More than 100,000 people massed on Saturday in central London for a march and rally organised by far-right activist Tommy Robinson, as anti-racism campaigners held a smaller counter-protest.

Huge crowds, many draped in English and British flags, gathered through the morning just south of Westminster for what Robinson, a veteran of UK far-right organising, has branded the country’s “biggest free speech festival”.

His latest ‘Unite the Kingdom’ event saw attendees march over Westminster Bridge before rallying near Downing Street for speeches by far-right figures from across Europe and North America.

“The silent majority will be silent no longer,” Robinson told the crowd. “Today is the spark of a cultural revolution.”

UK police said an estimated 110,000 people attended, noting it used a combination of CCTV and police helicopter footage for its estimate.

Around 5,000 people attended a ‘Stand Up to Racism’ march a mile or so to the north, as police deployed about 1,000 police to keep the rival groups apart.

The duelling demonstrations come amid growing anti-immigration sentiment, as Brexit supporter Nigel Farage’s hard-right Reform UK leads in polls and protesters target hotels used to house asylum seekers.

Robinson, 42, who has a string of criminal convictions and a big online following after years of spearheading a fervent anti-Muslim and anti-migrant agenda, increasingly fuses those themes with claims that Britain is now hostile to free speech.

“Every day in the papers you read things and you’re being left stunned — arresting people because they dared to talk about immigration or gender issues,” Philip Dodge, a retired baker from Sheffield, central England, told AFP.

He had travelled with his wife to the event, which was also being watched by hundreds of thousands of viewers on livestreams.

“I’m very concerned. I never thought I’d see this in this country.”

Far-right speakers

Other attendees, including women and young people, said they were more worried about migration.

“It’s an invasion,” 28-year-old Ritchie, who only gave his first name, said of the record levels of UK immigration in recent years, including tens of thousands of asylum seekers arriving annually on small boats across the Channel.

“They don’t understand we want our country back,” he said of the ruling centre-left Labour government and its Conservative predecessors, calling Robinson “a hero”.

At the anti-racism event, veteran Labour lawmaker Diane Abbott accused Robinson and his allies of spreading “nonsense” and “dangerous” lies that asylum seekers were a threat.

“We need to be in solidarity with asylum seekers, and we need to show that we are united,” she told Sky News.

London police, who drafted in officers from other forces to manage the crowds, have placed conditions on the protest routes and timings, insisting they end at different times and that both conclude by evening.

Some at Robinson’s event attached to their placards photos of Charlie Kirk, the right-wing American activist and ally of United States President Donald Trump, who was gunned down this week. Other signs included slogans like “stop the boats” and derided Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

‘Culture wars’

Planned speakers include French politician Eric Zemmour, controversial Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson and Petr Bystron of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. Reports said former White House strategist Steve Bannon would also address the crowds.

The event comes just over a year after anti-immigration riots swept several cities, which Robinson was accused of fuelling with incendiary online posts, and as free speech concerns become more mainstream.

The government has faced widespread criticism after banning the Palestine Action group in July. Police have since arrested under anti-terror laws hundreds of peaceful protesters holding up signs supporting the group.

Meanwhile, the recent arrest of an award-winning comedy writer for allegedly insulting transgender people online prompted widespread derision. After Irish writer Graham Linehan was detained, Prime Minister Keir Starmer urged police to “focus on the most serious issues”.

However, London’s Metropolitan Police chief Mark Rowley said the law needed changing and that he did not believe his officers “should be policing toxic culture wars debates”.

The influence of Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was thought to be waning after various legal and other woes. But his profile has rocketed since his X account was reinstated in November 2023, following billionaire Elon Musk’s purchase of the platform.