English National Party has been the name of various political parties of

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, which have commonly called for a separate

parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...

for England.

The original ENP

History

The English National Party (ENP) was founded as the John Hampden New Freedom Party in 1966 by Frank Hansford-Miller. "

John Hampden John Hampden (24 June 1643) was an English landowner and politician whose opposition to arbitrary taxes imposed by Charles I made him a national figure. An ally of Parliamentarian leader John Pym, and cousin to Oliver Cromwell, he was one of t ...

" was a reference to a leading parliamentarian from the

English Civil War The English Civil War (1642–1651) was a series of civil wars and political machinations between Parliamentarians (" Roundheads") and Royalists led by Charles I ("Cavaliers"), mainly over the manner of England's governance and issues of re ...

. In 1974, it was renamed the "English Nationalist Party". It was defunct by 1981; by this time, Hansford-Miller had left, and he campaigned for the "Abolition of Rates Coalition" in the 1981 Greater London Council elections. The party's best known policy was advocating a

devolved English parliament A devolved English parliament is a proposed institution that would give separate decision-making powers to representatives for voters in England, similar to the representation given by the (Welsh Parliament), the Scottish Parliament and the Nort ...

. Other policies included calling for the abolition of

income tax An income tax is a tax imposed on individuals or entities (taxpayers) in respect of the income or profits earned by them (commonly called taxable income). Income tax generally is computed as the product of a tax rate times the taxable income. Tax ...

, and an end to local authority housing. It was considered to be centre-right, and not racist.

Performance

The party contested the first 1974 general election as the John Hampden New Freedom Party; it contested the second 1974 and the 1979 general elections as the ENP. Its best performance was at the second 1974 general election, where it fielded two candidates and secured 1,115 votes. It achieved its greatest notability in April 1976, when it was joined by the

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

John Stonehouse John Thomson Stonehouse (28 July 192514 April 1988) was a British Labour and Co-operative Party politician and cabinet minister under Prime Minister Harold Wilson. Stonehouse is remembered for his unsuccessful attempt at faking his own death i ...

, who had formerly represented the Labour Party and at the time was awaiting trial for fraud. However, Stonehouse was convicted and left Parliament in August of that year, and the party did not stand a candidate in the subsequent by-election.

Other parties by the name

According to the far-right magazine '' Spearhead'', a group called the English National Party was one of the small far-right organisations that joined the National Front shortly after it was formed in 1967. There have been several parties which have adopted the "English National Party" name. These include a far right organisation formed by Raymond Shenton which contested the

1984 Enfield Southgate by-election The 1984 Enfield Southgate by-election was a parliamentary by-election held on 13 December 1984 for the British House of Commons constituency of Enfield Southgate. Previous MP The seat had become vacant on 12 October 1984 in tragic circums ...

; a party founded in around 1995 by Christopher Nickerson, which aimed for England to secede from the United Kingdom to support a sense of

English national identity A national identity of the English as the people or ethnic group dominant in England dates to the Anglo-Saxon period. The establishing of a single English ethnic identity dates to at least AD 731, as exemplified in Bede's ''Ecclesiastical Histor ...

; and a party founded by Robin Tilbrook and James Alden in 1999, with the aim of securing a devolved English Parliament, which was later renamed the English Democrats Party in 2002, and then just the English Democrats in 2004. In April 1999, a group calling itself the "English National Party" was one of several different organisations which claimed responsibility for a nail-bomb attack in Brixton.

David Copeland The 1999 London nail bombings were a series of bomb explosions in London, England. Over three successive weekends between 17 and 30 April 1999, homemade nail bombs were detonated respectively in Brixton in South London; at Brick Lane, Spitalfiel ...

, who admitted to carrying out the bombing, said that the claims of responsibility were made by others to "try to steal his glory."

References

{{Authority control English nationalist parties Political parties in England 1960s establishments in England Defunct political parties in England English nationalism Far-right politics in England