“Get one through the window”: Altrincham protesters shoot fireworks at hotel and tell residents to jump from windows.

On Halloween, “concerned citizens” in Altrincham, Greater Manchester, shot fireworks at a hotel housing asylum seekers and encouraged residents to commit suicide during a protest. Flanked by Britain First posters, anti-migrant protesters spouted Islamophobic hate and abuse at police officers outside the Cresta Court Hotel. 

As the most recent spate of demonstrations begin to trail off, the remaining protesters show the ugly face of anti-migrant hate: a mob willing to push strangers to suicide and launch flares into buildings. These included many of Manchester’s community of “auditors” – so-called “citizen journalists” who often descend upon anti-migrant protests to generate social media content. The auditors promise to film every moment of the events in order to support their fellow protesters. Unfortunately for them, that means that all their horrendous behaviour is well documented. 

This event’s notable attendees include MKR audits (real name Kelsea Rouge), English Ned and The Ginger Patriot (real name Ben Mills). Alongside the auditors were, of course, the anti-Muslim group Britain First – who are never too far away from any anti-migrant activity in Manchester. Altrincham has been a hot-spot for anti-migrant activity in recent years, largely owing to Britain First’s interest in the local area; the party has become a regular disturbance for the Cresta Court Hotel. Co-leader Ashlea Simon was present at the Halloween protest at the hotel, snapping photos of her fellow bigots as they proudly held Britain First banners. 

Fireworks and Firing Squads

First on the agenda was the lining up of two effigies, to be shot at by the protesters’ self-proclaimed “firing squad”. The two blow-up dolls, dressed in military-style uniforms with a hammer and sickle stapled to the front, bore the printed out faces of Sadiq Khan and Keir Starmer. The team set them up against a bush on the side of the road, before pointing small scale fireworks at them. 

Kelsea Rouge has filmed multiple events in Manchester and surrounding areas, and was keen to catch the launching of fireworks at the hotel on camera. Most exploded just above the roof, only missing the building by sheer luck, despite one protester encouraging the man setting them off to “get one through the window”. Another woman shouted “how’s that for your PTSD?” as the fireworks cracked above the hotel. 

After one of the fireworks failed to ignite, instead seeming to drop down onto the roof of the hotel, for a moment some protesters went quiet, perhaps starting to understand the gravity of lobbing fire at a building full of people. Others cheered even louder, thrilled that their fireworks might have actually hit their target. Luckily, nothing caught fire, and the tense moment didn’t deter Rouge from referring to the fireworks later on as “mint” and letting us all know she was “with them fireworks” going “right home for a fucking hotel”. 

“Jump, Jump, Jump” 

At one point, a resident of the hotel comes to his window. In response, a protester shouts “jump out the window and kill yourself, you’ve got no future”. The crowd then breaks into a chant of “jump, jump, jump”. A few members of the protest are clearly somewhat uncomfortable, laughing uneasily. However, no action is taken against the overwhelming number of protesters urging someone to kill themselves. 

Abuse was not only reserved for the residents of the hotel. Without a counter-protest to direct their anger towards, the local police took the brunt of the protesters’ anger. Ben Mills shouted that the police should be “here for the British people, not these dirty fuckers that are coming over”. He goes on to scream at the police if they could “name a terror attack that has been committed by a Christian, A Jewish (sic), a Hindu or a Sikh… and consider how many attacks have been committed by these dirty Muslims”. 

Mills clearly has never spoken to anybody who lived through the Troubles of Northern Ireland. Or watched newsreels of the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, where Timothy McVeigh killed 168 people. Or seen the photos of grieving families outside a Norwegian summer camp, where Anders Breivik had killed 77 people in 2011. Or seen the livestream shared by Brenton Tarrant as he opened fire on a mosque in 2019, killing 51 people. There are many further such cases. 

Another protestor accused the police of covering for “Muslim death cult members, fucking rapists, paedophiles, murderers”. The same man can later be seen holding up a Britain First sign – one of many – which was photographed by Britain First co-leader Ashlea Simon. 

Photographed alongside him was Karl Haydock, having clearly not learned from his previous run ins with Greater Manchester Police. At a September protest, he was charged with assaulting an emergency worker and racially aggravated harassment. 

The behaviour exhibited by the Altrincham protesters was despicable. They laughed and cheered as they shot fireworks at a building full of people and chanted for residents to commit suicide. They hurled abuse at police officers and residents, before popping to the local shop to get snacks and drinks as if this was just an evening’s entertainment. 

This was no genuine dialogue about the use of hotels to accommodate asylum seekers. These were no ‘concerned citizens’, or ‘worried mums and dads’, but individuals with nothing better to do on Halloween than film themselves partaking in racist abuse.