Nick Griffin is attempting one last return to the leadership of British fascism. As Searchlight has expected, he is formalising links with the Independent Nationalist Network, a faction mainly based in the Midlands.

The INN was formed as a split from Mark Collett’s Patriotic Alternative, and it includes some of the many PA members who reacted against the over-centralised and money-making approach of Collett’s cult.

For that reason, the INN doesn’t have a leader, but arguably its leading force is Richard Lumby from Wolverhampton (pictured with Griffin) who was West Midlands deputy regional organiser and election candidate in the Griffin BNP.

Lumby has stayed close to Griffin. Although he attended a “unity meeting” in May last year chaired by fellow INN activist Joe Strutt (known online as “Anglo Joe”), at which he discussed reconciliation with Collett and even a possible agreement with the Brtish Democrats, whose leader Jim Lewthwaite also attended the meeting, it always seemed more likely that he would team up again with his old führer.

On June 29th Griffin will speak in the Midlands at an “election training” event hosted by Lumby. Supposedly this will be open to all nationalists and non-factional, but Collett’s followers see it as part of Griffin’s plan to take advantage of PA’s failures. Those most likely to attend the “training” will be the oddballs of British fascism who dislike both Collett and his rival Kenny Smith.

Among these oddballs, the most committed is Alek Yerbury who unlike the others has managed to register a political party. Yerbury’s National Rebirth Party is the political arm of Yerbury’s paramilitary style National Support Detachment. Simply because they have enemies in common, and also because he is one of the few “independent nationalists” who can remain sober for 24 hours, Griffin hopes to get Yerbury onto his team.

For his part, Yerbury has given it a cautious welcome, advising that if any of his supporters feel themselves in need of election training they can attend. But this just shows how low the bar is set: for Yerbury makes clear it’s not about tactics, let alone strategy, but about how to process election nomination papers. However, he may have a point: two out of three proposed Patriotic Alternative candidates in the upcoming council elections failed to get on the ballot paper precisely because they failed to complete the required paperwork.

Joe Strutt, on the other hand, might stay clear of Griffin, as any such association would mean the death of his “unity” strategy.

Griffin doesn’t want his fellow fascists to spend money on elections that would otherwise go to him and his business partner Jim Dowson, but he sees some advantage in putting up local council candidates so that he can pretend to social media followers that he still has some political relevance.

He probably won’t like Searchlight reminding readers that he is now 65 years old. The same age that John Tyndall was when Griffin urged that he should be pensioned off in favour of a younger generation.