Do the papers which demand the right to free speech simply want the right to be racist and xenophobic with impunity? David Aaronovitch in yesterdays The Guardian really got the measure of their claim as diversity-onLine can document.

The Guardian G2 section 13.01.04, page 5, David Aaronovitch column, headline: Its nothing to do with free speech

Mr. Aaronovitch starts with the issue of Robert Kilroy-Silk (K-S) giving his take on what the suspended presenter has said since he was outed as the author of the anti-Arab article: We owe Arabs nothing in The Sunday Express 04.01.04. David Aaronovitch explains that the BBC is not gagging K-S, who can still say what he likes, but might not be suitable as a presenter who has offended a substantial section of its own licensefee payers. He then examines K-Ss article on Arabs.

In particular, with relevance to diversity-onLine he quotes from the article We have thousands of asylum seekers from Iran, Iraq, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries living happily in this country on social security. Aaronovitch believes this is code for They come over here, they take our money, they take advantage of us. You know who: the strangers, the outsiders, the grinning piccaninnies. The ones you feel resentful about-and you know what? Youre right

Which does bring us straight back to the general attitudes of The Express titles to asylum seekers and foreigners. Aaronovitchs starts with a prescient three-year-old comment from David Hellier, an ex-City correspondent of The Sunday Express under its then new owner, Richard Desmond. Said Hellier: Im sickened by the inflammatory hate-stirring headlines on asylum seekers

Aaronovitch points out that things got worse in 2002 giving headlines from Express titles such as: Cut benefits and stem the asylum tide (January 21st); Refugees in under age sex scandal (January 25th); Anger at 5-star migrant centre; Asylum luxury(June 8th); Asylum violence fear for villages (June 19th); Asylum law lets perverts stay in UK(July 7th); Neighbours fear of asylum seeker held in ritual killing case; Voodoo lady terrified us (July 11th), pointing out that the April 7th splash Got Aids? Welcome to Britain was particularly approved by ex BNP leader, John Tyndall which might suggest the market the Express group was hitting with its anti-asylum seeker campaign.

Then Aaronovitch brings the story back to K-S with the point that also in 2002 the resting BBC presenter wrote in the Sunday Express about a school in Sandwell, West Yorkshire, where children were having all semblance of an education destroyed by politicians in faraway London swamping their schools with Russians, Romanians, Palestinians, Arabs, Albanians, Kurds- you name it, theyve got it claiming it was the English kids in Cape Primary who shoulder the burden of admitting more immigrants. Which really does tie K-S in with the abiding campaign of the Express group.

It may not be surprising that the Express papers far from being shamed by the news of K-Ss suspension and the revelation that it provides a home for such material, or indeed the fact that the paper is apparently now so short of editorial staffing that it is unable to spot an article that it had already published six months before, has positively leapt to the challenge

While diversity-onLine can show that during 2003 the Express groups inflammatory, hate stirring treatment of asylum seekers continued unabated. Here are just a few of the more than 34 examples to be found on diversity-onLine that year: strap: Fury at asylum seekers free golf lessons Standfirst: Our kids cannot afford such luxury, say locals(March 3rd); Asylum Fury Standfirst: Bored refugees to get English lessons with £1/4 m of lottery money(June 3rd); Asylum seeker got British girl pregnant at 15 (Oh, and if they got wed he could go on living here)(July 4th); Q: Where is the asylum capital of the world A: Yes, its Britain(August 14th); the highly inaccurate Asylum seeker? Doctor will see you first (September 1st); Migrants get free English lessons Standfirst: Taxpayers could foot bill to help new citizens pass British test(September 7th)