FIREWORKS AS GUY FAWKES THREATENS LIBEL

21-02-2007

Blog wars have reached a new level of intensity after the creator of one of the country's leading political websites was accused of using libel laws to silence his critics. Paul Staines, better known as Guido Fawkes, is reported to have once written to the BNP seeking to foster links with the party when he was a Tory student - but even though he may have an innocent explanation, he now wants the story covered up.

Like some of our colleagues on the net, The Stirrer has been on the receiving end of these legal threats but we believe there is an important public interest in airing this issue.

The controversy dates back to an article published recently on another site www.pickledpolitics.com about Paul Staines, otherwise known as Guido Fawkes, creator of the award-winning www.order-order.com.

(For the record, Staines/Fawkes have never publicly admitted that they are one and the same person, but The Stirrer has written to Guido Fawkes as Paul Staines on several occasions and he has always replied. The Staines/Fawkes link has also been reported on BBC Radio 4).

Anyway, on Sunday 9 February, Pickled Politics re-published a Guardian article from 1986, when Staines (then known as Paul Delaire
Staines) was a leading light in the Federation of Conservative Students whilst attending Humberside College of Further Education.

The paper reported that he had written to the British National Party, with a view to forging links and establishing areas of common interest.

Not surprisingly, given that Fawkes is a known Tory sympathiser, his latter-day rivals in the blogosphere seized on the story, and gave it a good airing.

It was then that Fawkes got heavy, threatening sites that they faced legal action for defamation unless they withdrew the article. Pickled Politics and the others duly obliged.

Along with the warnings, Staines also sent a letter written in 1990 by David Rose, the journalist responsible for the original story, claiming that he had now made a full retraction. Except that he hadn't. As Rose told The Stirrer this week, he still stands by the facts as published, but after writing the piece he had come to know Staines and accepts that he isn't and wasn't a racist.

In the 1990 letter he writes: “”I wrote the article after speaking to you but did not then accept your explanation of what you had done: to wit a letter to your local BNP proposing ‘possible joint future activities' on the basis of your sharing the BNP's objectives.

“You told me then that you wrote this letter as an attempt to trick the BNP, in the hope of perhaps gaining intelligence of its activities and that your motive was only to damage this extreme right-wing organisation.

“At the time I regarded this as absurd but as our acquaintanceship has developed I believe you were telling the truth. I am certain you do not in fact share the odious objectives of the BNP and that in no sense are you a racist.”

Rose goes on to say that Staines' letter was “unwise” and an “act of youthful folly”. (You can read the letter here)

Now we all make mistakes when we are young. But what's baffling is the lengths Staines has gone to in order to cover up this indiscretion. Why is he so unwilling to explain himself?

The Stirrer certainly has no evidence to suggest that he's racist - but we do
believe that given the gossipy, innuendo-laden world in which he operates, it is rather rich for him to try occupying the legal high ground, rather than simply fighting his corner in print.

One blogger told me: “I can't afford a legal action, so when Staines wrote to me threatening libel action what choice did I have? I had to take the item down. In my opinion, he's a bully.”

Another website says Staines himself frequently publishes stories about politicians which paint them in an unflattering light and which come from anonymous sources.

Indeed on his Guy Fawkes e-mail, he invites you to “whisper vicious rumours” and “leak secret documents” to him.

Suffice to say, now the story is about him, Staines has gone curiously quiet - apart from warning The Stirrer of dire legal consequences if we dare to publish this article.