In recent weeks, there have been a flurry of far-right protests across Britain, outside hotels housing asylum-seekers.
On 8 August in East London’s Canary Wharf, around 100 protesters and counter-protesters each gathered outside the Britannia Hotel.
Demagogic figures like Nigel Farage have helped to whip up these protests. But blame should also be levelled at Keir Starmer.
It is his government that is ramping up attacks on migrants and celebrating Home Office deportations. And it is his government that is attacking the working class, whilst cynically blaming declining living standards on immigrants.
Just like last summer’s riots, the police have proven useless in fighting off the far right. More often than not, they have protected these thugs from counter-protests. Clearly they have better things to be doing – such as locking up hundreds of peaceful Palestine protesters.
We can have no trust in the police. What crushed the far right last year was mass mobilisation, like in Walthamstow, where thousands of workers and youth turned out to protect their community.
East London has a proud tradition of this. In 1936, at the Battle of Cable Street, Mosely’s fascists were sent running by the organised working class.
Today, there are many workers with illusions in Farage, who see him as an anti-establishment champion.
What is required is a bold socialist programme – explaining that the enemy is indeed in places like Canary Wharf: not in the hotels, but in the glass towers where the bankers, billionaires, and bosses reside.
They are the ones committing crimes, attacking our living conditions, and getting filthy-rich off of our misery.
