The leader of a campaign to stop a large site in High Town being sold to Shia Muslims has denied he is motivated by involvement with the English Defence League.
Darren Carroll told our sister paper The Luton News this week that he had set up pressure group House the People, to demand Luton Borough Council preserve the Old Drill Hall site in Old Bedford Road for affordable housing.
He says people in High Town were consulted when the proposals to build homes on the site were originally put forward, but have met a wall of silence now that the site is being sold.
The English Defence League (EDL) has branded the plans by the Shia organisation Masjid-e-Ali, currently based in Moor Street, a “super-mosque”. But the Shias say the facility would be a community centre, open to people of all faiths.
Yesterday Mr Carroll said that although he was related to EDL leaders Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who goes by the pseudonym Tommy Robinson, and Kevin Carroll, he was not a member.