A 27-year-old from Swansea has been jailed for nearly a decade after being found guilty of being a member of a banned group.

Alex Davies, who set up National Action in 2013, was found guilty at Winchester Crown Court last month and was yesterday sentenced to eight and a half years in jail.

Davies founded National Action with friend Ben Raymond with the aim of creating a Nazi youth movement in the UK, describing themselves as "white Jihadists."

According to police, they based their group on Nazi Stormtroopers and travelled around the UK attending demonstrations.

National Action achieved notoriety in 2016, when it was brought to the attention of authorities and it became the first far-right group to be proscribed by the Home Office since the Second World War.

After the banning of his organisation, Davies defied the proscription by continuing to recruit members, sometimes travelling huge distances across the country to avoid written communications.

A year after the ban, he set up splinter group NS131, which was also banned by the government. Individuals linked to the underground 'continuity groups' were found with banned weapons including machetes and crossbows and one was found guilty of planning to attack an MP.

Davies became the 19th member of these banned groups to be tried for their membership of National Action affiliated organisations.

He was brought to trial after a lengthy investigation by Counter Terrorism Police in the West Midlands.

Detective Superintendent Anthony Tagg said: “Our officers have worked tirelessly to secure convictions of men who posed a significant threat to communities across the country.

“They were not merely armchair terrorists, they actively planned a race war. They recruited from positions of trust – the military and the police.

“They stockpiled weapons, and researched explosives and bomb-making. They trained their members in boxing, martial arts and knife fighting.

“Extremists use this kind of ideology to create discord, distrust and fear among our communities and we strive to counter this. I would encourage people to report hate crime to us and it will be taken seriously.

“As a result of these investigations, we have seen a significant increase of right-wing referrals to our Prevent programme.”

In sentencing, Judge Mark Dennis QC said to Davies: “You are an intelligent and educated young man but you have held, over a period of many years, warped and shocking prejudices.”