After the Deptford Fire: A Watershed in British Relations

After the Deptford Fire: A Watershed in British Relations

"13 Dead Nothing Said" - Skin follows large protests in the aftermath of the New Cross Fire, a response to widespread institutional silence on the tragedy.

The loss of the lives of 13 Black teenagers during the New Cross fire of 1981 was widely considered to be arson started by National Front members. Officially the cause of the fire remains unsolved. At the time, the tragedy was ignored and unacknowledged by the government. This edition of LWT's multicultural series Skin covers the protest in the aftermath of the incident, one of the darkest periods of the 20th century for Black Britons.

The programme reveals the black community's grief, and tracks the emergence of a renewed sense of community solidarity in the wake of the government's silence in response to the tragedy. It follows the marches in solidarity with the victims and dissects the racist media backlash, focusing instead on how community solidarity bloomed as young, previously apolitical Black Britons began to organize and raise money for the Massacre Action Committee.

Look out for an interview with a young Darcus Howe, then an activist who would later become a prominent broadcaster on Channel 4. Howe discusses the outpouring of solidarity as a member of the New Cross Massacre Action Committee established by academic and historian John La Rose.

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Multicultural TV

This collection covers programming that emerged from specialist multicultural and Black broadcasting units.

A multicultural Britain was forebodingly cast as an oncoming social issue. Only at the behest of campaigning by the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination (established in 1965) did the programming introduced begin to frame Asian and later Black Britons as part of British society and cater directly to their needs. The earliest examples were programmes broadcast by the BBC Apna Hi Ghar Samajhiye (1965) and Nai Zindagi Naya Jeevan (New Life), which helped improve the English skills of recent Asian migrants. Targeted programming initially emerged regionally, and franchise holders in the midlands who feared the impending reallocation of franchises reacted quickly, leading to multicultural programming such as Here Today, Here Tomorrow (ATV, 1978), Here and Now (Central TV, 1978). In London, London Weekend Television produced Babylon (LWT, 1979), and the London Minorities Unit produced Skin (1980), an extensive focus of our collection. During the emergence of Channel 4, Black programming was in-built into the new channel. Black commissioners, researchers, and presenters emerged, leading to Black and Asian-led series like Black on Black (1982), Eastern Eye (1982), Bandung File (1985), and Black Bag (1985). These programmes catered not only with increasing specificity to their respective audiences but also took on an increasingly globally connective approach centred around acknowledging the intricacy of diasporic relations.

25 videos in this collection

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Bob Marley

  • 1981
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Black Actors

  • 1981
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Attacks on Asians and West Indians

  • 1980
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Immigration Laws Part 1

  • 1980
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Bengalis and the Rag Trade

  • 1980
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Here and Now

  • 1985
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After the Deptford Fire: A Watershed in British Relations

  • Deptford
  • 1981
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Here and Now

  • Birmingham
  • 1984
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Multi-cultural Education

  • 1981
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Divided Families

  • 1981
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Football

  • 1981
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Blues Parties

  • 1980
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Here and Now

  • Stoke-on-Trent
  • 1984
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Asian Doctors

  • 1980
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Here and Now

  • Wolverhampton
  • 1984
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25 Years of Black British Part 4

  • 1980
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Education in Haringey

  • 1980
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Benjamin Zephaniah, James Berry and Buchi Emecheta at Words to Life (Here and Now)

  • Cannon Hill Park
  • 1984
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The Deptford Fire

  • Deptford
  • 1981
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Police - Black Relations Part Two

  • 1980
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Black Churches

  • 1981
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Immigration Laws Part 2

  • 1980
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Villain Boroughs

  • 1980
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Housing in Southall

  • 1980
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Here and Now

  • West Bromwich
  • 1984
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