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Blackleaf · Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 4:52 pm Post subject: 25% of voters 'considering BNP'

25% of voters 'considering BNP'

Staff and agencies
Monday April 17, 2006

A BNP rosette. Photograph: PA

Up to a quarter of voters are considering supporting the far right British National Party, according to a draft report for a social policy research group.

The authors of the study for the Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust said today that feelings of "powerlessness and frustration" with the main political parties had led to increasing numbers indicating that they might vote for the BNP.

The claims follow a warning by the employment minister, Margaret Hodge, that disillusioned white, working-class voters were deserting Labour for the BNP. She said that as many as eight out of 10 white families in her Barking constituency in east London admitted that they were tempted to vote BNP in forthcoming council elections.

One of the study's authors, Professor Peter John of Manchester University, said the research suggested many voters in white working-class areas feel their concerns are ignored.
"They think they have been let down by the main parties. They feel their voices have not been heard, the main parties have ignored them," he told the BBC's Today programme.

"I think if I was in the main parties, I would be worried about this, that I have not talked about an issue which one of my core constituencies thinks is important."

He said that focus groups were conducted with voters in east London as part of the Rowntree report, but stressed that the levels of underlying support uncovered by the report would not necessarily translate into electoral success for the BNP.

"This is a very hypothetical question. It is not what party you will vote for, but who you might vote for. The idea is to try to tap into some underlying attitudes which may translate into electoral support, but may not and in the past have not," he said.

The study also analysed the wards in which the BNP enjoyed most support and found they were "white working-class areas" with little racial diversity, Prof John said.

He also accused the BNP of spreading "myths" which had particular potency in areas experiencing significant levels of change.

Phill Edwards, a BNP spokesman, said that during the last 40 years Britain had been transformed from "a racially homogeneous society" into one "where the cultures are now quite alien".

"That does add quite a lot of tensions and stresses," he said. "There are borders around countries. People require passports to move around. Borders are there to protect population groups, to give security and freedom, democracy and identity to population groups.

"These people shouldn't just be allowed to wander wherever they like. The fact of the matter is that people who come from these countries in the Third World, many of them do not share our culture and identity. They bring with them their internecine, inter-tribal warfare, they bring with them ailments and diseases and it does cause a lot of frustration."

The Home Office minister, Andy Burnham, said indications of growing readiness to consider a vote for the BNP reflected a trend towards protest voting, especially at local elections, but he played down the significance of the party's threat.

"When people hear their views, I think they will see them for what they are," he told Today. "But there is a danger in giving undue prominence to the threat that they pose. They pose a very localised threat and I am worried that if we give them too much coverage, it can back up the notion that they are a potent protest vote.

"Let's give them the coverage they deserve, in my view, which is very little."

The BNP launched its local election manifesto on Good Friday and said it was "standing for local freedom, security, identity, democracy" and putting "Britain first".

The party, which has 24 local councillors, said 356 candidates would stand for election next month.

According to analysis by the anti-fascist group Searchlight, the BNP is within a 5% swing of winning 70 council seats.

"They are posing a much bigger electoral threat than they have," Searchlight's director of research, Nick Lowles, said.

The BNP was increasing its anti-Muslim rhetoric in the wake of the July 7 bombings and the Danish cartoon row, he addded. The party was also benefiting from disillusionment among Labour voters, and the Tories' apparent shift to the centre, which had left a gap on the right.

Ms Hodge told the Sunday Telegraph that for the first time white working class people were no longer ashamed to say they will vote BNP.

"When I knock on doors I say to people 'Are you tempted to vote BNP?' and many, many, many - eight out of 10 of the white families - say yes." she said. "That's something we have never seen before, in all my years, even when people voted BNP they used to be ashamed to vote BNP. Now they are not.

The BNP is standing in seven of the 17 wards in Barking and Searchlight predicts it will get 20-30% of the vote. The party secured 16.9% of the vote in Barking in the 2005 general election. In neighbouring Dagenham, its vote was 9%.

guardian.co.uk

Aventinian · Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 5:09 pm Post subject:

National Socialist scum.
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frank rizzo · Nationalist Joined: 04 Apr 2006 Posts: 149

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Wolf of Badenoch · Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 9:56 pm Post subject:

Beat the bastards down!
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Babygael · Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 11:14 pm Post subject:

Wolfie yer de man!!

Blackleaf is talkin aboot wha?? BNP?? Wal am no' surprised. Ahm no' a fascist.but I live oer'seas an' every time ah catch the plane back, ah al'ways end up in the sasannach capital.An every time, the homeless population an' beggers on the street are either fra" Eirennach, or they are Sasannach.While people fra' far awa lands occupy the council accomodation.

It's nay good to kill yer ain' fer others.Ye'll nay get the votes.

Being a good humanaterian BEGINS at hame. Safe

BG.

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Drink beer,don't drive...its cheeper!

Leathlaobhair · Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 11:46 pm Post subject:

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Those must have all been important to me once. What I am now grew from that. A former self is a fool, an insufferable ass, but he's still human, you'd no more turn him out than you'd turn out any kind of cripple, would you?
-Thomas Pynchon

Babygael · Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 1:52 am Post subject:

Ru calling me a facisist??? Ok, ah can see why, I admit, that when it comes tae an idigenious people being taken advantage of , it really gets my gabhar! even if they are sasannach!

they do give out tae every part of the globe at the expense of their ain" an wan day they will pay fer it!!

BG smurfin

:

3pm uk time!!
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Lothian Sky · I Love 'Our Scotland' Joined: 04 Feb 2006 Posts: 347

Leathlaobhair · Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 8:42 pm Post subject:

Babygael · Posted: Wed Apr 19, 2006 2:00 pm Post subject:

All I said was that every time I passed through London,I see more and more homeless people and beggers on the street than before. I live in the caribbean and I am not used to that.
Nearly all of them are indigenous. So It would seem reasonable to conclude that they would eventually get fed up with the traditional political parties and resort to more untraditional types.Such as the BNP.

It was a mere observation and not a decleration of any political leanings on my part.

BG smurfin

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Drink beer,don't drive...its cheeper!

Celyn · Posted: Wed Apr 19, 2006 3:14 pm Post subject:

Did you ask them all whether they are in the habit of bothering to vote for any party at all? Indeed, how they get round the tiny difficulty of even registering on the electoral roll without a home address?

Babygael · Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 3:03 pm Post subject:

I did'nt ask them, I simply made an observation as will others who have home addresses. Smile

Is it wrong to make a simple comment around here

BG

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Drink beer,don't drive...its cheeper!

Neil · Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 4:01 pm Post subject:

Lothian
"The only good fascist is a dead one"is itself a fairly fascistic idea.

This is another case of misuse of opinion polls. I think most of us are sufficiently open minded to say that we would "consider", in certain circumstances voting for at least 3 of the 4 main parties. "Consider" just means you won't take orders not to vote for them, even, or perhaps particularly, from those who want to kill.
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Aventinian · Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 7:02 pm Post subject:

The people you'll see on the streets of London are not people who have been ousted from local authority housing for the sake of immigrants. They are more likely there as a result of personal and mental health problems which the government can't exactly cure. And believe it or not, some of them actually choose that lifestyle.

Babygael · Posted: Fri Apr 21, 2006 2:59 am Post subject:

Hey Aventinian, well then it seems like the idigenous peoples of G.B are in trouble! because they make up the rather large majority of homeless folk living on the streets! You have to ask yourself,why?

I don't mind criticism but if I said trees and grass grow in the park, I would'nt expect this level of criticism for making a simple observation.Check the art work!!

BG

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Ath-bheothachadh

Drink beer,don't drive...its cheeper!

Babygael · Posted: Fri Apr 21, 2006 3:04 am Post subject:

Oh an' ps Lothian sky,

BG

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Aventinian · Posted: Fri Apr 21, 2006 3:31 am Post subject:

SLG · Posted: Fri Apr 21, 2006 10:30 am Post subject:

I couldn't tell you about England, but in Scotland, in 2002/03, 2.43% of Homeless applications were made by non-whites. This compares to a non-white population in Scotland of ~2% of the total. So ethnic minorities are more likely to be homeless and seeking accommodation.

This is from a report into ethnic minority homelessness in Glasgow for Communities Scotland, which is an Executive funded agency.
http://www.communitiesscotland.go.../documents/webpages/cs_009022.pdf

Babygael · Posted: Fri Apr 21, 2006 2:06 pm Post subject:

Hey SLG, thanks for the information you posted, I spent some time getting through most of it!

My orgional thought was based on my own experience as a student in London.Three of us rented a flat where there were 400 flats in all, in three seperate blocks.We were the ONLY idigenous people there.And when you left there and went to get the tube,there were lots of homeless homey's. I can clearly recall a young Irish girl with a baby sitting on the steps in the underground begging.

So in other words my own views on this topic are based on what I saw at the time. Thats not to say I don't care what happens to any other group.
Its a situation that effects everyone.

BG smurfin

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Ath-bheothachadh

Drink beer,don't drive...its cheeper!

SLG · Posted: Fri Apr 21, 2006 2:18 pm Post subject:

I understand you form an opinion on what you can see. But I really don't think the issue of immigration has anything to do with the problem of homelessness in London. What exactly do you mean by indigenous anyway? As for the Irish girl begging, what is she doing in London anyway. Ireland is a different country, so she is as much an immigrant as any non-white immigrant.
When I lived in London, I definitely didn't feel indigenous Wink