Marmite Threaten to sue BNP

[Pete]

BNP facing Marmite legal action


Unilever says it has not given the BNP persmission

The maker of Marmite is threatening legal action against the British National Party to stop it from using a jar of the spread in a party broadcast.

Unilever said it had not given the BNP permission to use its product and was looking into taking out an injunction.

The BNP's online broadcast was removed from the party's website, but it is still available to view on file sharing website YouTube.

BNP leader Nick Griffin told the BBC the broadcast was created as a spoof.

It appears that the BNP is trying to tap into Marmite's "love it or hate it" advertising slogan.

Unilever said in a statement: "Neither Marmite nor any other Unilever brand are aligned to any political party.

"We are currently initiating injunction proceedings against the BNP to remove the Marmite jar from the online broadcast and prevent them from using it in future."

In the broadcast, a jar of Marmite appears in the top left hand corner of the screen as BNP leader Nick Griffin addresses the camera.

And now that there's been an excuse to bring them up, do you think we can have a shot at discussing the BNP's policies without involking Goodwin's Law? I find their attitude towards supermarkets particularly interesting...

[Bail]

Actually it wasnt the BNP who used the logo. Someone added it to the youtube version after they noticed a similarity between it and the Marmite "love/hate" viral (http://www.youtube.com/marmitevideo)

Some rather unspokesmen like content here: http://bnp.org.uk/2010/04/marmite-smear ... broadcast/

Not that I care. BNP boooo.

[Pete]

Excellent, the story gets more baffling as it goes on

[Gavin Scott]

The British National Party (BNP) are calling for an end to immigration from Muslim nations, saying this presents a "deadly threat" to the UK

The pledge is contained in the party's election manifesto, launched by party leader Nick Griffin in Stoke. The BNP also plan to give grants to encourage some UK residents to return to "their lands of ethnic origin".

The BNP recently changed their whites-only membership policy after it was ruled unlawful by the courts. Their opponents say they are extreme and their policies divisive.

The BNP is targeting Stoke, where they currently have a number of city councillors, plus 333 other constituencies as they seek to get their first MP elected to Westminster. Although they got two MEPs elected to Brussels in last year's European Parliament elections, they received less than 1% of the national vote in the 2005 UK general election.

The BNP are campaigning on a platform of curbing immigration, only allowing new migrants in "exceptional circumstances" and pledging to deport all illegal immigrants.

Mr Griffin said there was only one new commitment on immigration in the manifesto - which would see all citizenship grants approved since 1997 reviewed to see whether they are still "appropriate".

Mr Griffin said the UK was "full-up" and it was time to "close the doors".

The manifesto states "there should be absolutely no further immigration from any Muslim countries, as it presents one of the most deadly threats yet to the survival of our nation".

The party has previously said Islam is incompatible with modern secular democracy.

Mr Griffin said his party would support "decent settled minorities who accept that Britain should remain British".

But Mr Griffin said the manifesto had a "wholly new emphasis" - accusing the media of being "fixated" with immigration - and was focused on rebuilding the economy and employment.

Among other pledges, the BNP wants to leave the European Union, withdraw British troops from Afghanistan and abolish regional development agencies and other quangos. It calls for restrictions on imports from China to help protect jobs in British manufacturing and avert "economic disaster".

[Pete]

The thing that gets me about the BNP is the reporting of them by the press. They always latch onto the immigration / capital punishment whilst ignoring the plethora of shit elsewhere in their manefesto.

And yes of course a lot of their policies are "common sense." Remove troops from Germany because it's a historical anacronism in 2010. Makes sense. But then they want to "Preserve and restore our historic County Regiments" despite there potentially being a myriad of other ways to have the forces organised.

They suggest nurturing British manufacturing whilst restricting imports from China. Well given that a lot of technological manufacturing requires rare earth metals (from China) then how exactly are they going to manage this? There's a one sided system of thinking that suggests they believe that if we suddenly yank all investment from abroad nobody will care and they'll gladly throw their stuff at us (but only a bit, because we need to keep it local).

Oh and don't forget by the way, that they want us to go back to imperial measurements. Because that won't increase costs at all having to print everything twice. What about everyone since the 70s who was taught in kilos?

"The creation of a bulk transport tax regime that pushes supermarkets to supply more local and seasonal produce" yes because Tesco operate the way they do because they like pissing away money on trucks. There are significant economies of scale in the way things are done at the moment, especially with reverse logistics meaning the rubbish goes back to the DC on the van and is processed cetntrally. All this would do would end up with a load more smaller vans darting around instead.

"Invest in a high-speed, magnetic levitation, inter-city rail network" because maglev is so successful everywhere else, and when it was at Birmingham Airport.

"Allow the building of a new privately-funded airport on reclaimed land in the Thames estuary to reduce the pressure on, and stop the constant expansion of, the South East’s airports." So that's build a new airport, to prevent the expansion of airports. uh huh

"The ending of the scandalous and racist neglect that has left working class white boys at the bottom of the table for academic achievement" the what?


If you actually look at their manefesto you realise an awful lot of their policies, whilst "making sense" on the front, join together to form a smoke screen to hide the fact that bar frothing at the mouth, the people at the top don't have any clues.

Exactly how do they intend to "hold the bankers personally responsible" when the law to do so doesn't exist, and whilst their making it the people would piss off to the states, who the wouldn't extradite them because they've got removed the USAF from Lakenheath and Fairford under their "get rid of foriegn bases on our soil" policy.

Local people voting for local candidates, and onto councils, who have - frankly naively - aligned themselves with the BNP, I can sort of understand. They want to give the establishment a bloody nose, they want to break the Westminster Village mentality and they feel it's a way to do so. However I find it very hard to believe that anyone with half a brain would want Nick Griffin as PM with that ragtag load of policies.

[iSon]

The media (rightly or wrongly) fixates on the BNP's policy of immigration because this is the single issue that gains them the most support. OK, they've got a manifesto detailing lots of other guff as well but pretty much they are a divisive party who aim to exploit voters by letting them think it's ok say things like "I'm not a racist, but..."

Of the people I have spoken to who intend to vote BNP - not always for the right reasons - but that's their choice, they are voting because they too reel off the soundbites that "Britain is full" and "they're taking all our jobs". Question a potential voter on what else the BNP stands for and they can't say. But that doesn't matter to people who intend to vote BNP because the single issue of immigration is enough for them.

Is the media right to focus on the one particular issue? Probably not, but perhaps the press and broadcasters don't want to give any airtime to other ridiculous manifesto promises that the BNP have come out with. Because you can better you bottom euro, sorry Mr Griffin, pound that it will make a few others think "that makes sense". Heaven forbid.

[Chie]

A young man who lives across the way from my polling station is playing 'Land Of Hope And Glory' with all his windows open whilst repeating, in the most sincere and deadpan tone of voice over a megaphone, "Vote for the BNP. Think of the children! Vote British National Party!" Would that include the black children and the Asian children? What about the Eastern Europeans??

[Nick Harvey]

Would that include the black children and the Asian children? What about the Eastern Europeans?

Never mind them. They're not British.

[clanguk]

A little out of date, but still amazing how a local paper can influence politics, I can't find their storey on the web (would be pretty bad if it was still up) but this just goes to show how you can influence so many people with just a few words

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greensl ... ction-2010

Needless to say Eric Pickles got in (as he has for the last twenty odd years)!!