From: John Tyndall
PO Box 2471, Hove, East Sussex BN3 4DT


Dear Tony Lecomber,

I am in receipt of your letter of the 23rd September informing me of my suspension and containing a new shoal of charges against me. After just a cursory look at these charges, my first impulse would be to say: you must be joking! But I know of course that you most definitely are not joking, and so I shall take these charges seriously and contest them just as I did the previous ones.

Of course, before I can put together a proper defence against the charges I will require you to be much more specific than you have been so far concerning the particular references in Spearhead to which you take objection. You have quoted issue numbers, dates and articles, but this is not good enough; I need to know what particular passages in the articles you consider to be breaches of party discipline. I leave this in your hands.

But speaking generally, it seems to me that you are completely oblivious of a certain basic fact. This is that Spearhead is an independent journal and I an independent editor, and that in a presumably free country I am at liberty to say exactly what I choose and to criticise things said and done by the BNP leadership where I believe they warrant criticism. This happens in every political party: the internal rows and arguments that go on in the mainstream parties, whether they focus on policies or personalities, far eclipse in bitterness anything that has happened in the BNP. These things are accepted as part of the cut and thrust of internal debate, and it could not be otherwise. Your and Griffin's attempts to gag me over such matters go far beyond anything dreamt of in the Labour Party by even its most paranoid leaders. The same is true of Lib and Con.

The fact that you simply will not face, Tony, is that certain public statements, policy stances and actions by Nick Griffin over the past year or two have incensed many loyal members and caused intense divisions in the BNP. I am simply the main spokesman for these members because of a certain ability and experience in writing and speaking whereby I can articulate their concerns, and because I possess a medium (Spearhead) through which I have the means to do so.

I will just list a few of the major issues over which these divisions have come about:-

* Most recently, the proposal put forward by Nick Griffin to change the rules of admission to the party whereby we allow non-white members. Few deceive themselves that this issue has gone away because for the moment Griffin has put it on ice in response to massive protest.
* The adoption of a Jewish candidate (now councillor) for a ward in Epping Forest and the adoption of a half-Turkish one for a ward in Dagenham, yet to be contested.
* The selection of an Asian to be a spokesman for the BNP in a recent party political broadcast.
* Repeated statements by Nick Griffin that he does not believe in the feasibility of an all-white Britain, the latest of which on record is the assertion that this is an 'unrealistic utopia' - made, I recall, at the time of the Le Pen visit. In conjunction with this is Griffin's use of the term 'race freaks' to describe those in the party who disagree with him over such matters - a gratuitous insult to a great many loyal members and activists who have trudged the streets to spread the BNP message, particularly those in Oldham who did so on Griffin's behalf in the general election of 2001 and again in the local government elections in 2003.
* In June this year, the crass error of political judgement whereby the party committed excessive resources to the contesting of unwinnable Euro election seats, with the result that we made a grossly inadequate input into undoubtedly winnable - but in the event not won - local government seats.
* The current party payroll, which is utterly ludicrous for an organisation of the BNP's present size and actual political muscle. More and more people are asking serious questions about this payroll, with regard to its purpose, who is on it and at what rate, and the sources of money that are making it possible. These are legitimate questions for any subscription-paying members and donors to ask, yet so far no adequate answers have been forthcoming.
* The circumstances behind the party's failure to present its accounts for inspection by the Electoral Commission, and the penalty likely to be incurred for this failure. In this connection, few are impressed by the lame excuse that an auditor could not be found in time.

These are issues, along with several more, which, whether you like it or not Tony, there is a great deal of internal discontent in the BNP. Yet no adequate opportunities nor facilities whatever have been given to members to discuss and debate them in the party and to call the leadership to account. We have not had a general members' meeting since March 2000. Granted that we did not organise such events in my day but we did have the annual rallies (since curiously discontinued) at which strong discontents at the grass roots of the party, had they then existed, would have been allowed an airing - as it is always sensible for any leadership to do. Official party publications bristle with propaganda justifying the 'Griffin line' on various matters, yet other publications which sometimes approach them from a more independent angle and comment upon them critically are banned from display or sale at party meetings, Spearhead and Heritage & Destiny being the main examples.

Instead, all we get is a series of purges, expulsions, prohibitions, suspensions, proscriptions and, in some cases, the temporary closing down of good branches where people have had the temerity to dissent from the party line, whether it be over the issues mentioned here or over quite ludicrous, unjustified and illegal speaking bans against paid-up card-carrying members, even where those would-be speakers do not use the platforms to argue over internal issues but only to speak about general national politics. This year we have seen the suspension of a really excellent branch in the North of England simply because the organiser dared to invite me to speak there. We have also seen the effective, if not official, suspension of one of the very best London branches and the official suspension of its organiser over a quite trivial matter concerning the presence of a 'proscribed' person at a branch meeting, allegedly with the organiser's compliance. Another of the best branches in the North was threatened with closure, and its organiser with the sack, simply because of an invitation to Richard Edmonds to speak there - RE being supposedly 'tainted' because of his close association with me.

This, Tony, is paranoid behaviour that appears to be favoured as a substitute for the open, frank and free discussion of differences within the party that is long overdue. I should tell you that it is bringing you, Nick Griffin and the rest of your colleagues in the leadership into increasing loathing and contempt. If you imagine that 'chopping' John Tyndall (supposing that you get away with this) will make these matters go away, you are living on another planet.

Some of your charges are utterly laughable. One concerns books advertised in a private magazine over which I as proprietor and editor have sole discretion. Another concerns an advertisement for radio broadcasts which I have carried every month for several years. If this is a chargeable offence why was I not charged for it a long time ago instead of your waiting till now? Indeed the same thing could be said of other items published by me months ago but for which I was not charged at the time. Why not?

The only conclusion likely to be drawn even by the most unbiased observer is that when these items first appeared I had not announced my intention to challenge Nick Griffin in a BNP leadership election! Is that not so, Tony?

With regard to your charge relating to an item published in Spearhead and appearing on the Spearhead website titled 'The Problem is Mr. Griffin', either your memory is so defective or your records so chaotic that you do not recall that you tried to throw a charge relating to this item at me last year but it fell apart because I was not a BNP member at the time, having recently been expelled by your kangaroo court. The article was anyway part of the quite legitimate process of internal criticism and debate - which fact you cannot seem to understand - but it fell at first base because, not being a member at the time, I was not subject to the party's disciplinary rules. I have a letter from you which acknowledges this in so many words.

And while we are on the subject of this admittedly hostile article about Mr. Griffin, it certainly was not any more hostile than, if as hostile as, an item published by you in late 2000 in a tatty little rag which you called The Evening Chronicle, in which among other things you accused me of being a crook. I do not recall you facing disciplinary proceedings as a result of this.

These matters aside, you clearly do not understand the practical and legal limits imposed upon organisations' rules of 'proscription'. If a person is proscribed by an organisation, it means that he/she cannot be a member and that he/she cannot attend the organisation's official events nor take part in its official activities. It does not mean that other people who are members of the organisation may not associate with such a proscribed person on other occasions. Members of the BNP have the perfect right to associate with whom they please in their own time, whether this be on a private social basis or at events not organised by the BNP and not therefore coming within its disciplinary purview. You, Tony Lecomber, cannot dictate to them in such matters, anymore than can Nick Griffin. You really would be advised to seek an authoritative legal opinion on this, for by setting yourself up as monitor of what people may do away from official BNP business you are only making yourself look ridiculous.

You make reference in your letter of accusations to me as "a prominent member" and "founding father" of the BNP, with the implication that the party's public image is likely to suffer from certain statements made by me in writing of which you do not approve. Considering your own very prominent and senior position in the party, Tony, taken in conjunction with your jail record over the handling of explosives and the later assault on an opponent, this reasoning is utterly comic. I too have a jail record, but for offences much more directly political and of an altogether lesser seriousness in terms of criminality. I must also admit to having maintained you in your positions in the party following your offences years ago - an error based on personal loyalty that later was despicably betrayed.

This is quite aside from numerous other people in the party who have been given roles of prominence despite compromising events in their pasts - just to mention one, the appointment as number-one party candidate in the GLA elections this year of a man with a highly publicised record as a former football hooligan. Against this background, your reference to me reeks of the grossest humbug.

I shall attend your disciplinary tribunal, not because I am in any doubt as to its verdict, which I am certain has been pre-ordained, but because putting it on record that I have done so will be an essential part of the legal action that I shall undoubtedly take against the party if I am found guilty and expelled. We are likely to have, by your choice Tony, a re-run of the fiasco of last year, when you people had to reinstate me, and the cause of nationalism was left some £12,000 poorer in legal expenses as a result of your folly and vindictiveness. Is this what you want? And if it is, I have to ask: is there a Mr. Bountiful standing in the shadows ready to underwrite your costs if the whole thing flops a second time? And if so, who is he? Could he be the same person as is providing subsidies for the BNP's quite preposterous wage bill?

In saying this I do not regard it as a foregone conclusion that a legal action by me against expulsion this time will succeed. It is just possible that it will not. In that case someone else will be challenging Nick Griffin for the leadership of the party in my place, and I shall continue to oppose you with all the resources at my command, if it need be from outside the party at least temporarily. This battle, which you and your friends began back in the 1990s, turning a hitherto united party into a tragically divided one, will not be given up until you people are defeated. On that you have my word.

In ending, I would offer counsel that I am sure you will ignore but which is inserted here for the record. It is that you and Nick Griffin are acting with monumental foolishness in this your latest move. It will be seen by everyone, even many of your own supporters, for the cynical stunt that it is: an attempt to prevent me challenging Griffin in a democratic election for the leadership of the BNP. For a long time you have been vocal in proclaiming to everyone that Mr. Griffin has the support of the vast majority in the party and that a challenge to him by me cannot succeed. Very well, what then could be better than for you people to demonstrate this alleged majority support in the most practical way: by having a leadership ballot and Nick Griffin winning it?

But you seem unprepared to allow this, Tony. Just what are you people afraid of?

Yours faithfully
JOHN TYNDALL

Its a great response to Lebomber - Ha Ha let the battle begin!!