trusted to deliver BNP members either success or values. His contempt for BNP members and for the cause of British nationalism is clear. His callous and deviously-contrived actions in attempting to sabotage an important legal case being fought on behalf of the BNP and its members is tantamount to a traitorous act. Griffin should be charged for bringing the party into disrepute, not just for these acts but for a whole host of misconduct. But the supine members of the Advisory Council were always too weak and spineless to challenge him in a united and concerted way. Now they have lost their chance.

Griffin’s misconduct in passing confidential information to a third party, knowing that that individual would use it to smear one of his very own trusted legal confidents, as well as humiliating a former member who was acting in the interests of his very own party and its members, clearly show that at the very heart of the BNP lies a great sickness. There is a cancer within the BNP and its poisonous personality is rotting the very heart and soul of the partyBNP. With the slow death of the BNP will also be the slow death of Britain as the last remaining vehicle of political and civil opposition to the EU monster and the left-Liberal Plan to destroy the foundations and principles that it was built upon.Britain in partnership with the Corporations will soon disappear.

Is that what you want to happen?

There is still time to change the BNP.

The only obstacle to change is Nick Griffin.

It is up to you and all BNP members whether you wish to continue down this road to oblivion.