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Anti-Muslim racist Tommy Robinson has been promoting, wearing and selling supposedly patriotic clothes made by Muslims in foreign sweatshops, the Daily Mail can reveal.
Just last month, Robinson and his followers wore his branded merchandise during the anti-Muslim Unite The Kingdom (UTK) march.
On the day of the rally, Robinson told his followers on X: ‘If you want UTK merch you can get it here,’ with a link to the website.
The online store sells a variety of products emblazoned with Union Jacks, St George’s Crosses and the Unite The Kingdom logo.
However, these products are not produced in the United Kingdom. The manufacturer is a Belgian company called Stanley/Stella, which is based in Brussels, and the products are made in a factory in Bangladesh.
More than simply using Muslims to make these ‘patriotic’ shirts for his anti-Muslim supporters, Robinson has also chosen to use an incredibly controversial manufacturer.
According to the latest audit of Stanley/Stella by the FairWear Foundation, the company pays its Bangladeshi workers the equivalent of around 36p per hour.
The manufacturer has previously faced accusations that it uses a model of low income and poor working conditions, also known as sweatshops, to keep costs low and profits high.
However, such contradictory behaviour is nothing new for the English Defence League founder.
Robinson is the anti-immigration darling of racists and far-right hooligans, but is himself a second-generation immigrant (his mother was an Irish immigrant) who hides behind a name borrowed from a Luton football hooligan (his real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon).
Last year, he criticised the UK authorities for calling Southport child murderer Axel Rudakubana a ‘Wesh Christian’, but as a fellow second-generation immigrant, Tommy Robinson is as much English as Rudakubana is Welsh.
Then there’s his preferred campaigning interests — one of the issues he’s most vociferous about is that of safety on our streets. Of course, that’s coming from a man who has convictions for violence and fraud.
And while many of his Unite The Kingdom followers claim to be patriots, some of the same people beat up police officers and brought violence and racism to our streets.
The irony now is that as speaker after speaker was cheered for spouting anti-Muslim bile, chief racist Tommy Robinson and his posse of narrow-minded thugs were wearing Muslim-made merchandise.
At one point, the Islamophobic crowd stood in their finely made Bangladeshi shirts emblazoned with Arabic on their labels, listening to American Republican candidate Valentina Gomez urging them to destroy Muslims.
She walked out onto the stage to chants of ‘Oh Tommy Robinson’ before she started a tirade of racism as the police watched on, calling for ‘Muslims and dirty rugs’ to be ‘sent back to their Sharia nations’. She added: ‘We either fight now or we die, and we are warriors of Jesus Christ. Do not make peace with evil. Destroy it.’
Speaking through a translator, the far-right Nazi-collaborator-apologist Éric Zemmour added his name to the list of anti-Islamist speakers, saying: ‘We are both subject to the same process of the Great Replacement of our European peoples by peoples coming from the south and of Muslim culture. You and we are being colonised by our former colonies.’
Belgian far-right politician Philip Dewinter said: ‘It has to be clear that Islam is our real enemy, we have to get rid of Islam. Islam does not belong in Europe and Islam does not belong in the UK.’
And Brian Tamaki, the leader of New Zealand’s Destiny Church, said: ‘This is a religious war.
‘Islam, Hinduism, Baháʼí, Buddhism — whatever else you’re into — they’re all false. We’ve got to clean our countries up. Get rid of everything that doesn’t receive Jesus Christ.
‘Ban any public expression of other religions in our Christian nations. Ban halal. Ban burqas. Ban mosques, temples, shrines — we don’t want those in our countries.’
Many of Robinson’s supporters don’t seem to mind his chequered past, and Robinson doesn’t appear embarrassed by his contradictory behaviour.
Although Robinson has had a string of scandals that would see most other political activists’ popularity dwindle, he remains, in many people’s views, the saviour of Britishness.
The 42-year-old has had a string of companies that together owe hundreds of thousands in tax bills.
Some have been in his own name, while others were in his ex-wife’s Jenna Lennon and the name of his right-hand man, Adam Geary.
Robinson has been the director of five companies, his wife the director of two of those and an additional two, while, Robinson’s right-hand man Adam Geary the director of another two.
At least three companies were dissolved owing tax: Hope & Pride Limited (£325,423.01), Lennon Consultancy (£200.36) and Freestyle Freelance Ltd (£10,750).
Robinson has kept food on the table by consolidating his position as Britain’s most well-known far-right extremist.
It appears he has also secured his children’s futures.
During a crowdfunder for a legal battle last year, Robinson’s team said any donations that didn’t fund his legal battle would go to a trust fund for his children instead of being returned to donors.
After the crowdfunder pulled in more than £100,000 in donations, Robinson saved thousands by not fighting the case, instead, pleading guilty to ten breaches of a court injunction put in place to prevent him from repeating false allegations about a Syrian refugee.
He was sentenced to 18 months in jail. But the donations had already been made.
What continues to mesmerise so many people is Robinson’s ability to transcend scandal.
Despite his life of crime, contradictions and conspiracy theories, it can’t be denied that Robinson is a key and influential figure in Britain’s extremist political circles.
Last month, he managed to gather racists, conspiracy theorists and violent yobs from the dregs of society to the largest far-right protest in British history.
The attendance wasn’t three million people as he claims, but the fact that he could bring more than 100,000 to the streets of London is evidence enough that his combative style is attractive to vast swathes of people across Britain.
The question now is whether his supporters will turn on their hero for selling them clothes made by the very people they despise, or, in true Tommy Robinson fashion, whether Yaxley-Lennon can pivot and turn his faux pas into a new opportunity to coax even more followers to his controversial cause.
