Is BNP membership a sackable offence?

[Quinlad]

I was looking through the BNP membership list after it was leaked online and, as well as discovering that the family who live two doors down from me are all members (you really wouldn't have guessed to look at them), I noticed a few teachers, prison officers and servicemen were on the list.

I seem to remember reading that membership of a far right organisation is a sackable offence for police officers? Is that right? And does it apply to other public sector careers like teaching?

[sp1814]

Gromit

You've seen the list???

Where?

I so would love to find someone I know on it. Actually, it might be damaging...suppose I found me mum was on it!!!

[sp1814]

anotheoldgit

I see where you're coming from, but the dearth of senior black policemen would make it unlikely. Also, you have to remember that many BNP supporters actively hate blacks and Asians.

I don't think you could say the same about black policemen. They do a difficult and often dangerous job.

I'll be honest with you - I think you should accord them the same respect that you have for members of the armed services.

[jno]

sp1814, I'm not sure what the legal situation is at the moment, so I won't provide a link, but I don't suppose there's any harm in alerting you to the existence of a search engine called Google?

[sp1814]

jno

Good point.

I did try Google but it just gave me loads of websites reporting the story rather than links to the list itself.

[jno]

sp1814, just checked the latest BBC story and it doesn't appear to be anything to do with a court ruling after all, the original blog owner was just leaned on by the BNP to remove it. So as there seems to be no legal barrier, here's a new link... you'll kick yourself when you see how simple the name is...

http://www.bnpmemberslist.co.uk/

[sp1814]

Hoorah!

I've checked it out with a couple of colleagues at work.

Disappointingly, we've not been able to find anyone we know.

On a serious note - it's pretty poor of the BNP to save their membership list to an unencrypted spreadsheet!!!

Really dumb.

[Gromit]

sp1814

Depending on your browser, you can do a find for the first letters of your town's post code

eg. AB15

And you will be able to find how many members are roundabout.

Incidently, I found the list in a different place, but that site has been overloaded for the past hour.

http://wikileaks.org.uk/leak/bnp-membership-li st.txt

[JockSporran]

Many years ago I was a civil servant and I was browsing through the regulations one day when I came across this little gem:

'Anyone who is known to be a communist or a fascist may not hold the position of Director or above'.

Now, how do you tell if someone is a communist or a fascist? How do you define that? Perhaps it means membership of far left or far right parties?

[Velvetee]

Oh how entertaining seeing this list and checking to see if friends, neighbours or colleagues are on it. Will make fun reading for the next week.

[Velvetee]

Ha ha, just found one, who lives over the road. I'll be sure to send him a Christmas card. Lol

[Therema]

Well i can tell you what one looks like, she's a 5' 2" blonde, med built mother of two sons, not with a skinhead, bomber jacket and doc martin boots, but saying that i do have black and red doc martins, does that answer your question, we ARE all normal people

[dabees]

Someone with too much time on their hands has even marked every members postcode on Google maps.

http://www.bnpnearme.co.uk/

[Velvetee]

There's one just down the road from my old mum too. Think I might know her. It must be quite bad for these people as they will probably face victimisation for their extreme right views. Poor lambs!

[NiceCupOfTea]

Velvetee, I do hope you're being sarcy!

Doc Spock: 'It occurs to me that the BNP say in public what the majority of the public think in private.'

I don�t think the bnp do say in public what the majority of people think in private. You�re insinuating, correctly, that the bnp think racist thoughts. Since the bnp deny thinking racist thoughts, and say that they never say such things publicly even if they do think them, how can the majority of people be thinking racist thoughts?

Doc Spock (2): 'I bet those five survivors of WWI never thought they would see the day.'

I so agree with you. Those survivors also lived through, or fought in, WWII, against fascism. So I highly doubt they did think that they would see the day when a group of people living in the country they fought for would actively support and promote Hitler's views.

[Hammer-Head]

I may be repeating what has already been said but as the BNP is not an illegal organisation I would think you would have a fair case for unfair dismissal if you lost your job.

From Wikipedia:

Freedom of thought (also called freedom of conscience and freedom of ideas) is the freedom of an individual to hold or consider a fact, viewpoint, or thought, independent of others' viewpoints. It is closely related to, yet distinct from, the concept of freedom of expression.

End.

This is one of the 'basic human rights' and as such any employer breaching it by dismissing an employee for his political beliefs would be on thin ice.

Others on here have raised the point that a BNP member would (supposedly) not be able to give an objective opinion in certain cases. Does this also not apply to those of a far left persuasion.

We are all prejudiced to varying degrees.

Until the BNP are declared illegal (and I hope that doesn't happen) then you should be free to express your political beliefs by being a member.