Research and analysis

By Tony Peters The resignation of UKIP leader Neil “Liar and Cheat” Hamilton, which takes effect in May, was followed in pretty short order by that of deputy chair Rebecca Jane and, between them, these two departures have set off a fascinating chain of events in what was, once, the UK’s principal far-right party. Hamilton […]

As Patriotic Alternative limps on, its two breakaways are looking to gain electoral success in the May local elections. Paul Gale charts the latest ups and downs of the three rumps One year on from its catastrophic split, the UK’s leading far right group Patriotic Alternative (PA) is raking in the cash but struggling to […]

By Martyn Lester At the end of 2023, when unruly factions of Conservative MPs were demanding that the UK left the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) to make it easier to dump asylum-seekers in Rwanda, most normal people will have been mystified to hear the agitators described in the media as “The Five Families”. […]

In 2023 rival factions lined up to become the new BNP and the new UKIP, each of those parties being obviously on the way to the knackers’ yard, and only remaining registered in the hope of inheritances from some aged nazi or senile Powellite. At the 2024 local elections the competition is different. Who can […]

Poor Laurence Fox, whom some regard as the Basil Brush of right-wing British politics – fond of posing in front of TV cameras and laughing incessantly at his own 70s-style humour – has clearly been traumatised by his humiliation in the London elections, where he was massively overshadowed by, among others, the Animal Welfare Party. […]

As former Head of News at Channel Four, Dorothy Byrne hasenormous experience in broadcasting – and she is worried. She thinks Ofcom’s repeated refusal to punish GB News forserious breaches of impartiality poses a threat to UK democracy The UK Government is much exercised by the need to protect us all against extremism.  A new […]

Nick Griffin is attempting one last return to the leadership of British fascism. As Searchlight has expected, he is formalising links with the Independent Nationalist Network, a faction mainly based in the Midlands. The INN was formed as a split from Mark Collett’s Patriotic Alternative, and it includes some of the many PA members who […]

On 17 April 1999, a Saturday afternoon, a nail bomb tore through a busy market area in the centre of Brixton, south London. It was to herald the start of a deadly neo-Nazi terror campaign, and a desperate hunt for those responsible in which Searchlight was to play an important part. The bomb was a […]

British fascists are blaming each other and sinking further into mutual mudslinging after the far right’s many factions failed to nominate candidates in most areas at the local council elections on May 2nd. Influential neo-nazi umbrella group, Heritage and Destiny, lost no time in going online after nominations closed to describe the right wing showing […]

Review by Andrew Weir L to R: John Heffernan, Jane Horrocks, Jenna Augen The latest example of Germany’s never-ending self-interrogation about Hitler is the darkly satirical play Nachtland – it translates as ‘night-land’ or ‘night-nation’ – by Marius von Mayenburg which closes at London’s Young Vic on 20 April. The choice of date to end […]

by Richard Pembroke The Traditional Britain Group has seen some significant changes over the last 18 months, with expanded internet activity, including a strategic refocus on social media – probably overdue considering the increasing use of the internet by other far-right and extremist groups. These moves can, perhaps, in part be attributed to some significant […]

Britain’s newest neo-Nazi political party has been launched and is officially registered to fight elections. It is led by a much-ridiculed Hitler-lookalike. So is it a joke or to be taken seriously? Mark Scholl investigates… Though he pretty much fits the bill for the title Modern-day Authoritarian Demagogue (and who are we to deny him […]

On Thursday justice finally caught up with Ian Millard, a prolific and rancid antisemite. Millard was once a barrister but has been a persistent if fringe presence on the neo-nazi scene since the late 1970s. He once ran his own micro-party and was closely associated with Lucy Roberts (alias Ludmilla Baack), a leading officer in […]

Good to see that, despite their efforts at whipping up hatred in Llanelli, south Wales, UKIP failed miserably in the local elections , which, unusually, were held on a Wednesday. Their candidate, an anti-net zero former barrister, Hettie Sheehan, polled a mere 27 votes (4.3%) in the county election for Elli ward, and 43 votes […]

UKIP’s disgraced Chairman, Ben Walker, recently fired as a JP for misleading the authorities about his criminal record, may be wishing he was a plumber rather than just a ‘rogue builder’, such are the leaks springing from his floundering boat. The party’s UK Activists Forum WhatsApp group, supposedly the ‘top secret’ preserve of trusted leading […]

It was only back in 2018 that UKIP began tearing itself apart when leader Gerald Batten appointed Tommy ‘Ten Names’ Robinson as the party’s ‘grooming’ adviser. An association with the likes of Robinson was  too much for many members. The link was short lived but the damage was done. Now it seems Robinson is once […]

Gerry Gable Margaret Thatcher Documents from Margaret Thatcher’s Downing Street office, declassified at New Year 2024, show that Thatcher and her closest advisers discussed and approved of a right-wing smear sheet that attacked Searchlight’s editor and publisher Gerry Gable. This smear sheet – British Briefing – was edited by a former MI5 officer whose wife […]

Martyn Lester reviews James Ball’s account of the crazy world of QAnon and conspiracy theories The ‘wellness-to-fascism pipeline’. It was a phrase almost guaranteed to catch our attention, and when we spotted it in the headline of a Guardian feature (‘”Everything you’ve been told is a lie!” Inside the wellness-to-fascism pipeline’) back in August, it […]