Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has launched a stern condemnation of anti-asylum campaigner Daniel Thomas, describing him as “a far right and outright racist” who will face “the full force of the law” should his organisation commit any offences near contested accommodation sites.
The intervention came as residents of Piddington, Oxfordshire, voted overwhelmingly in a symbolic referendum to reject the housing of male asylum seekers at a nearby Ministry of Defence facility. Mahmood’s remarks, delivered at a knife crime event in Birmingham, also sought to draw a firm line between genuine community anxieties and what she called extremists deliberately inflaming division.
Piddington’s Defiant Ballot
The parish council ballot, held on Wednesday, returned a resounding 285 votes against just 26 in favour of a dramatic move to declare independence from the United Kingdom. The symbolic gesture was designed to protest plans to house asylum seekers at the former defence site on the edge of the village.
The result has attracted nationwide attention, with hundreds of other town and village councillors reaching out for guidance on replicating the campaign. The initiative has drawn support from the Conservatives, Reform UK and the Liberal Democrats.
Thomas, who is widely known by his nickname “Danny Tommo”, visited Piddington the day after the vote. He was accompanied by neither masked supporters nor balaclava-wearing associates during the trip. Parish councillor Joe Marshall described the encounter as a private engagement.
“It is a closed meeting. We will engage with them and walk them around the village and have a cup of tea,” Marshall said, adding that the village had also received open invitations to Reform, Labour, Conservatives and Restore. He noted that the presence of security personnel in balaclavas was unlikely to be welcomed. “This is a mild-mannered place,” he said.
Drawing the Line Between Concern and Extremism
Mahmood was clear in her attempt to separate the legitimate worries of Piddington residents from what she characterised as deliberate provocation. Speaking at the Acocks Green boxing gym in south Birmingham, she said she recognised the unease that accompanies major change to a community’s fabric.
“I understand the anxiety of local people when they’re about to see a change to their community. But it is important to distinguish that anxiety, where reasonable people can have a conversation, and the far right and outright racists like Danny Thomas walking into town, hijacking an issue and then using that to divide our communities,” she said.
“Their behaviour is completely unacceptable. And where they break the law, they will face the full force of the law.”
The Home Secretary also moved to reassure residents that the asylum seekers scheduled to move into the former MoD camp would not strain local services. Drawing on experience from other large accommodation sites, she said facilities would be consolidated on-site in a largely self-contained arrangement.
“I want to reassure the residents of Piddington that actually our experience from other large sites where we already have asylum seekers accommodated, whether that’s in Wethersfield or Crowborough, is that putting all facilities on to one site is actually the best way to manage pressures for local communities,” Mahmood said. “Our experience of other large sites where we are housing asylum seekers is that we’re able to put on that site more of the facilities that asylum seekers need. It’s a relatively self-contained facility, and the knock-on pressure to those local areas, I don’t think we’re going to see.”
She acknowledged that apprehension was not confined to rural areas. “I do understand the anxiety that people feel, when they’re about to see a change in their community or they are reading misinformation on the internet, or when they’re just concerned that a village is about to have a facility nearby that maybe they think may pose them some challenges,” she said. “I also hear that concern from communities such as mine, where there are large numbers of HMOs [houses of multiple occupation] and accommodation in which asylum seekers are held as well. There is concern across every type of community. Not just in the countryside or in those sorts of areas, but in inner-city areas as well.”
Thomas’s Threats and Denials
Thomas, co-founder of the Patriot Platform, has become one of the most prominent figures opposing asylum accommodation in the UK. A former bodyguard for Stephen Yaxley-Lennon — also known as Tommy Robinson — he established his anti-immigration movement after serving a prison sentence for attempted kidnapping.
In a YouTube interview with Dan Wootton, Thomas claimed he had spoken with three Piddington residents and framed his campaign as community-minded. “The people we are meeting are just normal mothers, normal grandmothers, normal men,” he said. “We have to start somewhere. Right now there are no men in that camp. We are going to put a legal, lawful plan in place to help this community in a way that has never been done before.”
Yet in a separate broadcast interview with Robinson, Thomas outlined a far more confrontational vision. “How powerful would it be if 5,000 men … surround the [Piddington] camp. We take tents. We sit there for days and we don’t let them [the asylum seekers] get in. And then we reinforce [the blockade] with members from the north, from Scotland, from Ireland.”
Thomas, who has been approached for comment, has denied any racist motivation. “Racism within our organisation is just not acceptable. That is the stance we have. We are not a white nationalist movement. I have friends that are black.”
His supporters have already coordinated disruptive demonstrations in Dover and Portsmouth, where masked participants blocked roads and attempted to intercept newly arrived individuals. On Thursday, Mahmood summoned senior police officers and urged them to strengthen intelligence gathering and deploy all available powers, including new legislation permitting blanket bans on face coverings at designated locations. Hampshire police subsequently sought to impose such a ban during an anti-asylum demonstration in Thomas’s hometown of Portsmouth, which he urged his followers to avoid.
A Crackdown on Knife Crime Launched in Parallel
Mahmood’s intervention on the immigration front came as she unveiled a major nationwide programme targeting knife crime. More than 230 areas affected by blade offences will share £26.25 million in funding to finance increased police patrols, CCTV installation and early-intervention schemes, spanning 27 police forces across England and Wales.
The Home Office said the strategy focuses on small, precisely targeted zones, which it described as the most effective approach to reducing violent crime. Each area, roughly equivalent to 10 football pitches in size, will receive dedicated patrols alongside programmes aimed at young people most at risk of offending or becoming victims.
Mahmood launched the initiative alongside campaigners Lynne Baird, Lorraine Jones Burrell and Pooja Kanda, each of whom has lost a child to knife crime.
Why it Matters
The collision between grassroots protest and organised far-right activism in Piddington illustrates how immigration debate in Britain is increasingly being shaped by forces on both extremes of the political spectrum. The Home Secretary’s attempt to validate legitimate local concerns while simultaneously naming and threatening activists like Daniel Thomas reflects the delicate balancing act facing ministers. If communities feel heard and resources are transparently allocated, that may defuse tension; but if trust erodes further, the risk is that more villages turn to symbolic rebellions and more activists turn to intimidation. The outcome in Oxfordshire could set a precedent for how the rest of the country responds to the next contested asylum site.
