Danger ahead: National Action - you can ban a name but you cannot ban an idea

Danger ahead: National Action - you can ban a name but you cannot ban an idea

When in 2016 the then Home Secretary Amber Rudd decided to ban National Action and made membership of National Action a criminal offence, she didn't take into account that you can only ban names but banning names doesn't stop an idea from spreading even faster.

A few days ago, Lizzie Dearden writing for The Independent revealed that National Action factions are growing in number. So let's be clear. The then Home Secretary lacked the necessary expertise to deal with the issue and there was no one available to alert about the very serious mistake she was about to make.

After the court trials and the ban, followers of National Action simply went underground and out of sight they can become a lot more dangerous and especially when they are supported by present and former members of the British Armed Forces.

The fall from grace of mainstream political parties and the perception that the political classes have a completely different agenda that is incompatible with the expectations of the British Electorate have created an environment that is fertile ground for organisations like National Action to spread its ideas. Austerity leading to hardship condemning not just the unemployed but also those in employment to a struggle for survival creates exactly what National Action needs. People are fed up, disenfranchised, falling into the hands of loan sharks, feeling unfulfilled, forgotten and thrown aside. 

The news about bank branches closures, closure of branches of well-known retail companies, cuts affecting local schools, the failures of the Welfare State and other big items like the fall of British Steel affecting an estimated 25,000 families are exactly what National Action needs for recruiting ever more followers. There is the feeling of 'they don't care about us'. 

While the present Home Secretary Sajid Javid talks about an update of anti-terror legislation,  what we need is a better deal for families across the United Kingdom. A growing number of cases of suspected mental illness are the direct consequence of people living under enormous stress caused by financial difficulties. Repression will only make existing problems at lot worse. We need to deal with sub-employment - people at work that live in poverty.

By improving living conditions, we can improve physical and mental health, eliminating key factors that lead to extremism and terrorism.