UK Column News — 7th September 2026

Ben Rubin (0:08)

Good afternoon, it's Monday, 7th September, 2026, just after one o'clock. You're watching UK Column News. I'm your host, Ben Rubin, and I'm delighted to be joined in the studio by Mr. Brian Gerrish. Hi, Brian.

Brian Gerrish (0:19)

Pleasure to be here.

Ben Rubin (0:21)

Always a pleasure to be here on a Monday. Now we have got a lot going on in the country at the moment. We're going to be talking about the rewiring of the British state, the transformation behind the scenes of the entire system of governance in the country, including looking back at some rather prescient reporting by Brian and Mike back in 2017, including some very familiar faces, basically the same people in the same organizations involved at UK Column. We're talking about back then. We're going to be looking at escalating tensions around the Falkland Islands, including one of our closest allies and best friends on the international scene. It seems to have a keen interest in one of our most strategic assets in the South Atlantic. We'll be looking at the desecration of a temple in the city of London. But before we get into that, we're going to be looking at the issue of the weekend, the protests on the South Coast of England, which kicked off on Saturday morning in the Port of Dover, where hundreds of men dressed all in black with their faces covered, without signs, without phones, without any kind of banners or flags, completely unidentifiable, descended on Dover Port and blocked one of the UK's busiest, in fact, I think it is the UK's busiest, port causing delays to business and leisure travelers alike, in protest against illegal immigration and small boat crossings. So we can see here some footage from the scene. Got another video taken by, I believe, by a bus driver.

I'm just going to play these without any of the audio, predominantly because there's not really much being said. And there's a little bit of foul language, nothing aggressive.

You can certainly get the idea of what's happening here. You generally seem to be a quiet and peaceful protest. There were no arrests made on the day. But they have predictably, I suppose, been demonized by a lot of the political class. So Farage condemned this, Robert E. Genrich condemned this, both of them from reform. Others in the government have described this as thuggish behavior. Predictably, or maybe less predictably, I don't know, even the right-wing press. So the Daily Express have come out and described this as frightening, with terrified women trapped in cars as masked protesters stormed over. But then actually, when we abandoned the mainstream media and just head to social media, people sharing stuff, we can see a rather different story. So this photo was shared by someone in the Southeast Patriots group on, I believe it was on Facebook. He was saying, it's the safest train in the world. They're lovely lads. They seem to be having a pretty decent time.

And actually, it's just about hiding their identity. So I'd imagine there's fewer repercussions come in their way.

Brian Gerrish (3:19)

Well, as the police take on more and more facial surveillance, and the CCTV cameras, that actually becomes more and more important for people. So you'd be able to protest without being digitized and labeled an instant terrorist. But I can imagine that people face with a lot of young men, totally in black, could be a bit...

Mike Robinson (3:44)

Could be intimidating.

Brian Gerrish (3:45)

Intimidating.

Ben Rubin (3:45)

It certainly could be intimidating. One thing I did wonder though, Brian, especially, so just so that we're kind of being honest with ourselves. When we talked about Just Stop Oil, for example, in the past, when they've gone around shutting down motorways and that kind of thing, in my view, is that essentially they probably have valid concerns, but their energy is being directed in the wrong way.

Do you think that this is probably the same issue here, but more on the right wing as opposed to the left wing of the political sphere?

Brian Gerrish (4:13)

I absolutely do think that, and I would like to know who is actually behind the organization and the decision that everybody is going to turn up dressed solely in black. Because this is the bit that makes me think there's more to this protest than simply a group of good people deciding that they're going to go and make their voices heard. There's something about this protest.

Ben Rubin (4:36)

Yeah, it's certainly very well organized. And actually, it wasn't just an isolated incident. So the Dover protest dispersed on Saturday.

But then on Sunday, the second protest, also on the South Coast, but further to the West in Hampshire. This was in Portsmouth.