AustLit

'On 23 April 1979, Blair Peach, a teacher from New Zealand, was killed by a blow to the head delivered by an officer of the Metropolitan Police Force Special Patrol Group (SPG). He had been demonstrating against a meeting to be held by the Nazi National Front (NF) in Southall, West London.

'Peach did not set out to be a martyr. He did not set out to die. His acting in solidarity with the community under attack that day was probably, had it not been for his death, as unremarkable as his less recollected actions, such as spending nights on the cold, wet street corners of Brick Lane to prevent the NF from holding paper sales. Yet the tragedy of his death, compounded by the ensuing miscarriage of justice, has been remembered as a galvanising moment of anti-racism in the UK, and has inspired a number of poetic works, including Linton Kwesi Johnson’s ‘Reggae fi Peach’, Bhanu Kapil’s Ban en banlieue, and Chris Searle’s edited collection One for Blair. In the early 1980s a Southall primary school was named after Peach. A touching tribute. Naming is touching. To name is to touch.' ( Lucy Van, Ling Toong and George Mouratidis, Editorial introduction)