“We haven’t seen this kind of racism on our streets ever – where people don’t feel safe going to work, children don’t feel safe going to school.”
That was how Stand Up To Racism (SUTR) organiser Sam introduced a rally in Windrush square yesterday (10 August) one of several organised as part of a national day of protest against recent far right attacks on refugees and asylum seekers.
Speakers included Bell Ribeiro-Addy, MP for Clapham and Brixton Hill, who said people like her, who are Black, from Asian communities, from migrant communities, “know that racism exists in this country”.
But to see people committing acts of violence that were racist and Islamophobic, “you think to yourself, will I ever truly belong in this country?
“But then on Wednesday,” she told the rally in Windrush Square, “when we saw the sight of people standing up to those fascist thugs and so many other people saying that, no matter what we face as people of colour, no matter what they face as refugees, they can see that there are many, many more people like you than they are those disgusting racist thugs.”
She was really worried about how these events were characterised as “protests”.
“When people gather deliberately for violence to commit racist and Islamophobic acts to attack specific communities. That is not a protest.
“Some of these people stormed into a refugee hotel to set them on fire,” the MP said.
“So don’t call them pro-British protests, because there’s nothing pro-British about them.
“Refugees are welcome here. Everybody, no matter what their colour, their race, their religion, is welcome here, and we need to keep shouting that as loudly as we can.”
Lambeth councillor Martin Abrams, who represents St. Leonards ward in Streatham, said he had been “shocked to the core” by recent events.
The far right had hijacked the horrific murders in Southport to push their fascist agenda. “The levels of flagrant Islamophobia and racism have been absolutely shocking”.
But, he went on, “I’ve also been filled with hope as anti-fascists, trade unionists, Muslims, Jews, people of colour, and members of all faiths, and none, turned out in their thousands and saw off the fascists.”
The last Tory government had spent 14 years demonising migrants and helping to spread racism and Islamophobia through their devastating “hostile environment” policies.
Abrams, who has been suspended from Lambeth council’s Labour party group for voting against its policy on Gaza, also criticised some Labour MPs for “disgracefully meeting with far-right groups to listen to their racist ‘legitimate concerns’,” and prime minister Keir Starmer for instructing Labour MPs and councillors not to not attend anti-fascist counter protests.
“As a Jewish councillor in the Labour party, I am so angry that for 10 wasted years we’ve had the entire media and most of the political class gaslight us that left wing racism and anti-semitism was the biggest threat, whilst also simultaneously peddling racist and Islamophobic rhetoric and fanning the flames of the actual real threat, the far right,” said Abrams.
“We need to keep sending a message that we are one people and we will not be divided by fear and hate. Our diversity is truly our strength and we are united in one struggle. We have to fight these fights every generation,” said Abrams.
“Friends, the real enemies of the working class, travel by private jet, not migrant dinghy.”
Phoen!x, from the Black Music Movement, spoke of his experience with during the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020 and 2021.
“I’m here today to say that these riots may have been the most visible thing that we have seen, but there are many other smaller stories that we do not hear about in the media, but require the same attention.
“I wish I could be as positive as everyone else about the mobilisation we saw on Wednesday, but I saw it before in 2020. And we said we need to maintain this energy going forward, and, unfortunately, I feel a lot of people didn’t. So here we are again.”
“I’m an immigrant,” said Denise Henry, a member of the national executive of the National Education Union teachers’ trade union, “I came here to teach. I’ve done 22 years in the system.”
“I just want to say to you: we will not be fearful, we’ll not be silent, and we’ll stand together. When we stand together, we can win.”
Saml Uwadiae a University and College Union member from Croydon College, told the rally: “It is my, it is our, responsibility to stand up to racism. It is our responsibility to change the narrative. It is our responsibility to end the scapegoating. But it is imperative that we work collectively and collaboratively.
“So in order for us to make all these changes, it is also important that we stand together; we hold our line.”
“I’m speaking as a person that’s been on this fight for my whole life,” said Maurice Mcleod, a Wandsworth councillor, who said watching pictures of far-right violence “took me back to the National Front going P-word bashing.”
He had been deeply moved to see so many people turn out at a rally to counter the far right in Walthamstow. “Standing shoulder to shoulder with anyone that’s under attack. Standing shoulder to shoulder with our neighbours when they’re being terrorised. That’s what’s happening.”
Umar Mahmood, a local Muslim community activist, said he moved to Lambeth from Bradford when he was young. “I came from pretty much an all-Asian community to, at the time, an all-Black community.
“What we realised was that there’s a lot of divisions, but actually, there’s a lot that brings us together.”
People would be wrong to think that today “we’re only coming out because something has happened. “Actually, that’s not the case. We come together year on year, month on month, whether it’s to celebrate a Jewish holiday, whether it’s a Muslim festivity, whether it’s Easter or Christmas, or whether we’re celebrating Remembrance Sunday, here literally in Windrush Square.”
Mahmood said that when he saw blatant Islamophobia being peddled by the far right in interviews and radio call-ins, it took him back to Remembrance Sunday last year when, probably at the height of the Palestine Israel conflict, “we did not allow divisive politics to divide our faith leaders.
“I, alongside our Jewish and Christian and other faith leaders, came together and we stood strong.
“We will not allow people to divide us, to spread hate, or to allow rampant racism to seep into every aspect of our society.
“We need to ensure that we’re countering their negative narrative about the Muslim community. Our mosque was targeted, which is based in Stockwell. We’ve had our imam’s car window smashed.”
He invited all present to the Stockwell Mosque “to have lunch with us and see what the mosque is about,” after next Friday’s prayers. “Everyone is welcome here in Lambeth, and everyone is welcome to our mosque.”
South London Stand Up To Racism is organising a meeting at Brixton’s Karibu Centre next Saturday (17 August).
