The famous gesture by John Carlos (right of photo) and fellow medal winner Tommie Smith epitomised resistance to racism.

He will speak in London on 21 May at a meeting organised by members of the RMT trade union on the London Underground and sponsored by the Fire Brigades Union.

>> More information and online booking

John Carlos will be joined at the meeting – ‘Resistance: the true Olympic spirit’ – by Doreen Lawrence, whose son Stephen was murdered by racists and whose long battle for justice brought the conviction of two of his killers earlier this year.

Also on the platform will be Janet Alder, whose brother Christopher died in police custody, and UAF joint secretary Weyman Bennett.

>> Download leaflet

The meeting takes place at 6pm at Friends Meeting House, Euston Road, central London. Entrance is free.

Picture (c) PA Photos Ltd

We will be touring London to get the vote out against the BNP, which is aiming to secure a seat through the ‘top-up list’ in the elections for the Greater London Assembly. The danger is that the fascist party could regain a seat on the GLA with just 5% of the vote.

This means it is very important to use your vote – casting your vote for other parties will help drive down the BNP’s percentage of the total poll.

We will be distributing thousands of leaflets to voters in busy parts of town and the cavalcade of vehicles will have live music from Love Music Hate Racism – including dhol drumming from the Dhol Foundation and
soul, gospel and rap from Blessed Souls.

We will be getting the message across loud and clear – use your vote against the BNP.

Join the cavalcade or leafleting along the route

The cavalcade will go from south London to west London on Saturday 28 April and across east London on Sunday 29 April.

You can join the cavalcade for the whole journey or part of it – phone UAF on 020 7801 2782 for more details.

You can join us to leaflet along the route of the cavalcade at the following times and places:

Saturday
11am – clock tower, Lewisham
12am – opposite Brixton tube station
1.30pm – in front of Southall Park, Uxbridge Road (near Southall police station)
2.30pm – opposite Uxbridge tube station
3.30pm – to be confirmed

Sunday
12 noon – top of Brick Lane, on Osborn Street
3pm – opposite Forest Gate police station, Green Street, Newham
5pm – opposite Barking tube station

>> For campaigning outside London, go here

Campaigning dates for the 3 May elections – get the vote out against the fascist camidates.

Antifascists will stage a mass leafleting against the British National Party and other fascist candidates at Kings Cross station from 5pm on Tuesday 17 April.

The campaigning event, aimed at ensuring Londoners use their votes to stop the BNP getting a GLA seat, and urging commuters to vote against fascist candidates elsewhere, is backed by the RMT transport union and the NUT teachers’ union.

If you are able to, please come along and join in the leafleting from 5pm, at Kings Cross station.

Local UAF groups are organising campaigning against fascist candidates around the country. Local UAF groups are asked to get in touch with the UAF office with details of activity in their areas. This list of activities will be updated as more details come in.

>> Download election leaflets

London tube leafleting on Tuesdays

UAF will be leafleting tube stations every Tuesday evening before the elections. If you would like to leaflet a tube station contact UAF on info@uaf.org.uk or 020 7801 2782.

More campaigning dates

There will be a cavalcade of cars across London on the weekend of 28 and 29 April.

>> Go here for details about the cavalcade and leafleting along the route

West Midlands
Walsall – Saturday 21 April
Cannock Chase – Sunday 22 April
Email Norscarf for more details or if you need transport from Stoke.

Nuneaton & Bedworth – Sunday 29 April
Leafleting day in the Nuneaton wards. We will be based at the Jubilee Sports Centre, Greenmore Road, Nuneaton, CV10 7EZ from 10am till 3.30pm. People can come and go and join in for shorter sessions as well as the whole/half day. Food and drinks available.

Text 07766 900 443 if you would like to attend and need transport from Coventry.
Email Norscarf for transport from Stoke

Cambridge
Saturday 21 April, Market square from 11.30am till 1.30pm. Leafleting Cambridge United football ground from 2.15pm – Please email Cambridge UAF for details.

Leeds
Saturday 14 April, Middleton ward, 11am
Saturday 21 April, Morley ward, 11am
Saturday 28 April, Middleton ward, 11am
Contact Yorkshire UAF

Sheffield, Rotherham and South Yorkshire
Saturday 21 April, Sunday 22 April, Saturday 28 April Sunday 29 April – leafleting sessions.
Contact Sheffield UAF

Epping Forest
Sunday 22 April, 11am – leafleting Loughton Broadway. For further details contact Waltham Forest UAF.

The home office, based in central London, has a large number of black and ethnic minority staff and visitors, and rightly does not allow staff to be members of far-right organsiations.

It is appalling that civil service staff going about their work should be threatened by the EDL’s racist and fascist thugs outside their workplace.

UAF has called a counter-protest against the EDL, backed by the home office workers’ PCS trade union, for Tuesday 17 April, from 1pm to 3pm.

Assemble 1pm, Home Office, 2 Marsham Street London SW1P 4DF.

PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka condemned the EDL’s plan to demonstrate outside his members’ workplace, saying:

We are proud to be a part of the sustained opposition to the BNP that has almost entirely forced them off our streets and out of our council chambers.

We are also fully committed to opposing the EDL whose disgusting politics of hatred and division have no place in our communities.

This [EDL] demonstration is clearly designed to do nothing more than intimidate and stir up racial tension, and it should be stopped.

UAF supporters will later join a leafleting session at Kings Cross station, urging commuters to use their votes to stop the British National Party and other fascist candidates at the elections.

UPDATE 23.04.12: for a report on this demo, go here

MfE supporters and flags are regularly in evidence at demos organised by the racist and fascist thugs of the EDL.

Their Brighton event is also being backed by the EDL-linked racist football hooligan organisation Casuals United, which has told supporters not to wear ‘colours’ – EDL or Casuals clothing or insignia. They want to pretend their racist demo is just a St George’s day event.

Antifascists are determined to expose and oppose these racists. UAF supporters an other antifascists will meet on Queens Road, at the top of Gloucester Road at 11.30am on Sunday 22 April.

Public meeting

Brighton UAF has also organised a public meeting, titled ‘How should we oppose racism and fascism?’ on Tuesday 17 April at 7pm, South Wing Community Base.

The meeting will be chaired by Professor Raf Salkie, with speakers including Simon Burgess (Labour party), Phelim McCafferty (Green party) and longstanding UAF and Love Music Hate Racism activist Lee Billingham.

Pic by musical photo man

This list will be updated as more transport is organised – latest update 25 April

>> Why you should be in Luton on 5 May

>> Statement signed by Luton MP, trade union branches and community groups

>> Download demo leaflet here

Barrow
Phone 07866 852 489 or email

Birmingham
Phone 07949 622 903

Bolton
6am, leaves city centre
Phone 07903 586 191
Tickets £25/£15

Brighton
Phone 07765 677 822 or email
Tickets £10/£5

Bristol
8am, from city centre
Phone 07903 253 028

Burnley
Phone 07817 688 835 or email

Cambridge
10am, The Backs, Queens Rd
Tickets – £5/£3
Email

Coventry
Phone 07766 900 443

Dudley/Sandwell
Phone 07506 231 737

Hull
Email
Tickets £14/£7

Leicester
9.15am, leaves from opposite Secular Hall, Humberstone Gate
Email
Tickets £10/£5

London

Brent and Camden
Phone 07900 558 014 or email
Tickets £15/7

East London
Phone 07967 169394 or email

Hackney/Walthamstow
9am, leaves Hackney Town Hall, Mare St
9.30am, leaves Walthamstow Town Hall
Email

Islington
Phone 07551 626 321 or email
Tickets £10 employed /£5 concessions

West London
8.30am, Kingston University
9am, Ealing Broadway tube
Tickets £10/£10
Email

Liverpool
Phone 07817 688 835 or email

Manchester
7am, leaves city centre
Phone 07903 586 191
Tickets £25/£15

Nottingham
8.15am, leaves from Nottingham Royal Centre
Email
Tickets – £7/12

Oxford
Leaves 9.15am
Phone 07503 169 657 or Email

Portsmouth
9am, The Hard
9.15am, Students Union, Cambridge Rd
9.30am, Fratton Bridge
Phone 07954 218 281 or email
Tickets £15/£10

Preston
Phone 07801 914 541

Sheffield
Phone 07545 197 939 or email
Tickets £15/£8

South Wales
6.30am, the Guildhall, Swansea, SA1 4PE
7am, Sarn Park Services, Bridgend, CF32 9RW
7.30am, National Museum steps, Cardiff, CF10 3NP
8am, Newport bus station, NP19 0WF
Tickets £15 waged/£10 concessions
Phone 07737 470 156 or email

Stoke-on-trent
Phone 07432 491 655

Telford and Shrewsbury
Phone 01952 567 111

Wolverhampton/Walsall
Phone 07506 231 737

UAF is mobilising nationally for this demo.

>> Why you should be in Luton on 5 May
>> Download demo leaflet here
>> National transport to the demo

Statement

‘We are Luton’ has produced a statement against the EDL, urging support for the march.

The English Defence League (EDL) has announced its intention to come to Luton on May 5th. When the EDL came here last year the lives of ordinary citizens were severely disrupted. We do not want this to happen again.

The EDL is a racist group dedicated to promoting hatred and intolerance in society. Islamophobia – bigotry against Muslims – is as unacceptable as any other form of racism. The EDL aims to create divisions in society by using diversity as a cause for hatred rather than celebration. There is no place for the EDL in Luton’s multiracial, multicultural and multi-faith community.

We urge all decent people in Luton, irrespective of colour, faith or beliefs, to join the peaceful ‘We are Luton’ multicultural celebration, marching from Wardown Park to St George’s Square on May 5th.

Signatories

Bury Park Youth Organisation, Mitalee Youth Association, Luton Council of Mosques, Inspire FM, Bangladeshi Youth League, Bengali Women’s Project, Luton Somali Forum, Ethnic Minority Project, Community Magazine, ASR Youth Project, Luton Bury Park Business Community, Pakistan Kashmir Youth Forum, Kelvin Hopkins MP, Luton NUT, Eastern Region Unite, Eastern Region PCS, Eastern Region CWU, Luton TUC, Beds TUC, Luton and Beds Green Party, University of Bedfordshire Unison

A coalition of local trade unionists and community groups in Luton is organising the march against the EDL.

>> Read the ‘We Are Luton’ statement and initial list of supporters

This will assemble at 11am, Wardown Park, New Bedford Road, Luton LU3 1LP and march to St George’s Square in the centre of town.

>> Download demo leaflet here

>> National transport to the demo

We want as many people as possible from around the country to join the protest against the EDL, which has called its own demo in Luton on that day.

Luton is where the EDL was formed, after a balaclava-clad mob of violent racists ran rampage through the town in 2009.

Reject

But Luton does not belong to the EDL – it is a multiracial, multicultural town where the overwhelming majority of local people reject the EDL’s message of anti-Muslim racist hate.

In September, thousands of antifascists successfully stopped the EDL from setting foot in Tower Hamlets – the demo they had described as their ‘big one’. The 600 EDL thugs who turned out could not set foot accross the borough boundary.

The day was a victory for all those who oppose the EDL.

But the EDL has not been knocked out and has been able to regroup in some areas – helped by irresponsible national TV coverage and the decision by police to let just 450 EDL supporters march through Leicester.

Opposed

And Luton is where they want to rally their forces and boost themselves up. Last year, they brought around 3,000 to Luton – above their usual turnouts at the time.

They were opposed by demonstrators in the centre of town and by huge numbers of people who gathered in Bury Park – which has a large Muslim population – to defend the local area from the EDL.

Now we need to make sure there are huge numbers of people on the Luton march against the EDL on 5 May, to deal a decisive blow against the racists and fascists in the town they seek to claim as their ‘home ground’. We want to show them they are not welcome in Luton – or anywhere else.

We will have details of national transport soon. Be in Luton on 5 May to say no to the EDL!

We’ve already had a number of donations sponsoring UAF member Rachel who will run the Cambridge Half Marathon next month to raise funds for UAF.

Sponsor Rachel

Rachel is in training now for the race on 11 March – and supporters have started sending in their donations to speed her on her way.

Thanks this week to: LB £20, FO £5, JA £5, JG £25, MD £10, SB £30, NF £10, MC £10, RR £25, AB £26, DW £10, MS £10, SB £5.

The total so far stands at £191. Please sponsor Rachel and help raise fund to support UAF’s campaigning work.

>> Read more: Rachel explains why she is running for UAF

UAF member Rachel will be taking part in the Cambridge Half Marathon on 11 March to raise money for UAF.

Sponsor Rachel

Rachel, who has been a member of UAF since it was launched in 2003, will be training through the cold winter months for her fundraising race – and we’re urging supporters to sponsor her.

Please click the Donate button to sponsor Rachel’s half marathon run. You can use a credit or debit card or a PayPal account if you have one to back Rachel and UAF.

Rachel explains why UAF and antifascism are so close to her heart:

For my 13th birthday, my parents gave me a copy of Anne Frank’s diary and her account of the bravery of her family and those who gave them a hiding place at great risk to their own safety has stuck with me ever since.

The need for people of all ages and backgrounds and of all faiths and none to stand together against the racism and bigotry of the far right is essential if we are to ensure the events of the Nazi’s Holocaust are never to be repeated.

I am proud to be running the Cambridge Half Marathon on 11 March to raise money for UAF, an organisation I believe has always worked hard to convince and persuade people to confront the violence and lies of the English Defence League and other racists and fascists wherever they have tried to organise in their towns and cities.

I have also been actively engaged in UAF as a representative in my own trade union. In Germany, trade unionists were one of the first groups of people to face persecution from the Nazis while, in Britain, trade unions were at the forefront of organising opposition to Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists.

The theme of this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day on 27 January was “Speak Up Speak Out” and it is in this tradition that trade unions stand when challenging discrimination and inequality both inside and outside of the workplace.

A Half Marathon isn’t what you normally might expect trade union reps to be doing, but if every one of you is able to give what you can spare, it will help raise the profile of UAF and give confidence to those communities and individuals facing the bigotry of the EDL and other far right groups.

We’ll be cheering Rachel on all the way on 11 March – please add your sponsorship now!