No Platform for anti-fascists?

By Tom Flynn / @tom__flynn

The Evening Standard reported last night that audience members hoping to attend the BBC’s Question Time next Thursday will be vetted to ensure BNP leader Nick Griffin – on his first appearance on the show – will not be confronted by anti-fascist campaigners. The move, which the BBC appears not to be applying to the BNP’s own campaigners, is based on the possibility of ‘security risks’ and ‘potential disruption to the show’,

According to a BBC source:

“Because it is a programme which has featured cabinet ministers and others for whom security is an important consideration, the people involved in producing the programme are extremely aware of what needs to be done to make sure there is no danger or disruption from the audience.”

That sounds fair enough, except that the show is being filmed at BBC Television Studios in White City. Anyone who has visited that studio will know that the security is as tight as at any airport or indeed at the Palace of Westminster. Your bag is searched and you go through a metal detector. If this is deemed sufficient to stop terrorism at Parliament and at Heathrow, then surely it is sufficient to prevent any security risk to the programme’s guests? Cabinet ministers and celebrities appear on Question Time up and down the country every week, in far less secure venues than the BBC HQ.

This suggests that the real concern is disruption to the show. However, it is recorded at 8.30pm, two hours before broadcast, which gives the BBC plenty of time to remove anyone disrupting the recording both from the studio, and from the eventual broadcast. In fact it would be so hard to disrupt the show successfully that I, and some fellow anti-fascist campaigners, believe attempting it inside the studio would be pointless, despite my own beliefs regarding ‘no platform‘.

In the circumstances I would much rather that anti-fascists – who understand the arguments better than most – be allowed to ask sensible questions on BNP policy that expose the party’s political naivety, economic incompetence and vile racist opportunism. The BBC is preventing this from happening. Some of our Labour colleagues oppose ‘no platform’ on the grounds that they believe Griffin would make himself look ridiculous in front of a live studio audience. But Griffin will not talk about race hate on the BBC. He will attempt to steer the debate towards other less controversial areas of BNP policy. Anyone who believes otherwise is naive about the level of political sophistication which the BNP operation has achieved in recent years. By excluding those who know which questions to ask, the BBC is giving him an easy ride.

I am also slightly concerned at the Standard’s claim that that audience members are being checked for ‘membership or involvement’ in anti-fascist organisations. How exactly is the BBC accurately obtaining proof of this? For some people, including myself, proof of anti-fascist activity is easy to find. Many others choose to remain anonymous, so it seems like a ludicrous waste of time and resources to thoroughly check the personal details of every audience member.

When Ellie Levenson, Tom Miller and I set up our ‘no platform’ campaign we faced criticism from colleagues who defended Griffin’s right to free speech. Now that our national broadcaster has denied that same right to those who oppose him, I hope those same people are just as insistent in our defence.