Their London and their times - The culture and politics of the time
Race
“Where does our color come into it?”
“We’re attracted to each other ‘cos of it, for Lord sake. That isn’t terrible – but it is if we bring some hierarchy into it.”
Deni’s glaring at Neil.
“Maybe we can only get it to work, get us to work, because you Brits never colonized Brazil. That’s the hope.”
In the 1970s and 80s, the explicit forms of discrimination, “colour bars” etc., evolved into more subtle but entrenched, structural inequalities.
Black and South Asian communities routinely faced housing exclusion, severe employment discrimination, and disproportionately high unemployment rates. Margaret Thatcher’s controversial 1978 television interview where she claimed British people were “rather afraid that this country might be rather swamped by people with a different culture” gave legitimacy to right-wing groups and stoked widespread societal anxiety. Minority communities experienced racist violence from extremist organizations like the National Front. Police harassment, coupled with poverty and societal neglect, led to civil unrest areas with large Black populations, most notably in Bristol, London and Manchester. A subsequent inquiry acknowledged that "racial disadvantage" was an undeniable reality in British life.
The All Lewisham Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (ALCARAF) was a prominent, broad-based anti-racist coalition formed in South East London during the 1970s. 
Composed of trade unionists, church groups, local politicians, and community members, it is most famous for its role in countering the August 1977 march organized by the National Front in an attempt to intimidate the local Black and minority ethnic populations. The ensuing street battles became known as the “Battle of Lewisham”.
The Anti-Racist/Anti-Fascist Co-ordinating Committee (ARAFCC) was a major grassroots federation formed around the same time, bringing together a coalition of community, trade union, and political groups to directly counter the rise of the far-right National Front.