07/11/2011 Inside Out East Midlands

Hello. Tonight, Inside Out is in Derby to remember a war long past

and some more recent battles. It was branded the most recent --

racist city. How did Leicester transform itself? No Blacks, No

Irish, No Dogs. This is Britain! And later in the programme, Tony

Roe recovers the remarkable story of the villages with no War

Memorial. The idea that there are villages and communities where

everyone came home, what joy and happiness there must have been.

This is Inside Out for the East Imagine a city where pubs, clubs

and guest houses openly discriminated against immigrants,

and where racial tension ran so high there were riots on the

streets. That's how broadcaster and student protester Barbara Jacobs

remembers the Leicester of her youth. We asked her to go back in

time to investigate how a city with such problems could become the

diverse community of today. And we should warn you, her film does

start with some offensive language from the era and includes violent

It was supposed to be comic satire. But not so long ago, Alf Garnett's

rants reflected more of the mainstream view than we care to

admit. The great British Empire! It is being given away to a load off...

That makes for an uncomfortable watch. I know people call it

political correctness, but I would rather be correct that listen to

that. However, it was a piece of its time. Its time was the 1970s.

There was I huge raid -- wave of resentment, what he calls the

British Empire and should have been called the British Commonwealth,

there were floods of people coming in, and naturally this led some

people to feeling very resentful, particularly in the city which at

that time was Britain's most racist city. It was one of the biggest

police operations ever mounted outside London. 5,000 police men

were brought to Leicester from 5,000 -- several forces. Some of

the worst violence occurred on the campus of the University of

Leicester. The fact that they are born here does not make them

British. They must be repaid created along with those who had

actually come into this country -- repatriated.

It was a time of pitched battles on the streets of the midlands as the

Anti-Nazi League and the National Front fought each other, and far

right views surged in popularity. But I want to find out how

Leicester fought back against its racist reputation. Has the

prejudice simply moved out of the town and into the countryside? To

find out, I need to revisit my own protesting past. Let's rewind to

1964 when I was a student at the University of Leicester. Just down

there, it was the most racist public in Leicester. Black people

were allowed downstairs but not upstairs. What is that all about?

It is like apartheid, that is what it struck us as. So we decided we

would do less it in. What was amazing was that our local

newspaper, the Leicester Mercury, actually did give us a bit of a

slot. It was just a bit bigger on the front page and a lorry sinks

into whole. Today, it would be all over the front page. But of course,

times have changed. Her the new national health service starts,...

When the Second World War ended, Britain needed workers - huge

numbers of them - to help reconstruct a war-battered country.

The appeal went out, and immigrants of 'good stock' were welcomed from

Britain's Commonwealth counties, including the Caribbean, to fill

the gaps in the labour market. I'm meeting three people who arrived in

Leicester during this time, to find I arrived from Jamaica. And during

the week, and as it church-going member of the community, I tried to

go to the church across the road. I walked in, and the pastor said,

welcome, but when did you come and when are you going back? No Blacks,

No Irish, no children have no dogs. This is Britain!

Staff shortages in British hospitals had been a problem even

before the founding of the NHS in 1948. In the 50s, the workforce

boomed, and senior NHS staff travelled to the Caribbean to

recruit new staff. But when new nurses arrived in Britain, they

found their welcome was often less than warm. Some of the patients

enquired as to whether it was the first time I had worn clothes. And

if it was the first time I had worn a bra. And I said, no. You are

talking about something that is different. I said I am not from

Africa, where you see dancing ladies without clothes. So they did

not have a clue, basically? they were ignorant in that fact,

that we were British subject. After months of protest, the

landlord of 'The Nelson' finally agreed to lift his ban on black

customers. We'd won our battle, but we hadn't won the war. World events

were about to put an even greater strain on racial harmony in

Leicester. Martin Luther King had a dream. So did the Ugandan dictator

Idi Amin. But a completely different kind of a dream. They

hold situation... Idi Amin's dream was to expel the

country's entire Asian community. Over many years, they'd become a

dominant force in the economy of this former British colony, playing

key roles in business, trade and the civil service. There have been

milking the economy of the country. The responsibility in Uganda, it is

the responsibility of Great Britain. Amin accused the Asian community of

hoarding wealth and sabotaging 'his' country. In reality, it was

his own extravagance which put a strain on the national budget. A

land grab began, and thousands of Ugandan Asians were given 90 days

to leave. Many of them have British passports. 50,000 of them were

thrown out. Some went to North America, some meant -- went to

other countries but the majority came to Britain. At the majority of

those who came to Britain came here, to Leicester.

In 1972, Leicester was a prosperous city and many Ugandan Asians found

jobs in hosiery manufacturing. But was Leicester the safe haven they

hoped for? I'm meeting brother and sister Nisha and Atal who fled

Uganda as children. You came here and thought it was a safe haven,

clearly it was not, was it? Something happened. That is correct.

Back in those days we had a glorious summer's. And they used to

attract a fair ground here. There was a group of English boys, boys

or men, they did not seem to be troubling anyone. But what they

were doing was taking all the wooden stakes out of the fence. And

the minute the fairground finished, that was the cue. Or you could see

was about 60 guys running across. They were swinging those things

indiscriminately. He ever came in the way, whether it was an man or a

woman, a child, whatever. At person got hit. You can imagine, it was

pandemonium. It is probably the most frightening episode of my life.

I would put it on a Power, I would remember being scared at the

airport in Uganda with all the soldiers. And all of a sudden, that

whole thing was re enacted but in a different way.

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 770 seconds

BELLS RING. We are in love for breath. -- we are in Loughborough.

The cavalry regiment are farmers or farm workers. A ledger listing the

names of the meant holds a surprise.. It says he joined up in

1911. He would have been 11 years old. He had lied about his age. He

was 15 when he first saw action. He was a lance corporal in 1916. At

the age of 17, too young to fight, he was lance corporal and having

fought a major battle. The Scot -- astonishing. The battle is

remembered every year at Bradgate Park, near Leicester. Some of the

cadets here were probably as old as some of the soldiers in World War

One. The Honorary Colonel of the Leicestershire and Derbyshire

Yeomanry today is the great- grandson of the man who left them -

- led them into battle. This is rather a nice little picture. It

does not see the light of day very often, but it is something very

special. These squadrons were under attack on the front line.

squadron's wanted to withdraw, and they started to withdraw, and a

great cry went up, hold hard, listened -- Leicestershire

Yeomanry! They subsequently fell. His great-grandfather led A

squadron. My grandfather, a was a commanding officer, was killed at

half-past six in the morning. He was out of it before the battle

really got going. The a squadron, which a Greek -- originally come

from Melton Mowbray and luck -- run and, held the line, and had they

not done so the Germans would have gone straight through. My dad was

in covering letter seat Scotland. - We have a photograph of him here

from his wedding in August 1914. He would have been 15 years old. He

does look older. He could pass for 17 or 18 quite easily. He was the

to save the day at the battle. The Life Guards had retreated.

bombardment had completely wiped out the front trenches. It had

disappeared in red mist. A knot of Yeoman with the infantry attack the

Your dad would have been in that front trench. I don't think he

would have forgotten it. He would not have forgotten it until the end

of his days. We found a veteran of that battle on his 100 birthday. I

did the interview 15 years ago, not knowing he had fought with my dad.

You must have seen some terrible things. Both sides were in battled.

There are many more stories to be found in villages. On the first

grave you see is one of the returning soldiers. Dead at 23

years old. He died from exhaustion or four years after the war. In