Andrew Brons: The quiet academic with a 'silly' teenage Nazi past

By Jerome Taylor

Tuesday, 9 June 2009

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Andrew Brons is the BNP's first ME

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A soft-spoken veteran of far- right politics, Andrew Brons appears to epitomise the sort of acceptable face of British nationalism that party leader Nick Griffin hopes will persuade voters that the BNP is no longer an extremist or racist fringe party.

Grey-haired with an almost donnish demeanour, Mr Brons has followed a career as a lecturer in politics at Harrogate College.

But beyond the 61-year-old's smart attire lies a tried and tested far-right pedigree that stretches back half a century.

His first dalliance with extremist far-right politics began at the age of 17 when he joined the National Socialist Movement, an organisation founded on Hitler's birthday in the early 1960s.

NSM members were responsible for numerous attacks on synagogues and Jewish property throughout the 1960s and also spawned John Tyndall who went on to found the second incarnation of the British National Party with his friend Nick Griffin.

Mr Brons joined the National Front in the 1970s when the neo-fascist group was at the height of its power, eventually becoming its chairman after Tyndall left.

Forced out in 1984, he faded from public view until four years ago when he joined the British National Party, eventually standing as an MEP candidate for the European elections.

Asked by The Independent yesterday whether he still held the same beliefs as when he joined the National Socialist Movement, Mr Brons said: "People do silly things when they are 17. Peter Mandelson was once a member of the Young Communist League but we don't continue to call him a communist."

Comments

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"Faded from public view"

1caro wrote:

Tuesday, 9 June 2009 at 01:21 am (UTC)

Is there an archive of Party Political Broadcasts somewhere? If so check 'em out, cos I'm sure you'll find one presented by Bronsy somewhen much later than 1984! I sincerely hope some of the legal tactics proposed against him & Griffin elsewhere succeed. Fingers tightly crossed.

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Got to hand it to these fascists

findempire wrote:

Tuesday, 9 June 2009 at 08:29 am (UTC)

They remain true to their perverted ideology come hell or high weather, unlike Labour, which has gone from socialist to raving neocon/neoliberal almost overnight.

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Good grief!

leedsceltic78 wrote:

Tuesday, 9 June 2009 at 07:07 pm (UTC)

He was my tutor at Harrogate College. I am absolutely stunned by this - I had no idea he had extreme right-wing views. He was kind and supportive to all students, and was extremely popular around the college.

If I had known all those years ago as an 18 year old that he had been involved with the National Front, I would have probably held some kind of protest in his lectures!

I am pretty shaken by this, I have to say. He was somebody I really looked up to and now I discover his abhorrent views many years later.

I need a drink!!! :-(

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Re: Good grief!

butcoulditbe wrote:

Wednesday, 10 June 2009 at 03:28 pm (UTC)

Okay, so you are discounting the validity of your actual experience of someone because of the way a newspaper presents the details of his biography...

Is it not possible for people to change and develop? I thought that was an essential belief of progressive politics. If indeed Peter Mandelson is no longer an advocate of Stalinism (I wonder!), maybe Andrew Brons is no longer an advocate of Hitlerism...

The worst possibility for the media and "old gang" parties would be if the BNP mean what they say when they say that they have changed... Is that why it is so unthinkable?

So maybe the Andrew Brons you knew personally really had moved on from his "silly" (ghastly) youth...

Cheers!

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