EXCLUSIVE: A secretive Facebook group which has policing minister Chris Philp among its members and where the Mayor of Croydon is an administrator has been sharing content from a far-right mate of the EDL’s Tommy Robinson. By STEVEN DOWNES
Far right: the content being allowed on Mayor Perry’s Facebook group is becoming more extreme
The secretive Facebook group set up by Croydon’s Tory Mayor Jason Perry has now hosted a video rant from a “venomously racist” mate of far-right criminal Tommy Robinson.
Among Perry’s Facebook group’s 2,000 members is Conservative MP for Croydon South Chris Philp, whose government job is… checks notes… the Policing Minister.
“Croydon say no to ULEZ expansion” was set up on the social media platform last year, with the borough’s £84,000 per year Mayor Perry listed as as administrator and “expert”.
It has since courted controversy as its members have posted a series of photos and videos celebrating tens of thousands of pounds of criminal damage to public property.
A warning to members not to encourage such vandalism, and worse, was only added to the group’s rules after Perry and his fellow admins of the private group, several of them Conservative councillors in Croydon, had been approached by investigative journalists following undercover work by Inside Croydon.
And while the warning was hastily added, there has been little effort carried out by Tory Mayor Perry or government minister Philp to clean up the content being published on their group.
Facebook ‘friends’: neither Jason Perry (left) nor policing minister Chris Philp have done little to discourage criminality on their social media group
Philp tried to wash his hands of the material that he can access in the private group by saying: “I cannot be held responsible for what other people post on Facebook groups which I do not administer.”
Even the definitively useless Philp might now want to consider his options over some of the company he has been keeping on the interweb, following the re-publication on his group at the weekend of an 80-second video rant by Liam Tuffs.
Back in September, when Inside Croydon first uncovered the dodgy company that Perry and Philp were keeping online, we described their Facebook group as occupying “one of the darker, murkier corners of the interweb, which is full of blatantly bogus conspiracy theories, racists and Islamophobes, anti-vax and anti-mask cranks, and out-and-out Trump supporters”.
Tuffs ticks several of those boxes.
Anti-Islam: Liam Tuffs (far right)
The video posted on Perry and Philp’s group has Tuffs spreading deliberate disinformation about immigrants getting some kind of priority access to GP appointments and housing.
Tuffs (also known as Liam Gillett) has dabbled in a number of businesses in the past, including as a roofer, running a sex shop and now as the director of a security business registered in Sharpthorne, East Grinstead.
Most recently, he has been enjoying the acclaim he has attracted from running a kind of sub-Trumpian podcast.
In the past, he has even tried his luck as a stand-up “comic”, providing “entertainment” for the Football Lads Alliance, UKippers and others on the far-right at a “freedom” rally organised in Whitehall by notorious racist Tommy Robinson, the founder of the English Defence League.
Real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, “Robinson’s” crime sheet is longer than most people’s arm: he has convictions for violence, stalking, financial fraud, drug possession, using someone else’s passport, using threatening behaviour, contempt of court and public order offences. He had served at least three separate custodial sentences.
Big day out: start as you mean to go on…
As the report in the i newspaper recorded at the time, “A comedian, Liam Tuffs, then railed against ‘snowflakes’ for getting offended, before transitioning into venomously racist jokes against Muslims, while claiming those jokes didn’t make him right wing.
“He also introduced the nonsensical rhetorical flourish, ‘I’m not anti-Muslim, I’m anti-Islam’ that other speakers went on to wield like a blunted sword.”
Others present at the rally included Anne-Marie Waters, ex-leader of UKIP Gerard Batten and “Markus Meechan, known online as Count Dankula, the YouTuber who taught a pug dog to salute the phrase ‘gas the jews’.”
The report continued: “The crowd at the rally itself was less determined to find nuance. One man in the crowd screamed ‘Muslim-loving bitch’ at a policewoman on the perimeter.
“A Muslim family had abuse yelled at it as it passed nearby the rally, and ‘get out of my country’ was shouted multiple times.”
One of the recurring themes of Mayor Perry’s anti-ULEZ Facebook group, and Tuffs’ video rant, is a visceral dislike of London Mayor Sadiq Khan, with barely disguised racism underpinning it all.
From the darker corners of the interweb: the anti-ULEZ lot cannot help themselves
With the London elections now less than four months away, the anti-ULEZ focus of the Tory-endorsed campaign against Khan appears to be running out of steam, as the outer London public come to terms with ULEZ expansion and discover it has not been the end-of-civilisation that the right had predicted.
Another, separate Facebook group, imaginatively titled “Just Stop ULEZ”, attracts a similar type of deep thinker.
They determined that they should kick off 2024 with a protesting “bang”, with an anti-ULEZ rally to be staged in that hot-bed of radicalism, Shirley, last Saturday, January 6.
Unconfirmed reports suggest that no one bothered turning up…
Such a shame: either (a) no one else turned up or (b) some of the anti-ULEZ group can’t even find a rendezvous when using a satnav
Read more: Tory minister is member of online group that salutes vandals
Read more: Met appeals for witnesses after two arrests over ULEZ bomb
Read more: Perry should apologise for anti-ULEZ Facebook group says MP
Read more: ULEZ is here to stay and the health benefits are on the way
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ROTTEN BOROUGH AWARDS: In January 2024, Croydon was named among the country’s rottenest boroughs for a SEVENTH successive year in the annual round-up of civic cock-ups in Private Eye magazine
Croydon Tories have long tolerated racists in their ranks, so helping Islamophobes spread hate and lies comes as no surprise. You’ve heard of a wolf in sheep’s clothing; Croydon Conservatives are fascists in Pride t-shirts
“Wait, it’s *what* kind of pride? I thought it was White Pride! Didn’t I tell you they wouldn’t stop at stealing words for happy.. it’s a ruddy disgrace.”
It’s an Islamophobic dog whistle turned fog horn attack on Sadiq Khan, hatred which the Tories are exploiting and enabling to try and get Susan Hall elected. They’ve tried this before with Zac Goldsmith (and mercifully failed).
In May 2021 a report the Conservatives commissioned on anti-Muslim racism in the party was finally published.
Nearly 3 years later, not only have many of the recommendations in the watered down scope of the investigation been ignored, Tory extremists are deliberately going the other way now
When Perry and Philp next turn up for a selfie with some Muslim community group to wish them a happy Eid, they should be confronted with the evidence of their duplicity – and told to piss off