The neo-Nazi raising the saltire across Glasgow

Dear Bellters — we’ll keep workshopping nicknames for you, fond readers — we were cutting aboot the city centre on Saturday night: up Sauchie, doon Buckie an' alang Argyle, to be precise. We’ve not seen town that busy since the pre-Covid days — which must have much to do with the imminence of Freshers’ Week. Either way, it was a joy to watch the debauched and revelrous parade around the streets in Bacchanalian exuberance. One scene will stick in Robbie’s mind for some time, however: in front of the snaking queue forming outside the Savoy nightclub, an inflatable female companion was luxuriating on one of Sauchiehall Street’s new benches. Quite the sight. Onto your briefing.

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 The neo-Nazi raising the saltire across Glasgow

Many living in north Glasgow will have seen the steady spawning of saltires affixed to lampposts over the last fortnight or so. The Bell has found that a self-described group of “young dads” have been coordinating the raising of the flags, forming a nearly-connected triangle of saltires between Summerston, Milton, and Maryhill. 

The Tartan Team, as they call themselves on Facebook, told us that they are protesting “politicians and councillors” over what they see as crumbling public services and living conditions. They assured us that “immigration isn’t a problem for us”, and that they oppose the protests outside asylum hotels, distinguishing themselves from the ‘operation raise the colours’ campaign in England, where St George’s Crosses are being flown alongside calls to end immigration. However, we’ve found that at least one of the Tartan Team’s members isn’t as reasonable as they claim. In fact, he shares openly racist and Nazi content online. 

Concerned neighbours and a Nazi-sympathiser

The group informed us that they set up a Gofundme.com page to raise money for purchasing flags and equipment for which they received “unbelievable support”. So far, the page has raised over £1,000 for the group. The Bell searched online references for the name of the man who set up that fundraising page, and what we discovered directly contradicted the Tartan Team’s claims that they weren’t anti-immigration.  

An X/Twitter account with the same name as the man who organised the fundraiser shared Tommy Robinson posts praising the raising of saltires in north Glasgow. We’ve found information that strongly suggests this is the same person who organised the Tartan Team’s fundraiser. That same X account shared a video which claimed to show a fight between asylum seekers in Spain, under which the user commented “gas them all” (a phrase used more than once on his account). The X account also shared videos that aim to expose the location of so-called asylum hotels in Glasgow. Most extreme of all, he recently shared a video of a podcast where the guest states, among other Nazi talking points, that “the answer for America lies… in Germany with a man named Adolf”. 

We debated whether or not to unmask the man behind the account given the extreme nature of the content he posted. As it's a common name in the city, we took the decision not to share his name and risk damaging the reputations of any namesakes.

The shifting symbology of the saltire

The Bell spoke to Maryhill resident Laurie Goldie, who, in light of recent events, started an online petition inviting local residents to sign up to a statement of solidarity and oppose “racism, xenophobia, and hate in all forms”. Goldie set up the petition to “change the narrative” around the flags that are popping up. To her, the values the saltire represents are “love, inclusion and equality”. 

Alex O’Kane, the man behind the north Glasgow community Facebook page ‘no1seems2care’, is a strong supporter of flying the saltire in the area. O’Kane is “passionate about the flag”, as his grandfather fought in the first world war and he himself supported and campaigned for independence in 2014. Now, however, he supports the flags as a “protest about the conditions up here” in north Glasgow. On his page, O’Kane discusses mental health, the lack of housing, cutting of services — all of which he says are “aggravated by immigration”, although he says the causes go far beyond that. He’s quick, however, to affirm that he’d be “the first” to welcome refugees if the material conditions of his neighbourhood in Milton weren’t so poor. O’Kane has documented and celebrated almost every instance of flags being raised in his area. Meanwhile, he consistently posts unconfirmed reports of women being harassed in which the perpetrator is identified by their ethnicity, which critics say stokes racial tension. 

It seems that, in north Glasgow at least, the flag-raising is consistently seen as a protest against the failure of politicians to improve the lives of residents in the last few decades. However, the meaning of the flag (beyond the most recent protest) differs depending on whom you speak to. For O’Kane, it’s a patriotic symbol that aims to attract the attention of politicians. For Goldie, it’s all about framing the saltire as a welcome to all and encouraging neighbourly support. According to the Tartan Team, their motivations are about material issues such as living conditions. However, at least one of them harbours extreme right wing and potentially fascist views that they were quick to dismiss in our initial exchange. 

Glasgow in Brief

🥵 If you’ve been to a sauna in the west of Scotland recently, chances are it was run by Hot Tottie. They’ve got a hot box at Luss, had one at Abies loch (before it was drained), and even did a pop-up at Civic House recently (apparently someone broke in after hours, pinching a wooden spoon and a pair of swim shorts, oh Glasgow). A seat in the sauna will set you back £10 per hour on a weekday, £15 on a weekend. If you are of a prying disposition, you can read this highly sensationalised Daily Mail piece on the stooshie the sauna created at Loch Lomond. The growing popularity of the pastime seems to signify Scotland’s embrace of its climactic and cultural ties with the Nordic countries. Hitherto, Scotland’s growing saunas all had another thing in common: a profit-driven model. Until now that is. 

Glasgow Community Sauna, set to open later this month will be run “by the community, for the community” on a not-for-profit basis. It’s a queer-led project that aims to make sauna and cold plunge “affordable and accessible for everyone”. They’re aiming to open by the end of the month behind the Bowling Green in Pollokshields. Oan yersels. Follow progress here. The not-for-profit sauna model might well rub up against Hot Tottie’s growing fleet. We’ve heard rumours the Alexandria-based business is eyeing up a permanent Glasgow spot, pending approval from the council. The location? Only a mile or so south from Pollokshields, at Queen’s Park recreation ground, where owner Kieran Izzett intends on building a sauna in a modified shipping container with a glass wall, cutting the roof off another container to create a plunge pool. Whether it gets the go ahead or not, it feels like sauna culture is here to stay.   

🚨 In a bizarre confluence of previous Bell reporting, a far-right politician was caught in a paedophile hunting sting over the weekend. Charles Baillie, former BNP candidate and leader of far-right political party Britannica, was charged with indecent online communications following the sting in Castlemilk by vigilante group Scotland Child Protection Team. Chillingly, Baillie arrives to meet who he thinks is a 14 year-old with a book in hand, the Treasury of Love Poems. The Child Protection video is a troubling watch, and definitely NSFW. It’s a strange meeting of stories, specifically our far right flags story today and Robbie’s interview with a paedophile hunter (there was even a Castlemilk supermarket connection), especially when so much far right motivation purports to “save the children”.

🏚️ In the latest update in the sad story of the tenement collapse at Albert Cross, the Greens councillor Jon Molyneux has called on Glasgow City Council to donate to a £150,000 fund intended to support displaced residents of the neighbouring block. Since the tenement collapsed in July, residents of the adjoining flats were evacuated in case their buildings were now compromised.

Louise Ramsay, a resident in one of the neighbouring flats, got in touch with The Bell and described how she has had “no access to my home, no opportunity to retrieve even the most basic essentials, and no clear answers on when we will be able to return”. Ramsay states that, because the council cannot guarantee their safety due to the building’s structural issues, residents aren’t permitted to enter their homes to retrieve belongings. The emotional toll that being displaced has had on her and her neighbours is “immense”, Ramsay says.

Stories you might have missed:

• Nine months of roadworks begin on Glasgow's M8
• New excavation at Govan Old 
• Inside the Glasgow launch of Jeremy Corbyn’s Your Party

Read/listen/watch: The Dirty Digger

We had reason recently — for reasons which may later become apparent — to rewatch this absolutely classic 2007 BBC documentary on Glasgow’s premier investigative crime magazine. Plus, The Bell has been pithily described as like a cross between the Digger and the Guardian (we’ll let you guess which one we’ve been reading at Bell HQ recently; hint: it costs £2 and is only available at the best local newsagents). The short doc hinges on the access that filmmaker David Graham Scott gets by working as a court photographer. In turn, he interviews its founder James Cruickshank, who appears in his trademark sunglasses (despite the dank weather of north Glasgow), and a USSR-era cossack hat (more apt to the climes of Possil, admittedly).

“Police don’t run this community, or the council — criminals run it,” Cruickshank tells Scott as they make their way up Saracen St, stumbling across a violent assault. But the doc does a lot more than revel in lazy stereotypes, it also rightfully questions the ethics of the city’s muckraker-in-chief, not to mention the risks Cruickshank and his team take to put the paper out every week. If you want more, look no further than Francisco Garcia’s 2023 profile in the FT. 

We also rec: 

• Dani Garavelli on Nicola Sturgeon’s memoir 
• Boom time for Scottish shipbuilding - thanks to Putin

Catch up and coming up:

• Natalie Whittle was set loose over the weekend to examine Glasgow’s War on Dugs and the ‘three barks and you’re out’ policy of some city establishments. 
• Calum was surveying the state of the city’s bowling clubs last week, but what he found was a tale of wanton opportunism, property development and profiteering. 

The lucrative land deals closing Glasgow’s bowling clubs

Members stand to pocket big sums from selling up. But local communities aren’t so enthused.

The BellCalum Grewar

• Later this week, Robbie is reviewing one of the city’s most controversial takeaways. The food, he finds, is the least troubling aspect of the story.

Headline of the week:

Dafties: Birdman disses Glasgow's lesser Mr Bigs

Re:view: Non Viet Vegan 

At just shy of £13, I don’t think this bowl of Vietnamese rice noodles meets Calum’s strict definition of Humble Yum™, but it sure was delicious, if not truly bargainous. Ostensibly a sliced beef or pork knuckle dish, at Non Viet’s vegan outpost in Partick, the meat is swapped out for deceptively meaty strips of seitan, snow fungus, tofu and all manner of delicious vegetables. The broth was intensely spicy, so much so I’m glad I had the run of the restaurant to myself given the noises I was making. But it was also deeply savoury, layered with lemongrass, chilli and mint. Still, it defeated me. The summer rolls I wasn’t so sure of; the rice paper was a little thick and the filling lacked the freshness of the bún huế. Plus, with portions this big, who needs starters?—Robbie

Glasgow Calendar: Doors Open Day

Returning to the city is the only festival at which you could visit the likes of Bridgeton Bus Garage, St Vincent Street Church, Sharmanka Kinetic Theatre and Garnethill Synagogue. All for free, no less. 

Glasgow Doors Open Day Festival is opening up 150 of Glasgow’s buildings, cultural landmarks and secret spaces. This year, the theme is ‘Glasgow: The Visionary City’. 18–21 September; locations across the city. Free. Info here.