When the wine is flat and the curry has gone cold

Another far-right rally on a summer’s day. What could possibly go wrong?

Just over a year ago the worst outbreak of public disorder in living memory swept across Hull city centre.

Police officers were attacked and injured, shops were looted, properties were damaged and completely innocent people inadvertently caught up in race-fuelled mob violence genuinely feared for their lives.

They included a family who locked themselves in a garage for their own safety while morons outside set fire to tyres and vehicles on their forecourt and shouted “Kill them”. Nearby, three men were forced to flee from a car as some of the same morons surrounded it and started to smash it up.

The trigger for all this was a rally organised by John Francis Gilling, founder of a group called Hull Patriotic Protestors.

Although his surname is Gilling, he’s often referred to as John Francis so I’ll stick with the latter in this latest update because he’s at it again.

The idea to hold a Stop The Boats rally in Queen Victoria Square on the first Saturday of August last year was decided by Francis and some of his group members in early July.

It’s highly unlikely at that stage they were aware that an annual multi-cultural festival was already scheduled to take place in the same spot on the same day.

What is known is that just days before the rally was due to happen Francis was asked by Humberside Police to cancel it.

The police request was made in the wake of the horrific attack earlier that week on a group of young children and their teachers at a dance studio in Southport in which three girls died.

Riots triggered by a tidal wave of online misinformation about the attack first erupted in Southport outside a mosque before spreading nationwide.

John Francis at last summer’s Stop the Boats rally

Sensing the potential for Francis’ rally to start a riot in Hull, the police asked him to pull the plug. Crucially, he refused.

In a subsequent TV interview Francis defended his decision to go-ahead with the rally with a frankly ridiculous statement.

Referring to a conversation with the unnamed police officer asking him to consider cancelling, he said he told him: “If I cancel it people are going to turn up anyway. It’s out of my hands now.”

At that moment, he could chosen to de-escalate. He didn’t. It was a deliberate act.

Instead, he posted a message in the Hull Patriotic Protestors’ Facebook group advertising the event. His only words of restraint were: “Try to be as sober as you can. There will be plenty of time for drinking afterwards.”

By then he had decided to add a vigil for the murdered girls in Southport to the rally’s anti-migrant agenda, appealing for people to bring flowers and teddy bears. Genuine sympathy or cynical provocation? I would suggest the latter.

Unlike Francis, the multi-cultural carnival organisers had heeded police concerns by hastily moving their event to another location outside the city centre. The last-minute decision wasn’t ideal for those involved but at least they acted responsibly.

So the Stop The Boats rally went ahead, initially without any police in attendance before a surprisingly thin blue line of officers belatedly arrived at Queen Victoria Square to act as buffer between the Hull Patriotic Protestors standing on the raised terrace next to Queen Victoria’s statue and a group of counter-protestors gathered together on one side of the square.

Wearing a Stop The Boats t-shirt, Francis was front and centre throughout the rally. Speaking about migrants, he shouted into a microphone: “Do one, I don’t want you here.” He would later admit that describing them as “an influx of illegal invaders” was “not the best choice of words”.

The violence started as the rally was coming to a close. Eggs and flour were hurled in the direction of the counter-protestors, some in the crowd watching Francis and his colleagues surged towards them, the thin blue line of police officers was forced to retreat and scuffles started to break out. Sadly, the rest is history.

In the TV interview, Francis refused to accept his rally had triggered the following riot but the ugly events that day had been slowing brewing for over five years and he had been at heart of much of it.

Back in January 2019 a group called Yellow Vest Hull took to the streets, initially protesting about the apparent inability of the government to deliver Brexit. Accompanying placards were also anti-BBC and pro-UKIP.

Within two months the Yellow Vest Hull Facebook page was re-posting support for ex-English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson who was organising “Brexit Betrayal” rallies.

In December 2021 a new group emerged called United Hull: Hull Against Grooming Gangs with several Yellow Vest Hull members joining its ranks. Its title would later change to United Hull: Supporting All Survivors of Sexual Abuse and John Francis would become its leader.

By now, Yellow Vest Hull was protesting against Covid vaccinations and denouncing the NHS. As well as street protests, both groups were active in private Facebook groups and on YouTube.

However, some were offering an opposing view.

In February 2022 a group called Hull City Football Lads and Lasses Against Fascism spoke out against United Hull and a planned march through the city. It said: “We believe they are using victims of abuse to hide behind to subtly spread a divisive agenda. United Hull have chosen to start their march from the car park near the MKM Stadium on a matchday in order to garner some popular support from those attending the game and then wanted to march down Spring Bank, a multicultural street in the city.

“This is similar to the tactics used by the National Front and the British National Party in the past. They will be hoping to provoke a reaction from those reside down Spring Bank in order to reinforce their claim that these communities are supportive of child-grooming which of course is not the case.

“United Hull are an example of a new tactic of the far-right, that is to hide behind worthy and emotive issues such as stopping child abuse, pretending to care about Veterans’ mental health and homelessness. They try to intertwine their hatred for those communities they do not see as ‘traditionally’ British with blame for the issues we see in society - and disgustingly manipulate those who have suffered from these issues such as abuse survivors.”

In July 2023 Francis set up Hull Patriotic Protestors after stepping away from leading United Hull, although members of both groups would continue to appear as speakers at each others’ rallies. The new group’s focus was mainly immigration.

In May 2024 Francis stood as an Independent candidate in a city council election in the city’s Orchard Park and Greenwood ward. Although he finished a distant fifth, I’m told he’s considering standing again next year.

Several rallies led up to the one in August. You can watch most of them in a cursory search on You Tube if you really want to see a group of mainly old angry white men shouting a lot.

Francis himself has admitted to being a former member of the English Defence League in his younger days although today he denies being racist and frequently repeats the mantra: ‘Black, Brown and White Unite’.

Another ex-EDL Hull figure William Riley was among those jailed for his part in the August 3 riot. He was handed an 18-month sentence after pleading guilty to violent disorder and assaulting a police officer. At the time, he was filmed wearing a baseball cap featuring the name of the charity One Punch Hull, which seeks to raise awareness of the risks of single punch attacks.

There’s another image of him minus any headwear back in his EDL days standing next to John Francis, the pair of them holding up a Hull City EDL flag.

Francis’ claims that his group is not racist also appear to odds with the actions of Christopher Douglas, one of the first to be jailed after the riot. He stood directly behind Francis and other speakers under the statue of Queen Victoria making Nazi salutes during the rally before becoming embroiled in the violence that followed.

When he was jailed for two years and eight months, CCTV shown at Hull Crown Court captured him throwing missiles, pushing police, shouting abuse and, at one point, stealing a riot shield and brandishing it above his head.

In the TV interview, Francis said he had no immediate plans to hold organise another rally.

Conveniently for him, his friend and another former EDL figure Scott Pittsy obliged by organising one just two months later under the faintly ludicrous title of Rise of the Foot Soldier.

Leeds-based Pittsy had spoken at previous rallies in Hull, including some organised by Francis, although not the one on August 3.

Among them was a march and rally by the group Patriotic Alternative when he appeared alongside its Hitler-lookalike leader Alex Yerbury. Holding the group’s banner that day was John Honey who would later be jailed for two years and eight months after pleading guilty to racially-aggravated criminal damage, violent disorder and burglary committed during the August 3 riot.

Pittsy had also led a far-right takeover of what had previously been local community protests at plans to house asylum seekers at the former RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire.

However, anti-fascist magazine Searchlight later revealed a bust-up between Pittsy and another far-right activist who he claimed had emptied £2,000 GoFundMe account set up to support the camp set up outside the base at Scampton.

In a Facebook post Pittsy named the alleged thief, claiming he had stolen the money to “get pissed and smoke there (sic) heads off” at another protest camp in Gloucestershire.

As the saying goes, grifters are gonna grift.

Pittsy’s Rise of the Foot Soldier rally in Hull turned out to be a bit of a damp squib. Only a small group turned up, most of them from Hull Patriotic Protestors, while a sizeable counter-protest also took place.

Francis again spoke at the rally, delivering his now familiar rant about immigration. He was heckled throughout and you can watch a video of some of it here

with Pittsy featuring prominently in a bright red puffa jacket.

Make your own mind up whether they seem like the types to invite round for a polite chat about what’s wrong with the world over a nice cup of tea.

I mentioned earlier that Francis is now at it again because later this month he’s got another rally planned for Queen Victoria Square, once again being promoted as a Hull Patriotic Protestors’ event and billed as a “Peaceful static demonstration”.

On the agenda are a familiar series of grievances - immigration, “two-tier justice”, grooming gangs and what Francis describes in a video promoting the rally as “far-left fascism”.

In the video posted on the Yellow Vest Hull Facebook group (yes, they’re still around), he also suggests a new hardline far-right neo-Nazi group called White Vanguard might be planning to “hijack” the rally and tells them to stay away.

“If you are thinking of coming to any of our demos in Hull, please don’t come. We don’t want you. We are not a racist group. We have got no problem with the colour of a person’s skin. We are a group of people who are concerned about issues in this country.

“So if you’re thinking of coming and hijacking’s our demo, please don’t do it because you’re just going to spoil it for a lot of good people.”

I’m not sure he sees the irony of asking a far-right group to avoid inflaming a potentially volatile situation.

Despite the company he keeps, Francis continues to deny that either he or his group are racist.

Whether he is or not might be resolved one way or another early next year when he stands trial on a charge of racially aggravated harassment along with another charge of threatening behaviour.

Both charges relate to an alleged incident in Hull in October 2023 - nine months before he decided to ignore police advice and go ahead with the August 3 rally last summer.

He has already pleaded not guilty to the charges and remains on unconditional bail until a summary trial scheduled for January.

In the meantime, perhaps new Hull and East Yorkshire Mayor Luke Campbell might fancy sparing the city centre from more potential damage and the need to deploy extra police officers by calling on Francis and his friends to call off the event.

After all, Hull Patriotic Protestors publicly backed Campbell as the Reform UK candidate during the recent election campaign and he’s yet to make any comment on whether he wants to be associated with them or not.

Having ignored the police last year, perhaps they might listen to the man they hailed as “The New Reformet” just a few weeks ago.

Personally, I’m not holding my breath on that one.