The Holiday Inn Express on Manvers Way, just outside Rotherham, stands quiet and empty. There are hints that something has happened here: cracks in some of the windows, and round the back, if you know where to look, remnants of police tape. But there are no obvious signs of the violence that took place in August, nor of the danger faced by the hotel’s former residents, who, many say, were lucky to escape with their lives when the hotel was set alight during a far-right riot.
It was hot on Sunday 4 August when what had been advertised on Facebook as a peaceful protest, triggered by the murders of three girls in Southport, turned violent. At its height, about 750 people gathered, some from the local area but many from much farther afield.
