Who is behind the anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim and, when all said and done, just plain racist riots that have spreading across the UK over the last couple of days? Fascist groups including Patriotic Alternative and Britain First, who have done their damnedest to incite such angry racism for years, are secretly whooping with delight at what has taken place since the awful Southport murders. But let’s not make the mistake of believing that they actively organised it.

Some of these groups’ members may have been spotted at particular incidents (no one wears a Free Sam Melia T-shirt at random!) but by and large they are just piggybacking events that are perhaps more football hooligan flashmob in nature. These parties (and especially their leaders) are very happy to stand back and let events take their course, without suffering any legal repercussions themselves. And all the time, of course, wringing their hands and saying, “We warned you this would happen…”

PA Deputy Leader Laura Towler, for instance, the wife of race hate jailbird Sam Melia, went online to specifically deny the group had organised anything.

For Britain First’s Paul Golding it was the predictable script: “I don’t condone violence, but can you blame them in Southport for attacking the police …?”

The British Democrats also sought to distance themselves from the violence: “While protesting and demonstrating are within our rights, we must not allow our anger or outside influence to turn the protest into a riot.”

But don’t be misled. This arse-covering blather is purely for public consumption. They may not be orchestrating things, but privately they are delighted at developments.

But even out on the further reaches of the right, there is – predictably – nothing like unanimity.

Dover fascist Steve Laws, who was arrested at the London thugfest on Wednesday, was disappointed “to see our own disavow the people willing to do what was necessary” (translation: attacking the Southport mosque and battering the police).

Peter Rushton, Deputy Editor of the neo-Nazi umbrella outfit Heritage and Destiny, asked: “And just how does a bunch of rioters attacking a mosque (in response to a crime committed by someone with no apparent connection whatever to Islam), or burning a police car, take us any closer to getting our country back? Wasn’t last night a step backwards?”

Alek Yerbury, leader of the emergent National Rebirth Party, denounced the Southport rioters as ‘feral’ and, writing the morning after, said: “By all accounts, there is significant collateral damage to the local population, with gardens destroyed, property smashed and even a shop looted.

“Therefore my recommendation to nationalists in Merseyside is to go to the street in question and offer assistance to the predominantly white British population there in remedying that collateral damage.”

We have no idea how many nationalists responded to Yerbury’s call. We suspect they might have received short shrift from residents had they revealed who they were.

Curiously, Yerbury’s partner, Katie ‘Sanity’ Fanning, took a rather different line:

“I’m rather pleased to see displays of righteous anger taking place across our nation. People ask what will it achieve. Most humans are followers they look to the actions and words of others to see what they should do. Even if they have felt anger towards what is being done to our people and our nations they have thought that to show it would make them outcast which is something the majority fear, when they see growing displays of anger they then feel that it is also OK for them to publicly show theirs.”

If you want to apportion blame for the rioting then most of the opprobrium must fall squarely on the Channel tunneler ‘Tommy Robinson’, his sidekick ‘Danny Tommo’ and their supposedly more respectable enablers such as Laurence Fox, Katie Hopkins and UKIP ersatz leader Nick Tenconi. Those last three were at The Fugitive’s Trafalgar Square rally last weekend, giving his hate-filled activities their shabby seals of approval. Even before that, they had been lionising him on social media. They bear a heavy responsibility.

When the Southport murders were reported they lost no time in peddling the lie-filled narrative doing the far-right rounds, that the alleged killer was a Muslim and an illegal migrant:

‘Hatie’ Katie Hopkins: “His name is Ali al Shaqti…The police are covering up for illegals.”

Laurence ‘Looza’ Fox: “Enough of this. We need to remove Islam from Great Britain. Completely and entirely”.

Nick ‘Temp’ Tenconi alleged that the Southport killer was “under orders”. 

And then there was Nigel Farage.

On Wednesday, this irredeemable wretch of a man went on TV to ask if the public was being deceived about the motive for the Southport attack. Like other attacks, he said, the police have said it was ‘non-terror related’.  Why, he asked, were we always told that such attacks were ‘non-terror related’.

“I just wonder whether the truth is being withheld from us. I don’t know the answer to that, but it is a fair and legitimate question…”

Let’s bounce that back and ask: “Is Nigel Farage a child-molester? We don’t know the answer to that, but it is a fair and legitimate question…”

Neither of those is, in fact, even remotely a “fair and legitimate question” because, of course, there is not the faintest shred of evidence to support either proposition. Both are false. It’s just an utterly dishonest way of floating a scurrilous suggestion in the hope that it will gain some traction. 

We note, in fairness, that Farage’s Reform UK underling Richard Tice has denounced the violence in unequivocal terms. It was, he said, “Appalling and utterly condemned… The full weight of the law must rain down on the rioters.”

Even so, it’s a bit rich coming from someone who has put in a solid shift to whip up prejudice against migrants and asylum seekers, but at least this is direct and unambiguous. Which is more than can be said for Farage. As far as we can tell, he has uttered not a single condemnatory world about the rioters.

The man who bears more responsibility than most for the dreadful events of the last few days is Tommy Robinson’s mate and right-hand man, ‘Danny Tommo’, a criminal lowlife who is more than ever Robinson’s representative in the UK since Robinson scarpered back to Spain at the weekend to avoid a court appearance and probable jail.

It was Tommo, real name Daniel Thomas, who broadcast the call to riot online on Monday night. It was directed at all their mates in various hooligan gangs and football firms round the country – the dregs of the now disbanded English Defence League – and this was the rallying call to which the racist hooligans and far-right thugs responded.

Just recall what he said, filmed fuming in his car:

“Every city has to go up.”

“Get prepared. Be ready. We have to.”

 “It has to go off in different cities.”

“We have to show them we’ve had enough.”

 “I’m ready to go. I know that a lot of you are. I’m speaking to other people at the moment”.

 “We’re ready to go. We are, literally, ready to go.”

“Just get ready.”

It goes without saying, though, that when it did ‘go off’ in Southport, he was nowhere to be seen.

He it was who also helped launch the call for another demonstration in London on Wednesday night. This, too, ended in violence and mayhem, but Tommo – predictably – was not among the 100 or so arrested. According to witnesses, at the first sign of trouble he legged it.

We trust the police will not delay too long before knocking on his door and inviting him to help them with their inquiries.

Robinson himself has started backtracking. The man of many aliases but whose real middle name is ‘Gutless’ is trying to put some distance between himself and the criminal acts of those who attacked police officers whilst chanting his name.

“We will not win our country back by throwing rocks. I fully understand your anger & I stand with the heartbroken & devastated community in Southport…”

A community whose heartbreak he and his vile chums added to immeasurably on Tuesday night.