Now this is really frightening!!

[Harold Hill]

KeyboardJockey, your posts on B&D are very interesting.

Question: What's the big difference, if there is one, between B&D and, say, Redbridge or Havering? Are the social problems worse or the local pols & council officers sillier?

I imagine unemployent is lower in Redbridge and Havering. The BNp have always had a presence in B&D so are able to mobilise there far better. Plus Havering is far more Tory than Labour. Barking and Grays are one of the few places in Essex that are the opposite

 

[Blackmushroom]

So whats the solution? Political parties should pander to anti-foreigner sentiments?

 

[KeyboardJockey]

So whats the solution? Political parties should pander to anti-foreigner sentiments?

Maybe not pander as you say but at least be aware that badly managed immigration policies coupled with a snobbish attitude to the white working classes fromthose parties that traditionally supported them along with the working classes of all creeds increases tensions. Add in a situation where a party like the SWP creates a political vehicle specifically to gain votes off of the muslim community thuse legitimising communitarian based politics and you have the makings of a political disaster.

There will always be racist twunts around like Kenny Vermouth. Like sexually transmitted diseases they will always be with us. The big difference now is that those parties who traditionally backed the working classes have a sneering attitude towards them but a positive attitude to incomers.

A couple of weeks ago an old guy probably a war vet was crying his eyes out at Barking station. He was with a friend and he appeard to be shit scared (from what I managed to overhear) about going through barking because of the gangs of africans and asians and eastern europeans hanging round there. I heard him say that if he could he would get out of this shit country like his children want to and his friend said that the problem isnot that the countries shit but there are two many shit people in here.

Now although I don't agree with his sentiment I can see where it comes from and it is not just mindless racism it is fear of change that can't be controlled and change that imposed by remote poltiicians who sneer at the little man.

I have no sympathy with the open door twats as regards immigration and diversity but neither do I agree with the 'send em back' approach. Somewhere in the middle is required. If immigration policy is not seen to be fair to both potential immigrants and the indiginous population the only winners will be the bnp etc.

 

[gosub]

So whats the solution? Political parties should pander to anti-foreigner sentiments?

Before this shower got in, upped their salaries, gilt edged their pensions and the term "political elite" had been bandied about; we had elected representatives. It was and still should be their job to prevent the alienation and disenfranchisement of all strata's of society thus limiting the scope of extremists to build a platform.

I have some sympathy for the used to have A,B,C type now we just have management, only its not management in a real world sense. The notion that plummeting party memberships should a case for state subsides to prop up a clearly failing system rather than inducement to reengage with the wider electorate yet another example of do as we say not as we do. But then if they had to live by the rules they set and expect the rest of us to live by, I think a lot of them would be in jail.


Edited to add : White working classes leaving Labour for BNP - I thought the Prime Minister had decreed everyone middle class

 

[audiotech]

Home Office minister Andy Burnham has dismissed the likelihood of the BNP becoming a stronger electoral force. He said:

"I think the report that has been published ... reflects a growing tendency towards protest voting, particularly at local elections,"...

"But I think things have got to be kept in proportion. There's no way the BNP will get anything close to 25%."

In the 2005 general election, the party raised its total number of votes by 0.5% to gain 0.7% - or 192,850 vote.

It gained support in the 2004 European Parliament elections, increasing its votes by 3.9% to gain 4.9% of the vote, but failed to win a seat.

*Emphasis added.

http://www.turkishweekly.net/news.php?id=29958

This from the Joseph Rowntree report.

...the nation-wide European election exit poll found that 64.2 per cent of respondents said they disliked the BNP ‘a lot’, which seems to confirm the existence of a large majority of voters for whom extremist parties, pedaling racist ideas, are an anathema in British politics. Also the earlier State of the Nation 2004 poll found that 76 per cent of respondents said that they ‘could never vote’ for the BNP with trade unionists (83 per cent never) and ABC1 (80 per cent never) standing out. Proportions of voters who could ‘never vote for’ the BNP were high in Scotland (88%), Wales (85%) and the South West (87%). The BNP were easily the most unpopular party, with nearly half of respondents (47 per cent) saying that disliked them a lot, and 72 per cent disliking them overall.
http://www.governmentontheweb.org/downloads/Elections_London/Far-Right-Paper-EPOP-2004.pdf

However, this appears contradictory.

In the London 2004 poll 23 per cent of respondents claimed that they ‘might vote’ for the BNP in the future, indicating greater levels of potential support than previously recorded. These proportions of respondents suggesting that they ‘might vote for the BNP in the future’ were consistent across all the polls reported here. The State of the Nation 2004 poll found that even while the BNP is most unpopular, some 18 per cent of the British population, rising to 20 per cent across England and 24 per cent in London, say that they ‘might vote’ for them in the future. In the European exit polls, we found that 18.7 per cent of respondents said that they might.
http://www.governmentontheweb.org/downloads/Elections_London/Far-Right-Paper-EPOP-2004.pdf

 

[KeyboardJockey]

Home Office minister Andy Burnham has dismissed the likelihood of the BNP becoming a stronger electoral force. He said:
.

interesting stuff there but the BNP are very strong on the ground round here. Mistakes made by the local authority and perceptions of unfair allocations in housing (the housing that hasn't been sold off under right to buy that is) is boosting them.

Third place in a gen election is the sort of position that groups like the Greens would give their right arm for.

 

[scott_forester]

I tend to think that Labour are using the boggy man of the BNP as a device to get their vote out - which is pretty underhand.

 

[JHE]

I tend to think that Labour are using the boggy man of the BNP as a device to get their vote out - which is pretty underhand.

Yes. There are also (at least) two other reasons why the news media have carried so much on the BNP in the last few days.

1. By talking up the BNP's support, the Labour Party (and others) will be able to claim success when the BNP's vote is less high than some are now suggesting.

2. The news media feel a little short of material over the bank holiday weekend.

 

[KeyboardJockey]

I tend to think that Labour are using the boggy man of the BNP as a device to get their vote out - which is pretty underhand.

Good point. You always must take what ever comes out of the mouth of Margaret Hodge with a bucketful of salt.

It can't be denied however tht the bnp did get a third place in the Gen Election and that is worrying. I think that the potential bnp outcome depends on the calibre of the candidates that they put up. They got badly burned in Goresbrook by putting up Clueless Kelley who was quite frankly as thick as shit. The bnp's star candidate Laurence Rustem was defeated at the bye election by the libdems pulling out and other parties putting thier efforts behind defeating Rustem.

We do have an independent candidate Anthony Richards in one ward (I'll look it up later) who is well known and has rightly attacked the council's record on bread and butter service issues such as crime as well as attacking on the immigration / asylum seeker issue by appealling for a more common sense approach.

As I said above, if the bnp put up popular candidates who click with the population then they could take up to three seats. They might take back Goresbrook and they might pick up a seat on Thames View because of the council's appalling handiling of the contaminated land issue. They might take Mayesbrook as they had a very strong showing at the polling stations in the last GE. However in Mayesbrook they will be up against UKIP.

On the Barking side of the borough in some wards it's going to be a straight fight in the more affluent wards between Tories and bnp.

It is going to be an interesting election.

 

[scott_forester]

It can't be denied however tht the bnp did get a third place in the Gen Election and that is worrying.

Not to play down the horror of a BNP MP but what difference would it really make? Don't get me wrong they are scumbags but the chance of them getting any real power in this country is pretty remote, you could imagine the press making mincemeat out of any council that ever come under BNP control. Not their biggest fan but I'd expect if Respect win any overall control they'll be a fine example of the press dusting off their 'loony council' script book.

The only thing that makes the BNP relavent are people like Hodge who talk about them as a very cyncial ploy.

I never thought I'd hear a Labour MP worry their support was shifting to the far right.

 

[syd mullet]

Its worth pointing out that to enable the majority of immigrants in and to have housing for them, the idigenous population have moved away once their streets started getting a few immigrant households. This tells me a lot. Maybe its lost on some here. Its certainly lost on the politicans at Westminster. I wonder if they ever contemplate where 75% of the indigenous population of Southall have gone to, and why they moved out?

It is the clever people who move as soon as they sense what is happening/going to happen to their district, because house prices always slump. This who failed to act usually fall into simple, 'trapped', categories: the simple, the old, and those who failed to act fast enough and found their properties devalued by immigration and so could not get a good enough price to purchase elsewhere.

 

[scott_forester]

the idigenous population

How long do you have the live somewhere to be classed as idigenous?

 

[In Bloom]

Its worth pointing out that to enable the majority of immigrants in and to have housing for them, the idigenous population have moved away once their streets started getting a few immigrant households. This tells me a lot. Maybe its lost on some here. Its certainly lost on the politicans at Westminster. I wonder if they ever contemplate where 75% of the indigenous population of Southall have gone to, and why they moved out?

It is the clever people who move as soon as they sense what is happening/going to happen to their district, because house prices always slump. This who failed to act usually fall into simple, 'trapped', categories: the simple, the old, and those who failed to act fast enough and found their properties devalued by immigration and so could not get a good enough price to purchase elsewhere.

Let's not forget the people who don't own their own homes and the people who can't afford to move.

Believe it or not, there are still some of us out there.

 

[treelover]

Imo, one of the big problems in my view has been what can only be described as 'omerta' by the left and indeed the major parties. If as the telegraph claims, legal immigration, has risen to over 1.2 million, excluding illegal/asylum seekers, and rising, then this will bring massive change. The last time, Britain witnessed such a massive demographic change, (albeit temporary) was when the U.S and commonwealth forces were stationed here, prior to D_Day. there were many many problems afaik, but the difference is these concerns were discussed regularly in the press. But, now, until now, there has been little genuine non-reactionary debate/discussion of the consequences of large scale immigration, anyone on the left who does so is generally shouted down


btw, Mods, could this thread be changed to a more meaningful one
such as

0ne in four white voters may vote BNP

 

[JimPage]

The BNP has gained some support, and (to M Hodge's shock) quite a lot more looser sympathy, in some particular areas, including Barking and Dagenham. It remains a very minor party.

i think you have been reading searchlight too much. they are organised nationally and adding to their network of branches at the rate of at least 2 a month

do you regard the 808,000 votes they got in 2004 and the 34 saved deposits in 2005 as a minor level of support?. actually recognising they are on the up is not supporting the bnp. its the first step to doing something about it

 

[JimPage]

Yes. There are also (at least) two other reasons why the news media have carried so much on the BNP in the last few days.

1. By talking up the BNP's support, the Labour Party (and others) will be able to claim success when the BNP's vote is less high than some are now suggesting.

if anything, it is talking in down. the bnp have been polling 25% in their target wards now since 2002- are you actually saying their vote has been going down iover the last few years?

 

[morlock]

Yes. There are also (at least) two other reasons why the news media have carried so much on the BNP in the last few days.

1. By talking up the BNP's support, the Labour Party (and others) will be able to claim success when the BNP's vote is less high than some are now suggesting.

if anything, it is talking in down. the bnp have been polling 25% in their target wards now since 2002- are you actually saying their vote has been going down iover the last few years?

Talking up the possibility of BNP victories is designed to ensure:

1) All anti-BNP voters (Greens, LibDems etc will vote tacticaly. against the BNP)

2) BNP members will become disillusioned when they don't get all the victories they've allowed themselves to think they'll get

 

[brasicritique]

whats really frightening is that Billy brag is going to fight the BNP by going on tour great that should do the trick maybe mark steel will be the warm up act

 

[JimPage]

Talking up the possibility of BNP victories is designed to ensure:
1) All anti-BNP voters (Greens, LibDems etc will vote tacticaly. against the BNP)

>>>>>>>for the tories perhaps? the poplular front tactic- has been tried- and failed. the only game in town is building a working class alternative to them

2) BNP members will become disillusioned when they don't get all the victories they've allowed themselves to think they'll get

>>>>> judging by the average fash-upon-stormfront- the most they are expecting is 10-20 gains nationwide. they learnt their lesson from 2004 when they over-estimated the potential of breaking through

 

[shagnasty]

immigration has happened .and were do they go to the working class areas and to the credit of the working people they have embraced these people the working class get the shit end of the stick everytime .one thing i found out about immigrants they are no different from us