- Robert Henderson (writer)
Robert Henderson (born 1947) is a British writer who has caused public
controversy with his views on racial issues and his letters to the British Prime MinisterTony Blair .Henderson spent his early childhood in
Cheshire before moving toHertfordshire , where he was educated at St Albans School, later graduating fromKeele University . Since then he has lived in CentralLondon . Before retiring due to ill health he worked for the Inland Revenue, while also retaining a strong personal interest incricket . In 1995 he became the subject of huge (mainly negative) attention from the British media after "Wisden Cricket Monthly" published his essay "Is It In The Blood?" (originally titled "Racism and National Identity"), which suggested that theEngland cricket team should only be made up of "unequivocal Englishmen" and called for the non-selection of all non-white cricketers, wherever they were born or brought up, and white cricketers born or brought up outsideEngland (the latter have been a substantial part of the team in recent decades). A legal action taken against "Wisden" by the black England cricketersDevon Malcolm andPhilip DeFreitas was settled out of court.Henderson, claiming media bias against him, and censorship of his views, wrote a number of letters to his constituency Labour MP,
Frank Dobson , and later to Tony Blair (then opposition leader) and his wife Cherie. In March 1997 Blair is said to have contacted the police asking for a means to stop this "pestering"; onMarch 24 1997 a story accusing Henderson explicitly of "pestering" the Blairs appeared on the front page of the "Daily Mirror ". Henderson has frequently claimed thatSpecial Branch and the security services have, on Blair's instructions, interfered with his mail and tapped his telephone.Henderson claims to take his views from all over the political spectrum, and is certainly a supporter of the welfare state and a sympathiser with historical radicals such as the
Leveller s and Chartists. He supports the general concept oflibertarianism but believes that it stops at national borders; he deplores what he calls "liberal internationalism " and is passionately anti-EU . However, his domestic libertarianism leads him to fervently oppose identity cards, which he sees as an infringement of personalliberty and freedom. He displays many tendencies which might be associated with the term Old Right in its British sense, notably his belief that Britain should have retained its "strategic industries" and resisted free trade and globalisation, his opposition to the Iraq war and his particularly strong opposition to immigration and the presence of "racial minorities" in the UK. He is also sceptical of the mainstream scientific consensus onglobal warming . The only MP to have put forward anEarly Day Motion in support of Henderson is the now-retired SirRichard Body , a Tory MP who was sympathetic tonationalism and rejected theeconomic rationalism and pro-globalisation slant of the latter-dayTory party, in 1999.His belief that Britain should be "self-sufficient in all major industries" leads him to criticise strongly
Thatcherism and theNew Right . The phrase most closely associated with him in many circles is "liberal bigot", which he uses to refer to modern-day "mainstream" left-liberals as a means of describing what he sees as their hypocrisy.A political hybrid, Robert Henderson has written most frequently in recent years for the political magazine "
Right Now! " and the English nationalist/cultural magazine "Steadfast". "Right Now" could be described as of the Old Right, while "Steadfast" has wider political appeal (and is becoming increasingly "green"). He has not written for "Wisden" since the 1995 controversy.External links
* [http://www.anywhere.demon.co.uk Collection of Henderson's writing]
* [http://www.geocities.com/blairscandal/ Henderson's 'Blair Scandal' site]
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