Momtaz Begum-Hussain Had A Problem, And No-one Else Could Help...

...so she set out to find The A-Team...

Wait, no, that's not right. She turned to Twitter, of course!

I've made a decision. From now on, if I need help, I'm heading straight to Twitter. I've tweeted pleas before. I once posted that I needed a job and the same afternoon got commissioned to write an article. But a few weeks ago, I discovered the true benefits of the virtual world.

Awwww, how heartwarming! Was was her problem? Lost kitten? Stuck tap? Locked out of her house?

It was election day and on my way back from a lunchtime trip to the launderette I discovered a huge BNP banner had been tied to the lamp post outside my flat. My immediate reaction was to pull it down. The trouble was, I'm short and it was higher than my tallest chair could reach. So I sent out a tweet. Could anyone help me tear down this monstrosity?

Ah.

I pondered the idea of knocking door-to-door until I found a ladder-owning resident, but it's a busy main road where people are closely guarded and don't stop and chat. Then I spotted my immediate neighbour who's exceptionally tall. When I told him about the banner and the fact I needed help, he laughed and went indoors.

Well, yes, after all, he perhaps quite sensibly reasoned it was a legitimate political party so who was he to help you censor them?

I was contacted by a local councillor and a member of another political party, who advised that I should deal with the issue legally.

Did they? Spoilsports!

Finally I got it. The tweet that saved the day. A message from a stranger to say assistance was on the way. Sure enough, two gentlemen promptly arrived with a ladder in tow. I tweeted a photo of them, and have since found out who they were, marking a satisfactory end to my tale.

At least with CiF, you can usually get some common sense below the line. And the first comment (and highest rated) points out the truth of the matter:

Well, indeed. Welcome to the new politics. So much improved by our addition of tribalist, communalist cultures, eh?

Breathtakingly Patronising? – Check! It Must Be The ‘Indy’, Then…

Deborah Ross produces the most insulting, sneering article I’ve yet seen in the ‘Indy’. And that’s saying something.

She’s despatched to East London to go on the campaign trail with the BNP, just like...well, a lot of reporters. At this point, I’m beginning to wonder if the BNP doesn’t consist of just three men and a dog, and all the others in the entourage are journalists and documentary filmmakers…

I’m not alone in that thought either:

So, I'm off to spend the day with the British National Party which appals almost everyone I know – "Poor you"; "Say you're busy"; "Can't you pull a sickie?" – but I find I'm peculiarly thrilled and excited.

Eh..?

I find the BNP in Barking and Dagenham, which basically means going east on the District line until you fall off at the end.

Ummm, no, sweetie.

That would be Upminster, a good few stops further

As I tip up, an altercation is already taking place – oh, joy of joys – between a BNP man in a sandy-coloured suit and a fat, white tattooed fellow with a neck thicker than his head and a Staffordshire bull terrier snarling at his side. "You got a problem with my bird, looking over the fence," the tattooed man is shouting, while jabbing the sandy-suited man in the chest. "Next time you come over, I'll hit you with a shovel!"

My God, you don't get this at Blenheim! Hit him with the shovel! Quick, someone find him a shovel!

Any other strange and exotic native rituals these people should perform for you, Deborah?

But, disappointingly, the minders manage to talk the tattooed man down. What was that all about? I ask. "That," says one of the minders, "was because Richard Barnbrook [the sandy-suited man, a BNP councillor] looked over the other fellow's fence where his girlfriend was having a bonfire, and he got cross about it."

Oh, how quaint!

The minder is friendly and later updates me on where dog-fighting is at these days. "They use them Japanese akita dogs now. They can pick up a Staffie and it's gone." He also says: "I can't give you my real name, love, for security reasons, but it's Terry."

Gosh, it must be like starring in your very own episode of ‘Minder’ directed by Guy Ritchie, eh, Deborah?

The job, today, is to press the flesh and distribute flyers. The flyers come with the headline "New Labour Have Changed The Face of Barking & Dagenham" and juxtapose two photographs. One shows pretty, white young women in tea-dresses, lining a street on what appears to be VE Day, and has a "From this..." arrow on it. The other, meanwhile, has a "To this..." arrow on it, and shows three women in burkhas, one of whom is giving the finger. I confess I have never personally seen a woman in a burkha give the finger but, like I said, perhaps I've lived in some kind of bubble.

Well, we are beginning to rather get that impression, Deborah…

Now, this is all very amusing, but I suspect if she’d written in this vein about any other borough or area, it wouldn’t have graced the pages of such a politically-correct organ of the media as the ‘Indy’.

How about you?

On The Campaign Trail In Deepest East London….

Although I don’t normally link to (or read) the ‘New Statesman’, there’s an article on the rise of the BNP and the local election campaign in Barking and Dagenham that’s very illuminating.

Though possibly not for the reasons that they might have supposed:

There was a time when Labour was so dominant in the area that it barely needed to canvass. When the Barking MP Margaret Hodge was first elected in 1994, she won with 72 per cent of the vote; in last year's European elections, Labour's share across Barking and Dagenham was 31 per cent.

Ouch! That's one hell of a drop. It also rather gives the lie to the allegation that Labour are using minorities to buy votes, though, doesn't it?

Because it certainly seems as though the people moving into B&D aren't voting Labour...

In an attempt to regain support, Hodge is hosting a question-and-answer session in a school hall with the former EastEnders actor Ross Kemp. But despite the star guest, there is little enthusiasm for Labour in the audience. Ann Steward, a member of a Becontree tenants' association, tells Hodge: "The only politician who attends our meetings is Richard Barnbrook [a BNP councillor] and that's why the BNP do so well. They come round and trim our hedges. Now the elections are looming we see Labour, but where have you been? We need your presence."

That's rather telling. Has Labour been neglecting this area because they've taken it for granted, or because they are aware that their polling is dropping and they can't find an answer?

Naturally, the Right to Buy policy of the previous Conservative government comes in for criticism, while neatly avoiding the fact that Labour have done nothing in the last 13 years to resolve that ‘problem’:

Yet it is also one of the most deprived places in the country, and the growing population puts an extra strain on public services. The problem is compounded by other London councils being allowed to place their own tenants and homeless people in private rented accommodation in the area. Even Tory-controlled Westminster - located on the other side of London and with some of Britain's most expensive streets - has placed 56 families here.

Ah. It's been used as a dumping ground then. No wonder the Labour candidate hasn't shown her face there...

There are 11,695 families on Barking and Dagenham's housing list and local anger has been directed at the new faces they see down the street. As I follow Hodge canvassing, complaints about housing crop up again and again. We hear tales of families that have had to wait three, five or even more years to get a home. One man has spent eight years living in a one-bedroom flat with his wife and four children. Hodge and her team patiently explain that this is because of the Right to Buy…

While neatly avoiding the fact that they've done nothing to resolve that...

A young mother says she's considering voting BNP because she likes the party's insistence that "local people get local housing". She adds hurriedly: "I'm not racist, though - half my family are black."

Hodge, who has been dashing between doorstep conversations with a bright "Hello, I'm your MP", turns to me and grimaces, as if to say: "You see what we're up against?"

Yes. Yes, we do, Hodge. People with reasonable concerns, whom you patronise and sneer at though only ever behind their back, to the 'safe' personage of your tame left-wing journalist...

Hodge has made an effort to turn around Labour's fortunes in the borough. She has moved her office here from Westminster and last year oversaw moves to rejuvenate the local party and boost recruitment. Several councillors were deselected and the party has taken on a wave of younger, ethnically diverse members.

Ah. Well, that's a winning strategy with those white, working class voters, eh, Hodge?

Good lord, talk about snatching defeat from the jaws of...well, defeat.

“The left don't like what I've been saying," she concedes. "But I think you can puncture racism by dealing with the feeling of unfairness that people have."

Good luck with that. Since a lot of those candidates are now standing as independents, you've managed to triple the feeling of unfairness...

Under pressure from figures on the left of the party, including the Dagenham MP Jon Cruddas, Labour has in recent months begun to address the lack of affordable housing. But is it too little too late? "Both main political parties should have invested far more in affordable social housing much sooner," Hodge admits. "But social housing is not universal, it is something that has to be rationed, and socialism has always been about the language of priorities."

And if it's going to be decided on 'priorities', then immigrants and asylum seekers, with larger families and complex 'needs', are always going to score higher on that list...

Her team knocks at another door. The white-haired man in his fifties who answers says he'll vote "for whoever is going to stop all this immigration. I drive a bus, and no one on it speaks English any more."

“Well, they all should speak English," Hodge replies.

And we laughed at Brown over #bigotgate...!?

Here's a woman who earlier sneered at the lady concerned over immigration despite being part of a mixed race family herself, yet happy to agree with a bus driver that the people on his bus should 'speak English'!

To whom? Each other? Would Margaret like to see official Labour Language Police walking the streets, ensuring no private conversations are ever carried out in foreign tongues??

And that's despite the fact that the government prints official documentation in all the languages under the sun!

Josephine Channer, a 31-year-old small business owner, is one of the Londoners who have been attracted to Barking by its cheap property prices. She is also a Labour council candidate, but sees things differently to Hodge. "With a lot of the white community, I think support for the BNP is just plain racism," she says.

That must go down well with your constituents, Josephine...

In the five years she has lived in Barking, Channer has seen her estate change from being largely white to a more typical urban mix.

'More typical'..? That's telling, isn't it...?

She claims to have encountered prejudice within the Labour Party. "One councillor who was deselected said that they would run as an independent if they were going to be replaced by a black candidate."

Is that so surprising? Can you now see the appeal of the BNP? Because I can...

But Josephine's fellows aren't voting for the Labour Party as a result:

Pastors in Barking's Pentecostal churches have been urging their congregations to vote for the fundamentalist Christian Party, whose leader, George Hargreaves, is also standing for parliament.

Hodge acknowledges this may split the anti-BNP vote, but plays down the threat. "I'm getting a mixed response. But I think the Christian Party is not about what I've done locally, it's about my attitude to abortion and stem-cell research."

Heh..!

Channer takes a bleaker view: "We've pissed off the white community, the black community, the Asian community, and now we've got to try and mend it in four weeks."

Good luck with that....

Leftie Warriors Ignorant Of Political And Economic Reality...Again

It seems the Left are only happy about some political parties being given a soft ride by newspapers:

An Essex newspaper has come in for severe criticism for an “article” on its website which reads almost word-for-word like a BNP press release. The report, which isn’t bylined, gushes about how “proud nationalists” dug into their pockets to fund Brentwood & Ongar BNP candidate Paul Morris’s deposit, “packed into a back room of a patriotic pub”.

Oh, noes! Newspapers are only ever supposed to hurl abuse at the BNP! How can this have happened?

The post, on the Essex Chronicle website “This is Total Essex” – which also tweeted the piece – adds: “The party operates under a veil of secrecy to protect members from those who oppose their beliefs and did not reveal the location of the meeting until just minutes before it was due to start. With the pub set to become a regular meeting place for the new group, they have asked us not to reveal where it is.

“Christine Mitchell, a 68-year-old grandmother from Chelmsford, will be running the branch from here on in. Mrs Mitchell, who is contesting the newly created Saffron Walden seat in the general election on May 6, said: ‘We are fighting for British jobs for British workers, that is the start but we are standing for other reasons – crime rates, the state of the education system and the fact MPs have stolen from the public.’

“The former Conservative leader of Westminster Council, Peter Strudwick, spoke for more than an hour during the meeting, rallying support for what he called “ideologies” for the future…

“Searching faces scoured the room until a man who had until then sat quietly in the corner, put his hand up to pledge £100. Others then thrust crisp £50 notes in the pot before the less well-off handed over their screwed up £10 and £20 notes. There was much applause and hand shaking as the money came flooding in, uniting the room in the campaign to bring about radical change.”

'Bring about radical change'..? That's only supposed to happen when the left do it. The left! God, you parochial little newspapers need to learn your place...

Don't worry, there'll be room for you up against the wall come the glorious revolution.

I mean, it's unthinkable that a newspaper, of all things, could print this without giving the other side a right to repl...

Oh:

Readers vented their fury at the Chronicle’s appeasement of the BNP in the comments.

'Appeasement'..? One might think they aren't a minority party...

But it's worse than that, comrades! Brace yourselves! It appears that some newspapers have been...

Oh, I almost can't bring myself to say it. They've been...accepting advertising!

Not from wholesome, union contributions, or any of the army of quangos and fakecharities. No, they've been taking the devil's shilling!

In January, Left Foot Forward revealed how 14 local papers in Essex had accepted advertising from the BNP during the 2009 European elections. This is the roll of shame: Basildon Recorder, Braintree Weekly, Chelmsford Weekly News, Clacton & Frinton Gazette, Colchester Weekly News, Echo, Essex County Standard, Evening Gazette, Halstead Gazette, Harwich & Manningtree Standard, Maldon & Burnham Standard, Southend Standard, Thurrock Gazette and Weekly News Brent & Bill.

Oh, horror! Local newspapers are commercial organisations...!

Who'da thunk it?

Following The Candidates: BNP

Meanwhile, the ‘Telegraph’ draws the short straw, and is out and about in Dagenham with Nick Griffin, yet another historically safe Labour seat:

It is hot in the London borough of Barking and Dagenham. It feels like the first day of summer. And, in a park opposite Becontree tube station, BNP activists are gathering for their day of action. There are maybe 100 of them. Some are suited and booted, and some are in "Anglo-Saxon" T-shirts and tattoos, the very archetype of ex-National Front. Heartbreakingly, there are children here.

Ah, the scene is set, then…

Nick Griffin is standing here against Margaret Hodge, the Labour Minister of State for Culture and Tourism (majority: 8,883). It is a stunt. But it is possible that Barking and Dagenham could soon have a BNP-controlled council. It is now the second largest party at local level with 15 seats and they aim to take absolute control; along with Stoke, this borough is the centre of BNP hopes.

And why?

Well, this little vignette might tell you why, though the Telegraph staffer doesn’t comment on it:

Before the muster, I spend an hour with Margaret Hodge, as she walks the empty streets. She is brisk and bossy. "Come back later," says one man, dragged out of bed, when Hodge wants to register him to vote. "No," she replies, "Let's do it now."

So, just like the last post with Miliband, we see the way the elite treat the public; as servants, dumb creatures to do their bidding for the prospect of a treat.

Is it any wonder they are voting – in effect – ‘none of you vile scum’ when they put a tick in the BNP box?

I go to the Cherry Tree pub to wait for Griffin, who is giving a press conference. The drinkers come out to talk. They are all ex-Labour, now BNP. "It's housing, schools, hospitals and jobs, not colour," says one man. "I believed in Old Labour but not New Labour. They have failed in this borough."

"People have had enough," says a woman. "We are being pushed to the back of the queue. My son couldn't get into the school of his choice. He has no chance of a council house."

"You don't appreciate that our facilities are getting swamped," says another man. "If we vote BNP, people might start listening to us. Because we have been abandoned by our government."

All perfectly good, solid points. None of them very right wing either, as Tim Worstall points out. It almost – almost – sways the Telegraph staffer.

Until…

I begin to sympathise with their grievances, because they are right – no council housing has been built here for 30 years. The rise of the BNP is one of Labour's greatest failures. But then comes the racist bile. "Go into a supermarket," says another man, "it's full of immigrants. Why?"

It seems that noticing that there’s an influx of immigrants in your supermarket, that the culture of your home area has suddenly changed, and that no-one consulted you on it, is now to be considered ‘racist bile’ by the Righteous.

Which makes you wonder just what words they’d use for genuine racism, doesn’t it?

Griffin gets into his car and we drive to Dagenham Broadway, where the BNP has erected its stall. We pass the BNP music bus, pulled over by the police for playing loud music. Griffin gets out and glad-hands; he seems to adore it.

Reverend Robert West, the BNP candidate in Lincoln, shouts, "It is not racist to love your country!" as Pastor James Gitau, a black BNP supporter, stands next to him. Every time the Rev Mr West shouts a slogan, Gitau shouts, "Hallelujah!"

Ooooh, this’ll be good…

A young black girl stares on, astonished. A second black woman strides up to the black preacher, and berates him.

"Why are you holding this?" she shouts. "You are a black man. You should be ashamed." In response, Gitau waves his flag.

So, in Tanya Gold’s eyes, desiring to see more of your fellow countrymen and fewer outsiders in the supermarket is ‘racist bile’, but implying that because your skin is black, you should vote with all your fellows is…what?

She never elaborates.

Griffin has, I learn, gone back to the Cherry Tree pub, where there is due to be a debate between all the parliamentary candidates in a private room. It is closed to all press and supporters except for Sky News, who will be broadcasting it. I arrive to find the gates to the car park locked, and a woman from Sky arguing with a Hodge employee. Margaret, he says, doesn't want to go into a BNP pub. But if she wants to debate, she must, "because no other venue would have Griffin". This is the mood in Barking and Dagenham.

Of course, she doesn’t want to debate at all, as we learn:

I find Hodge a few doors away, outside her campaign headquarters, a brown, bare church. She is trying to find the Tory candidate's telephone number, so they can both pull out of the debate.

"That pub is BNP," she says, looking disgusted, "I don't want to walk through it."

Now, what, I wonder, constitutes a ‘BNP pub’? Is it just that this pub allowed the debate to be held there?

And how would Margaret Hodge possibly know that that’s what it is, since one of the main complaints about her is that she’s hardly ever seen in the area?

And just how do they ever expect to win votes back from those old Labour voters who are now voting BNP if they never address the issues, never debate anything, and treat the voters with utter contempt?

Although perhaps she didn't want to debate with Griffin in case they wound up agreeing on some things?

The Battle For Barking Hots Up...

As noted by Laban Tall and Edwin Greenwood, the Berk of Barking is (briefly) back in his home town to extol the virtues and benefits of multiculturalism and cheap labour.

Before fleeing back to the lily-white haven of decidedly non-multicultural Dorset, of course. Multicultual Barking is wonderful, you see, but you wouldn't want to live there, would you?

Cahal Milmo, in the 'Indy' reports from the front line and guess whose fault it all is?

The lack of social housing is a major problem locally and a key electoral issue. Margaret Thatcher's right-to-buy policy cut the housing stock in an area which includes the vast Becontree estate, the world's largest public housing project. Successive Labour governments have stymied the development of new homes, leaving a council waiting list of 11,695.

Ah, perfect...

Nearby lies the council ward of Goresbrook, the epicentre of BNP support in Barking and Dagenham. Its streets are lined with terraced houses, many displaying the signs of right-to-buy ownership such as conservatories and extensions.

The traitorous scum. How dare they purchase their homes and improve them!

Don't they realise that the great and the good can't possibly advance their goals if people insist on having something worth fighting for, and reject the idea of living in a crowded, heavily oversubscribed slum..?

And for a real idea of just how the progressives and their fellow travellers view the people they supposedly want to win away from BNP votes, check out yesterday's Tweet from pudgy lefty Johann Hari:


That's the way to win votes, Johann...for the other side.

Update: Well done, Labour. Via Al Jahom, it looks like you've handed them something to shout about on their Barking rally today. You utter, utter cretins...

What We Need Is More Talking, Until These People Get The Message!

Eshaan Akbar (Who he? According to ‘CiF’, ‘Eshaan Akbar is taking part in the Young Foundation's UpRising programme, which aims to identify, recruit, develop and support a new generation of young leaders, aged 19 to 25, from a range of backgrounds in east London.’) has an article looking at the rise of the BNP in east London.

First, his ‘out of the frying pan’ decision:

I moved to Chadwell Heath in Barking and Dagenham – where 12 of the 51 councillors are from the BNP – 10 years ago, only a mile away from the West Ham Utd training ground, and my brother attends one of the most improved schools in the country. My local amenities include a newsagent owned by a Sri Lankan, a Bangladeshi restaurant, a cafe and "chippy" owned by a Turkish family, Pakistani dry cleaners and a closed-down Woolworths.

Ahh, glorious diversity!

Despite this, Nick Griffin, leader of the BNP, will be standing for election in a ward in the south of the borough at the general election.

‘Despite this’..? Maybe ‘because of this’. Did that ever occur to you, Eshaan?

…the BNP have been tactically astute in striking when the iron is hot and have invented a new game – politics by immigrant numbers. Your odds of getting a job, that council house, hospital treatment or your children getting a fair amount of attention from their teachers are better if there are fewer people going for that job or council house and fewer children for the teachers to contend with. It's a simple argument, but an effective one…

Well, quite.

So long as these key issues – around employment, social housing, and education – remain unaddressed by those in power who can effect change, particularly at the local level, the BNP will have a bouncy castle of a platform.

Again, quite.

So what to do about it? Well, if Eshaan is to be believed, talk longer and harder at these stupid people until they get the message:

Local councils have an important role to play in working with local partners and central government to identify ways in which to encourage disaffected communities to engage with society.

They are ‘engaging with society’. They are voting for the only party that promises them an answer to what they see as a problem.

I fail to see how you plan to combat this by telling them there isn’t a problem at all. That’s been tried for the last eleven years, without success.

But its most important role is transparency and communication. Central government has stepped into the domain of transparency with their recent launch of data.gov.uk, but at the local level this means very little, especially in a borough where residents are unlikely to use the internet to interrogate government data.

Really? Is B&D an internet blackspot, or something?

Residents want simple questions answered: Will I get a house? Will I have a job? Will my child do alright in school? Is my situation the fault of immigrants?

And if the answer might be ‘Yes’, better avoid asking that question, at all costs!

What separates the BNP from other parties is that they seem happy to do the groundwork to answer those questions – no matter how fabricated their answers may be – and, in the absence of an alternative, residents accept what they are presented with.

But you aren’t offering any alternative, Eshaan, except the chance to be told everything is rosy and you are all horrible racists for thinking otherwise.

Fascism has its roots in movements where members feel like they and "their people" are victims. Right now, in Barking and Dagenham, there are a lot of people who are being told they are victims.

And your solution, Eshaan, is to tell them they are not, more often, and harder.

But others are listening, and promising action. And it’s not just the BNP:

Migrants would be forced to 'earn' the right to benefits and council housing over several years under explosive plans outlined today by a senior Labour minister.

Margaret Hodge warns British values of openness and tolerance are under threat because of an increasing sense of 'unfairness' over immigration.

And Margaret Hodge is clearly fully clued up on ‘British values of openness and tolerance’, being, umm, a Labour MP…

The Culture Minister is calling for a new points system - based on length of residence or national insurance contributions - to determine that only migrants who have made a fair contribution to society get the same rights as local families.

She’s calling for it now? Why is it suddenly ‘fair’ now, when it wasn’t eleven years ago?

Mrs Hodge was attacked as 'offensive' by senior Labour colleagues after calling for a shake-up of housing rules two and half years ago.

But last year, the Government announced it was adopting the policy proposal she made to give councils new powers to give local people priority on waiting lists.

Now the minister is risking angering colleagues again by going further, with an admission that the Government has failed to address voters' concerns over immigration.

Why would she do this?

Sir Andrew Green, chairman of the MigrationWatch, said: 'This sounds like a very promising idea. It's just a pity that the Government has not done anything about it over the last 13 years.'

Indeed. So why would she do th…

Ah:

Mrs Hodge received 13,826 votes at the last election, a majority of 8,883. The BNP finished only 27 votes behind the Tories on 4,916.

All is revealed…

Of course, as Leg-Iron points out, she's bound to be lying like a cheap rug, but she wouldn't do that if she didn't think it'd work.

Barking, Hugh? I’ll Say You Are….

Hugh Muir is at it again:

The evening rush outside the Vicarage Fields shopping centre in Barking has the skin tones of many of our major cities. A white English woman in a shiny black raincoat hurries to a cash machine. Another woman of Chinese extraction walks by, her neck protected by a fake-fur lining. Two Asian men in jogging gear chat behind her. A black man folds his newspaper and hurries home.

Oh, what a wonderful multicultural Garden of Eden (despite the hideous carbuncle that is Barking Train Station), eh, Hugh? How pleased you must be to see this, in the, ooh, let’s be generous and say three hours, four tops, you might have spent in Barking before fleeing back to the safety of Grauniad HQ.

Did you think to enquire if the ‘white English woman’ was happy with the way Barking has changed? Or didn’t it occur to you?

But it seems there’s a serpent whispering to the inhabitants of Barking, and Hugh cannot let that go without challenge:

Many people from different parts of the world have alighted here in Barking and this week Nick Griffin of the British National party announced that, come the next election, he plans to be their MP.

Which is unlikely, as it’s a Labour stronghold, though admittedly the BNP have done well there in the past.

The far right already forms the official opposition to Labour in Barking and Griffin sees easy pickings from the corpse of an old Labour fiefdom. He might be right. But Darren Rodwell tells me he may have to think again.

Oh, really? And what does Darren Rodwell (who he? We’ll find out) plan to do about it?

For things have been happening on the ground, things that might help Labour make up years of neglect that left estates vulnerable to the appeal of the BNP. It's not based on morality or political philosophy, he tells me. Those aren't the key drivers of opinion. It's practical. It has to be.

So, what’s the magic formula that will turn the Barking voter away from the BNP?

Please tell me it isn't the useless UAF, who decided to support the RMT in a demo against the BNP on Thursday, and all assembled outside Upney Tube Station, with a BBC reporter filming them...while Griffin went to Barking Town Hall!

The response, says Rodwell, born and bred in the area, must also be about the nuts and bolts, reconnecting with erstwhile supporters, showing empathy.

And they plan to do this by resolving the pressing issues with immigration, lack of housing and crime?

Oh:

That is why this year, Rodwell, 39, a tenants association leader and a Labour agent, has helped Margaret Hodge, his much-maligned MP, and other volunteers, deliver more than 150,000 letters and leaflets. They have knocked on 22,000 doors; made around 9,000 contacts; delivered 20,000 questionnaires. The politics of shoe leather.

They knocked on 22,000 doors and made 9,000 ‘contacts’. That’s just half.

And how many of those 9,000 told them they’d happily vote Labour as a result? How many told them something else?

Griffin will inevitably work hard – unlike some of his councillors in the town hall – for he sees the opportunity of a lifetime here. But Rodwell tells me that Labour, having realised where it went so wrong in its heartland, is ready to work harder.

Yeah. It’s ready to…well, spin. And avoid the issues. And send out leaflets.

That’ll do the trick, I’m sure.

And I can’t leave this post without uploading a screengrab of this article this morning, showing that the Grauniad’s reputation for poor editing is still intact:

They've fixed it now, sadly...

Welcoming: Yr Doin It Wrong…

So, the BNP has signed up its first non-white member:

An elderly Sikh who describes Islam as a "beast" and once provided a character reference for Nick Griffin during his racial hatred trial is set to become the British National Party's first non-white member.

And how does the membership react to this newcomer, this first-of-many to their fold?

A BNP spokesman said last night: "He is perhaps the kind of immigrant you want if you are going to have them."

/facepalm

There’s ‘damning with faint praise’, and then there’s whatever the hell that is…

Over at Blognor Regis, it is noted that anyone who would proclaim surprise at the BNP's choice has never studied history.

As Secret Bases Go, It’s Not Very ‘Tracy Island’, Is It?

‘BNP has secret base!’ screams the headline in the ‘Lancashire Telegraph’, conjuring visions of palm trees slowly folding to the ground and a runway appearing amongst the fast food shops, to launch Nick Griffin skyward at the next election.

Sadly, the truth is a little less exciting than that.

The British National Party has been quietly running an office in Burnley town centre for up to nine years, the Lancashire Telegraph can reveal.

The low-key office, just metres from Burnley town hall, is not mentioned in the far-right party’s literature or on its website - and most residents and even seasoned local politicians were unaware it existed.

Unaware? Or uninterested?

But Lib Dem council leader Gordon Birtwistle said only “very, very few” people were aware of it.

He added: “Outside their membership I would not have thought anyone knew. If they had been open about it, they would not have used a pseudonym and it would be on their leaflets.

“If they want to be taken seriously they should be open so people know if they want to visit them they can do.”

What sort of people, Gordon?

These sort of people?

Yeah, can see why they aren’t happy to advertise…

Elaine Heywood, 37, of East Road, said: “It makes you wonder what they have got to hide. They are supposed to be a major political party now, but they are not being open and transparent. You can’t have your cake and eat it.”

Why not, Elaine?

All the other major political parties are more than happy to have their cake and eat it, particularly when it’s been paid for by the taxpayer.

And when it comes to being ‘open and transparent’, well, take a look at what we learned over the weekend.

Still think they need to be more like the other parties, Elaine?

”… you have to expect that if you come to an anti-fascist demonstration with a BNP banner.”

A rather triumphant article in the ‘Indy’ on the QT debacle:

From mid-afternoon they came, in their hundreds, to the gates of Television Centre, waving banners, lighting flares and chanting "BBC! Shame on you."

Oh, that’s good, is it? Well, I suppose it is, in the sense that people are free to have their say, so long as no-one gets hurt.

Ah:

Wooden poles that held placards were thrown at the four-deep cordon of police. By the time filming began at around 7.30pm, six people had been arrested and three police officers had been injured. One was taken to hospital with a head injury.

As I said over at another blog: ‘Riot shields. Water cannon. Job done…’

Shimal Thakrar, 33, from Edgware, London, said the audience hissed and booed during the filming and shouted "liar" and "get out the door" at Mr Griffin.

You’re a little early for pantomime season, aren’t you? Also a bit old…

But it’s the UAF idiot that reveals the true danger in our society today.

And that isn’t the temporary political success of a small left-wing nationalist party:

Martin Smith, the Unite Against Fascism organiser, who directed protesters to the gate at Television Centre through which many surged, had vowed to resist police attempts to break up the demonstration and insisted it was essentially peaceful. But he did admit that one far-right supporter had been attacked earlier in the afternoon. "A guy came with a BNP banner. That was ripped from him and he was hit on the head, but you have to expect that if you come to an anti-fascist demonstration with a BNP banner," said Mr Smith.

No.

No, you don’t, any more than a black man or woman has to ‘expect’ to have racist violence directed at them because they inadvertently wandered into a BNP rally.

Both are wrong. And the fact that you can’t see that makes you even worse than Griffin…

'Question Time' Reflection

Interesting that the 'Daily Fail' headline is 'Jeered, scorned and ridiculed - still BNP's Nick Griffin milks his moment in spotlight on Question Time'.

Do they really not see that the one thing leads to the other..?

BNP On Parade...

Well, in a few hours we'll know how the Great BNP Debate went down.

This morning, the intensity reached fever pitch among the Righteous:

A BBC presenter has attacked the decision to invite the leader of the British National Party (BNP) on to BBC1's Question Time tonight, warning that the move "completely contradicts" rules on impartiality and would erode the public's trust in the Corporation.

Hmm, which one? One of the big political presenters – Huw Edwards? Jeremy Vine?

Michael Rosen, the former children's laureate…

Ah…

…accused the broadcaster of "hiding behind" the BNP's European election victories to justify its decision, adding that executives "were relishing" the ratings that the broadcast is expected to receive. "It is failing in the very impartiality that it claims to be trying to uphold," he said.

He didn’t elaborate on how allowing an elected party member onto a tv debate would do that, which is just as well.

He added that the BBC's championing of the "trust agenda", introduced after controversy over a documentary about the Queen, had been ignored in pushing ahead with Mr Griffin's appearance. "It will lose my trust and that of others if it goes ahead with this," he said. "The BBC is not just any ordinary organisation. It is like a public place – we all own it and need to be a part of it. It has a responsibility to everyone.

"They make this very clear when you work for them. If I were to say anything remotely similar to the things Nick Griffin has said and will say tonight, I would not be allowed on. The BNP's whole notion of reversing immigration rests on the notion that many people shouldn't be here ... the people that the BNP target are licence-fee payers."

And so are the people that have voted for them.

Quite a dilemma, eh, Mikey?

He added: "The BBC is obsessed with putting things 'through compliance', to ensure no one will find programmes politically, sexually or socially offensive. I have been stopped from reading a poem that contained one swear word before. Yet while they go into palpitations over things Jonathan Ross says, they are allowing Nick Griffin airtime to say things that will offend millions."

Because no-one voted for you or Jonathon Ross. You are just employees on contract.

This man, like it or not, is an elected official, and is therefore entitled to present his case.

What are you all worried about? The BNP will likely condemn themselves out of their own mouths, so why not let them speak? After all, as DumbJon points out, the creme de la creme of diversity is aligned against them. Surely Sayeeds Warsi will have no trouble swaying us all?

But it seems that some aren’t so sure, and would rather subvert democracy:

Hundreds of protesters are expected to gather outside the BBC tonight, and police are poised for violent clashes. The programme may be moved to a secret location should it prove too dangerous to ferry guests to the studio in BBC Television Centre, west London.

It shouldn’t prove ‘too dangerous’ – the slightest hint from the UAF and other rent-a-mob scum intent on undermining democracy and the riot gear and water cannon should be deployed.

Weyman Bennett, joint national secretary of Unite Against Fascism, said: "The BBC will be responsible for any increase in racist attacks that take place after they have gone ahead with this."

No, they won’t. The people that commit them will be responsible.

Or would you accept being held responsible for the actions of your members?

No? Thought not…