Just an innocent bystander . . .

Many thanks to Alistair from Glasgow for alerting me to the following photographs.

Just note the look on the face of the cameraman on the far left in the top photo. You know he's thinking "What the hell is she doing.?"

Full marks to the gentleman on Nick's security team for getting her out of the way in such a professional manner. For all he knew she could have been carrying a knife.

I hope the Metropolitan Police are aware of the first photo and charges the UAF's Anna Heath with wasting Police time over her assault claim.

Of course there shouldn't have been an unauthorised demonstration so near to Parliament in the first place.

This comment came from The Times website:

"It is an Offence under SOCPA 2005, s.132, to organise and/or attend a demonstration within the Vicinity of Parliament (Designated Area) without Authorisation from the Met Commissioner.
To obtain Authorisation, written Notice must be given 6 clear days before the demo if this is "reasonably practicable".
If not practicable, then written Notice must be given AT LEAST, and IN ANY EVENT, 24 hours before the demo starts.
The Designated Area is outlined in an Order, SI 1537/2005. It is quite large, stretching from Hungerford Bridge to Lambeth Bridge, then up to Victoria, Birdcage Walk and the Mall, then on to Northumberland Avenue and back to Hungerford. Encompassing Whitehall etc. of course in this wide circumference.
The punishment for the crime is either prison (max 51 weeks) or a fine level 4, or both.

Can we see UAF's Authorisation please? If they do have one, it should not have been given as the purpose of the Act is to prevent exactly their type of behaviour occurring in the first place. If they don't have one, they have committed a crime and broken statute law, whether they threw anything or not. The police can arrest on the spot, without a warrant, if there is no Authorisation. So, did they have one? Can we see it? Please?"

Very well said, and if the demonstration was authorised why wasn't there a much heavier Police presence?

And finally this is a great offering from Joey Smith in acknowledgement of the hard work done by our supporters across Britain. Victory Song really grows on you the more you hear it.

'Media's fury' will add a million viewers

OUR final Allerdale candidate card is featured this morning and it is for Tina who is standing in Maryport East.

Steve Harris is her election agent once again, as he was in 2007, and he has been busy working hard within the Electoral Division to maximise our vote on June 4th.

Maryport East is made up of the borough council wards of Ellenborough and Ewanrigg and we fought both these 2 years ago.

It was the first time that Labour had been challenged in a borough council election in the town for 12 years and we were rewarded by two votes of 30%.

Here are the candidates and stats:

Cumbria County Council
Maryport East
Thursday 4th June 2009
Keith Little (Labour)
John Stanyer (Conservative)
Tina Wingfield (British National Party)

COUNTY 2005: Keith Little (Lab) 2044, Derek Pattinson (Con) 421.
BOROUGH 2007:
Ellenborough Ward: Janice Wood (Lab) 635, Martin Wood (Lab) 580, Martin Wingfield (BNP) 342.
Ewanrigg Ward: Carl Holding (Lab) 610, Carneem McCarron (Lab) 572, Tina Wingfield (BNP) 276.

While Keith Little appears to have an unassailable lead on the county result from four years ago, if you take the votes from two years, things are much closer. Labour's best vote is 1,245 against our 618 which make things look slightly more competitive.

"Hole in my Shoe" was s 60's song by Traffic and I have one after leafleting yesterday. Just hoping it doesn't rain to day or I'll have a wet right foot! - at the moment the weather looks OK.

Thanks to the Daily Mail and the The Sun, our broadcast is guaranteed to be the most watched PPB of any Party.

The media loves that word 'fury' when describing people's reaction to something that the naughty BNP has done. It certainly makes any headline an attention grabber.

We have scored some own goals of our own during this campaign but thankfully they have been matched by our opponents and their friends in the media.

Make sure you tell everyone you know about the broadcast tonight. It might just prove to be a pivotal point in British politics.

Opposing the Islamification of Britain

THIS first words I heard this morning when my radio alarm went off were read by a newsreader concerning the Archbishop of Canterbury telling voters not to support the British National Party.

But I didn't have time to feel any disappointment at this intrusion into the European Election campaign by a clergy which has always had its own politically correct agenda.

That was because the BBC ended the brief news item with a quote from a British National Party spokesman saying that the BNP was the only political party campaigning against the Islamification of Britain.

Dare I hope that this will be the phrase that sticks in the mind of anyone listening to this report?

Text from Nick Griffin last night at quarter past nine enthusing over the response he had received yesterday when he and the Truth Truck had visited Whitehaven.


This photo is taken early morning in nearby Cleator Moor so it's no wonder that Clive Jefferson who is a candidate here, can't hide his delight that the Chairman of the British National Party has come to support his campaign. Bill Pugh is a Whitehaven candidate and he seems to be impatient to get the Truth Truck to the coast to start campaigning there.

There is a growing unease amongst workers at the near-by Sellafield nuclear plant over foreign contractors bringing in foreign workers and with many Sellafield employees living in the borough of Copeland, our full slate of candidates in the county council elections might just provide the ideal protest vote (with or without the Archbishop's blessing.)

I was out on my own yesterday in Wigton, pounding the pavements delivering the candidate cards for our candidate Paul Stafford. He couldn't be there because he was attending the ceremony to swear in his wife, Debbie, as Wigton's Deputy Mayor - something that certainly won't do his campaign in the Wigton county council seat any harm at all.

Our Allerdale candidate card this morning is for Stephen Stoddart our representative in Workington's St John's Ward.



This ward should provide us with our best result in Allerdale. Clive Jefferson fought a borough council by-election here in November of last year and secured a very promising 20% of the vote. Todd, as Stephen is called locally, is very well known on his patch and he will certainly attract a personal vote which could just take us within striking distance of the Labour and Conservative candidates.

Here are the election stats:
Cumbria County Council
St Johns Electoral Division
Michael Davidson (Conservative)
Joe Holliday (Labour)
Stephen Stoddart (British National Party)

County 2005: James Samson (Lab) 1345, John Heathcote (Con) 984.
Borough 2008: Gerald Humes 452, Simon Collins 394, Clive Jefferson (BNP) 257, John Bracken (Ind) 113, Alistair Grey (Green) 55.
Borough 2007: Joseph Holliday (Lab) 788, Michael Davidson (Con) 780, John Heathcote (Con) 698, Konrad Hansen (Lab) 418.

There doesn't seem to be any real nasties in newspapers this morning, I expect they are being saved up for next weekend.

There was this carried in a report in The Sunday Times:

"The market is closing up and hard rain falls on the shoppers. Brynley McDonald, 63, sells DVDs from his stall. He has always voted Labour, but not this time.“They’ve no control over anything – like immigration, it’s just chaos,” he says. “I’m thinking about BNP. We look after everybody who comes in and we treat our own like crap.
”Two unemployed men in their fifties are both considering BNP. One was a builder: immigrants take builders’ jobs. His mate, Paul Brooksbank, worked on the railways until five years ago. He hates what has happened to the industry.
“People don’t work for the love of the job any more, the love of the railways.
”It is another big theme: the collapse of ethos. That, after all is what has happened at Westminster where, to quote Flaubert, there are people who would pay to be bought.
Outside the Golden Lion, the lunchtime smokers and drinkers all want to have their say. Awful, embittered stories of NHS and welfare persecution tumble out. Mention expenses and half of them cry: “Snouts in the trough!”
Noreen Stanley, a cleaner, says MPs should get £7 an hour. Here, too, some are veering towards the BNP, though Noreen and her husband Leon say they will stick with Labour out of habit, but “they’re all the same”.

You can read the full report here.

The Sunday Express reports:

"The Sunday Express survey also suggests that a disillusioned 55 per cent would not vote at all.
Among those intending to vote, the BNP picked up 38.4 per cent support compared to 19.2 per cent for Labour.
The result, in what was a safe Labour seat, gives the Tories 13.4 per cent of the vote, the Liberal Democrats 10.7 per cent and the Greens and the UK Independent Party 7.1 per cent each.
If the result is repeated across the North-West in next month’s European Parliament elections Mr Griffin will be elected to Brussels."
You can read that full report here.

There's more leafleting with candidate cards tomorrow in all seven Allerdale seats and then the process of targeting wards to get them completed starts in earnest on Tuesday.

Pakistan calling . . . Pakistan calling . . .

"The fascists of the British National Party (BNP) are a threat to everyone. But they are particularly dangerous for Muslims living in this country."

So says the Pakistan Daily which presumably must be a newspaper for Pakistanis living in Britain. You can read the report here and when you have finished that one, there's another one from the same newspaper here

Dare I suggest that the "threat to everyone" posed by Pakistani Muslims is far more serious as the London tube and bus bombings have illustrated and that Pakistani Muslims are "particularly dangerous" to BNP members as Keith Brown found out at the cost of his life.

Life after Malik begins today and it's a sunny morning in Cumbria in celebration. I find it ironic that the former Justice Minister who skillfully manipulated the media to futher his career should be brought down by that same media.

When I was campaigning in Burnley in 2002, I met an ambulance man who was with Malik when he was allegedly hit by a police baton during the Burnley Riots a year earlier. He told me that Shahid would not allow his wound to be treated until the media had photographed it. It was a good move on his part because it was those pictures that propelled him on to the national political stage.

Malik blamed a "media feeding frenzy" of bias and poorly researched reports for his downfall and I can sympathise with him on this. Take a look at what the British National Party has had to put up with this morning.

A BNP vote is a big mistake

Posties in storm over BNP leaflet

BNP hope perfect storm will sweep them to power

BNP could be at heart of Far right EU group

British pensioners on BNP leaflets are Italian models

The last two reports are from the Daily Telegraph and a long time, non-political, friend who works on that newspaper says to expect more of the same as long as the expenses scandal keeps on rolling on. He told me yesterday:

"Every single exposed MP has used the "your boosting the BNP" argument when trying to persuade us not to publicise their particular abuses of the expenses system.
"All three party leaders have been on to the editor using the same argument in an attempt to get us to finish the story quickly and not to drag it out.
"The anti-BNP stories are part of a sop to Brown & Co. as is the promotion of a blog attempting to discredit the BNP."

Now I'm quite pleased to hear this. In a way it is good news.

Yesterday's YouGov poll and quite a few political commentators are indicating that we are not benefiting from the Expenses Scandal and that disillusioned voters are turning to UKIP. That's certainly not what our activists have been reporting, or it seems now, the activists of the three main parties, as my friend at The Telegraph reveals.

Last night as Tina and I sat down for drink after a quite manic week. We watched the fall of Malik on Sky News and then discussed the whole expenses saga. Surprisingly we were both of the same opinion.

We rather it hadn't happened!

Some might find this attitude astounding, but we have come to this conclusion because of the voter volatility it has caused.

Without the expenses scandal, the BNP was quietly working towards having three MEPs elected on June 4th. It would have taken a political earthquake to stop us winning in the North West, Yorkshire and the West Midlands . . . and now, of course, that is exactly what has happened.

The thoughts of Fleet Street's big hitters

FOUR comments, this morning, from respected political commentators for the broadsheets.

"Politicians generally, rather than any one party or MP, will be damaged by the disclosures on MPs’ expenses. They will discredit mainstream politics, reduce turnout and benefit anti-establishment groups. So watch how other parties, especially the British National Party, do in the European elections on June 4."
Peter Riddell, The Times.

"So I'm afraid that for many people in the European and local elections in June, it will seem perfectly logical to vote for the BNP. The old "they're all the same" refrain seems true; therefore people will want to vote for a party that isn't. The main parties talk of combining to "exchange information" to help keep the BNP out. This is crazy: it will only confirm the idea of an intra-party conspiracy, an attempt by politicians to survive by being, collectively, "too big to fail".
Charles Moore, Daily Telegraph.

"A long-running expenses saga could dominate the June elections campaign. Worryingly, it could easily boost support for the far-right British National Party, which is trying to win its first seats in a nationwide election in the Euro poll. The revelations could be a timely gift to it."
Andrew Grice, The Independent.

"In the short term, the leaders of the BNP must be rubbing their hands with glee. Whenever there is disillusionment with mainstream politics, minority parties attract more votes. The expenses drama is a prelude to next month's European and local elections. It will impact on turnout and make it easier for extreme parties to make their anti-politics pitch. If there is a series of by-elections they too will fuel the turbulence of what was already going to be a stormy summer."
Steve Richards, The Independent.

You can read Harriet Harman's thoughts on all this, as given to The Times, here

We discussed almost every aspect of our European Election campaign at our Windermere planning conference back in December. We had most things covered that might effect us. This expenses scandal wasn't factored in simply because it was all due to come out after the June 4th poll. It seems, at last, we have had a bit of luck and the 'pigs in the trough' at Westminster which the BNP has so often highlighted, could well help us in our quest for MEPs.

"Please make up you own mind" says our leaflet being delivered to postal voters along with a copy of Freedom here in the Allerdale area of the Cumbria County Council. It's a simple leaflet with a topical message - think for yourself and don't listen to the discredited Old Gang parties.


It is a bit of a coup for us to have Vince, our candidate in Harrington, Clifton, and Stainburn, standing for the British National Party. He was formerly a senior official in the local Conservative Party.

Update from Gary Tumulty in Salford contesting a by-election where the campaign, in part, has been paid for by the generous readers of this blog who contributed to an appeal on these pages around a month ago.

Gary reports:

"I had 20 BNP campaigners out with me on Thursday around the Whit Lane, Charlestown area of Irwell Riverside ward. We were mass leafleting and canvassing and the response received was even better than the first time we went round delivering the Euro leaflets.
"I still have people coming out shaking my hand and telling me how they feel let down by Labour Party thanking me for standing. We have had lots of pledges of support and plenty of my leaflets are appearing in windows around the ward.
"We were accompanied during party of the day by a journalist and cameraman for a report to appear in the Sunday Telegraph. "

Tina and I are off to Maryport this morning to deliver Freedom to the postal voters of Maryport East. Yesterday we had an excellent day in Moss Bay in Workington where 500 postal voters received their BNP pack.

Some might think that it's a lot of extra work going around delivering to specific houses in a street. It is not, I can assure you.

Labour wins its election up here by the postal vote. It had a 95% to 5% superiority when we fought them in Maryport in 2007. In fact, it is safe to say, postal voters are almost all Labour voters.

If we can make inroads into that superiority by winning over a few to the BNP, or just making them even more disillusioned with Labour that they don't bother to vote, then it could have a significant effect on those all important percentages for the European Election and help us with our County Council campaign.

So who's making the headlines this morning

LET'S start off with today's newspapers . . .

Tories and Labour both fear BNP surge - Daily Telegraph

Shock at BNP coin sticker - Sheffield Star

Labour disunity and the rise of the BNP - Daily Express

Tories to blame for BNP rise - Daily Mail

Anti-BNP campaign - Daily Mirror

Our final nomination papers go in this morning and then the campaign in Allerdale starts in earnest. But before that there's the small matter of taking delivery of 30,000 copies of Freedom which will arrive on a great big pallet some time today. They will have to be got indoors as soon as possible as it's bucketing down with rain here in Cumbria at the moment.

Tomorrow we start on the postal voters in Workington, delivering to them a copy of Freedom, a letter from Nick and a leaflet introducing the local candidates and briefing people on what smear leaflets to expect from the local Labour Party.

Fingers-crossed, it appears that Clive Jefferson might just have performed the impossible and come up with a full slate of candidates for Copeland. I can't tell you what an incredible performance this is considering our limited manpower in West Cumbria. There's more news on Clive's informative blog which can be found here.

Nasty smear leaflet about me put out in Manchester over the weekend claiming I was sent to prison for "race hate crimes". This is just another Labour lie.

For the record, I wasn't sent to prison and my appearance in court was nothing to do with "race hate crimes".

In 1983, in an election leaflet, I warned that immigration must be stopped because it was destroying British culture and the British way of life. A full year after that election leaflet had been put out, the authorities decided to prosecute me over it and I was found 'guilty' and fined £1,500.

On a matter of principle I refused to pay that fine and hence had to serve three months in Pentonville Prison including Christmas 1985.

On my first morning of incarceration I was visited by the Prison Governor who said that I was free to go anytime I liked if I paid the fine which would reduce in amount for each day I spent in prison. I told him that I was making a stand on behalf of those who felt the need to speak out on immigration issues and was duty bound to serve my full term.

I am very proud of what I did, and the Labour Party can can twist the truth and try to smear me all it likes. There's not one politician in its ranks today who would have the courage to do what I did, let alone come out and carry on the struggle, in the face of overwhelming odds, for another quarter of a century after that ordeal.

Thank you for allowing me to get that off my chest . . . I feel much better now.

Does this look like WH Smiths?

ON Friday, on the main BNP website, I suggested that Andrew Brons, the British National Party's lead candidate in Yorkshire, should get himself down to WH Smiths in Harrogate on Saturday to get himself a map of Strasbourg to familiarise himself with that city. I was offering the advice as Andrew looks on course to winning a seat in the European Parliament after the BNP's excellent vote in the East Ecclesfield by-election in Sheffield.

But he didn't, and he was right not to. I'm grateful to Steve from Suffolk for briefing me that: "If Andrew Brons is elected as a MEP he will be pretty lonely in Strasbourg as the European Parliament does almost all its sittings in Brussels not Strasbourg. It sits in the French city for only 12 sessions of the year".

I'm also grateful to Yorkshire Regional Organiser Adrian Marsden, who told me that Andrew was too busy to go shopping because he was out campaigning. Adrian reported:

"Following on from the highly successful 'Days of Action' in North Yorkshire, today saw the team in the North Lincolnshire town of Scunthorpe.This is a town with a proud history of steelmaking, an industry ravaged in recent times by globalism.

"6,000 leaflets were distributed during the day in a number of districts with a team also heading down to Glanford Park, the home of Scunthorpe United.

"At the stadium we were overwhelmed with the response from the 'Iron' supporters. We were mobbed by people of all ages who were eager to take the Anti-EU and 'Racism cuts both ways' leaflets we were distributing.

"Andrew Brons was impressed with the local activists who accompanied him during the 7 hours the team were in the town. The commitment of people who had finished work and came straight out to help spread the word and others who helped for 5 hours and then went off to work afterwards, was exceptional."

The photo shows Adrian, Andrew and Dave relaxing with a pint of Yorkshire bitter after the day's activity.

Here in Cumbria, the shock 'retirement' announcement of Carlisle's Labour MP Eric Martlew, is the talking point. It's a shock because we have seen a lot of Eric out electioneering in recent months and a GMB insider told us just before Christmas that he was pulling out all the stops to keep his seat in the city at the General Election. Now suddenly, he's going. The word on the street is that he is jumping before he is pushed and that in July, when MP's expenses are made public, Martlew's red face will become even redder.

I'm always delighted to hear from Wayne McDermott our East Midlands election officer. Like me he's an elections anorak, and when there are elections in the air, he motors on all cylinders.

Wayne is standing for both the district and county council seats in Measham which is in Leicestershire and on the border with Staffordshire and Derbyshire. He thinks he is in with a bit of a squeak there after a day's canvassing yesterday but acknowledges that, with over 100 seats being contested in the East Mids, his responsibilities as the region's elections officer might limit the effective of his campaigning.

In the North West, our key by-election in the coming weeks is in Salford where our candidate Gary Tumulty, is contesting the Irwell Riverside by-election on May 21st. If anyone in the region can get along to help Gary then please contact him at bnpsalford@live.co.uk

Here's a photo of Salford BNP's new Truth Trailor which was paid for by contributions given by the readers of this blog. Thank you to all concerned.

Some interesting stories in today's newspapers. My colleague Simon Darby, is under fire in the Sunday Mercury - you can read the report here. And in The Observer there's quite a meaty piece and an editorial on our chances in the European Elections. You can read them here and here.

BBC Radio Cumbria came up with a classic piece of political bias in its religious programme this morning. A near-10 minute slot with a vicar attacking the BNP, yet no BNP spokesman given a look-in. But as I said yesterday: "We don't care". The BNP is now acquiring an anti-hero status, so the more we are attacked the greater our popularity.

As one of the posters on the influential elections' website Vote-2007, said yesterday.

"Griffin's dour and sour message is more in mood with the country. It's how voters are feeling at the moment.

"The more other politicians, the church, the unions and well-off Coronation Street stars attack the BNP, the more attractive it becomes as the first choice for a disengaged electorate."

And finally if you are waiting for a response from me to an enquiry, please be patient. I have over 200 emails to answer, and my in-box has pinged half a dozen times with new messages while writing this blog entry.

Today, I'm drawing up the postal vote list for the final three wards we are contesting in the county council elections here in Allerdale, and then I shall start on my correspondence . . . with the help of a glass of wine or two.

Could it be 40 for Cumbria?

A DIFFICULT day for us yesterday compounded by the news, delivered by a smirking Copeland organiser, that they now have 11 candidates, just one short of a full slate.

Allerdale BNP had been hoping to pip them 9-8 in the seats being fought stakes but now the final score looks like being 7-11, a crushing defeat for Workington, Maryport and Wigton by Whitehaven.

So added together it looks as though it's going to be an impressive showing by the British National Party in the Cumbria County Council Elections on June 4th. These are unconfirmed figures but at the moment, as I understand it, we have Carlisle (17), Copeland (11), Allerdale (7), Barrow (3), Eden (1), South Lakes (1). That's 40 seats, just two short of the 50% of seats available on the council.

Our difficult day came from people being out, not having the correct paperwork, both our key activists having to work and being side-tracked by having to move some heavy printing equipment - and I mean heavy - which took an hour and a half out of our busy day.

We did submit three nomination papers, which were accepted provisionally but because we lacked the BNP's certificate of authorisation were returned to us. When I last contested elections back in 200,7 I'm certain I just wrote on the nomination paper 'British National Party' and that was it. Anyway by four o'clock the papers were re-submitted and accepted so it's three down, four to go.

This morning we are splitting forces so we can actually start some campaigning. Paul and Carl will be putting out the Euro warm-up leaflet in the small remaining part of Maryport West that still has to be leafleted and I shall submit another two sets of nomination papers that were completed late yesterday, and try to complete a third.

Last night, when I got home, I finished our postal vote leaflet which will go out with a complementary issue of Freedom and a letter from Nick Griffin. Very simple leaflet just introducing the candidate with their photo and warning about the smear leaflets - telling voters "It's just the Labour Party" so don't be conned by the array of grandiose titles that appear on the anti-BNP leaflets.

I've also got two more candidates photos to get which must be taken today. As you can see there will be no 'paper' candidates in Allerdale, not like some places where you might find a jar of Hartleys on the supper table at five o'clock!!

No news from Sheffield, so who knows. Andrew Brons our lead candidate in Yorkshire and Humberside needs 10% of the vote to make it to Strasbourg, so with a bit of a buffer zone something around 12-13% would be a great result for us.

No other news as everyone is busy getting their nomination papers signed.

First stop this morning is Morrisons for some A4 paper for the leaflets - apparently is the cheapest port of call.

Salford says "Thank you"

Don't say you didn't see it first on this website!

This is one half of the centre page double spread of our European Election candidates in the May issue of Freedom. The newspaper is at the printers as I write and delivery to the units is promised for May 1st.

The front page headline is "Take care of our old folk" and calls for care homes to brought back into the public sector and for our elderly to be looked after in a way their lifetime of service to the nation and paying of their tax, deserves.

It could be a good issue to get out to postal voters in the first two weeks in May.

Congratulations are due to the readers of this blog who rallied around to support Salford BNP with the funding of its vital local council by-election on May 21st, just two weeks before the Euro poll.

Candidate Gary Tumulty, told me last night:

"We have been around the Irwell Riverside ward leafleting and have put out over 7500 leaflets. The response has been excellent with many people coming out in support and shaking my hand and saying they will be voting for us in the by-election and then again for the European Elections.

"Locals have told me of an issue they have with a park in the ward which I have acted upon and people will see that the British National Party listens and gets things sorted out.

"For the Euro elections we are going around the whole of Salford visiting the postal voters with our message and we now have our own "Truth Trailer" which we will be using in the by-election and the European Elections. I will send you a photo when we have one taken.

"I would like to thank you as well for the appeal that you ran on your blog and to all those who contributed to the Irwell by-election fund. We received a considerable amount of money to help us on our way, and even had our colour election address paid for by Bury BNP."

I would like to reiterate what Gary says and to thank all those who contributed to the fund. And full marks to the British National Party in Bury - it's a great example of how units are working together in the North West.

I'm on telephone duty, as well as election duty, today as Tina is on a course in Leicestershire.

My main job this morning is preparing the county council electorial divsion maps for the seven seats we are contesting. I'm still hopeful that it might be eight, and there's even an outside chance it might be nine, but there's no arm-twisting on my part, it's up to those concerned whether they come forward to stand or not.

Back with more news tomorrow.

Allerdale 7 - 8 Copeland

THERE was a final planning meeting last night for the Cumbria County Council elections in Allerdale.

North West Regional Organiser Clive Jefferson, was there and he made it very clear that yesterday was the cut-off day for candidate selection and those who had, for the last month, been a pain in the backside by sitting on the fence as to whether they would stand or not, have been dismissed so we are left with SEVEN confirmed candidates.

There are 16 county council seats in Allerdale so we are just below the 50% contested mark. There are 84 seats on the full council. We are contesting six wards held by Labour and one held by the Lib-Dems.

Back in 2005 we didn't contest a single county council seat across the whole of Cumbria, let alone any in Allerdale, so this is a massive achievement. Also, all seven will be properly fought campaigns with an election address for the candidates. This, together with one Euro Election leaflet being distributed now, and the Euro Election address delivered by the Royal Mail, will form the backbone of our campaign although there will be some tweaks to it during the next 42 days just to maximise our vote.

I'm still hoping that we might be allowed to contest an eighth seat as I'm seeing one of the fence-sitters tonight. We get our election packs tomorrow, so once I have that nomination form in my hands I shall be able to find out which way he will be jumping.

The only 'disappointing news' was that our arch enemies within Cumbria, the dastardly Copeland BNP, are fielding more candidates than we are. Clive is also the Copeland organiser and he took great pleasure in telling us that they already had 8 candidates selected for Copeland's 12 county council seats.

There's a great traditional rivalry between the towns of Workington (Allerdale) and Whitehaven (Copeland) and they call each other's residents, "Jam-Eaters", which is the biggest insult possible up here in West Cumbria. I believe it stems from the idea that your parents don't earn enough money to provide a cooked evening meal, but I might be wrong.

So things have started to buzz in Allerdale and I can't wait to get involved with the campaigning next week. I have a list of election tasks to undertake, but first Freedom has to be finished, and that's the priority for the next four days.

The New Statesman understands

Off-button at 7.13 this morning. I just couldn't stand any more.

It was the South African General Election this time, which isn't even until next week. John Humphrys has been sent all the way out there, at licence fee payers expense, just to report on the ANC recording a landslide victory.

John explained why the BBC is making such a fuss about it in his opening gambit: "The ANC is the party of Nelson Mandela."

Make no mistake Mandela is quite incredible. A former Black terrorist fawned over by so many White people. I expect he wakes up most mornings and thinks: "Nelson, how did you do it?".

It doesn't seem like Friday this morning with no elections to report on. Next week it is back to normal with contests for us in Redbridge, Erewash and Aberdeenshire. I'll try and get some info on how our campaigns are going over the next few days.

I expect most of you have read the article in yesterday's New Statesman. It's here if you haven't.

It is a very good understanding of what has taken place over the past five years and it acknowledges the changes that have taken place within the British National Party since 1999.

One of the key passages is:

"But even one seat in the European Parliament would provide resources and publicity that could act as a potent catalyst for a party accustomed to operating on a shoestring outside of the media spotlight."

It is key because it is correct in identifying our aspiration and the benefit of meeting it. It is also right in acknowledging how we have operated on shoestring budget, although claiming that we have been outside the media spotlight is naive. We have been hounded and persecuted in the media for the past ten years and all what we have achieved has been done inspite of this.

At the last European Elections we came close to winning three seats, and that was despite Max Clifford pulling Kilroy-Silk out of the hat for UKIP and a very poor campaign on our behalf. Our main leaflet was almost unreadable. Even our most enthusiastic supporters said it was awful and as it was our only way of reaching voters due to a virtual media black-out because of its love affair with UKIP, it was amazing that we polled so well.

This time around our campaign in 500% better, so hopefully 500% more effective, and that should be enough to secure a seat in the North West at the very least.

We had a very nice Easter Sunday, I meant to mention this before. All the family were there and as we enjoyed our aperitifs and chatted, we listened to our Colin Auty CD. My in-laws are great fans of his, and for me when listening to many of his songs, the hairs on the back of my neck still stand up.

Back in the early 1990s I wrote a series of books about the history of my football team, Workington Reds AFC. In 1977 they dropped out of the Football League and the title of the books was So Sad, So Very Sad . . which summed up the feelings of most of the supporters of this brave little club. Reds had such a proud history, two League Cup Quarter-Finals (including beating Blackburn 5-1 at Ewood Park), promotion to the old Third Division, and cup games against Liverpool (0-1), Manchester United (1-3) and Cheslea (2-2) (0-2), so it was a tragedy that they had fallen by the wayside.

When I listen to Colin's music and think of the events that led to him dropping out of politics, the title of those Workington books comes to mind.

Doing a Kinnock!

I don't mind admitting that I did a Neil Kinnock in the early hours of this morning when the Moston by-election result came through.

Mimicking the Labour leader's bizarre "well alright!" show of emotion during the Sheffield 'victory' rally at the 1992 General Election seemed quite appropriate at just after one o'clock in my thankfully deserted office.

I felt especially excited by this result and I hope that you did too. It was much better than some expectations and these results are always the sweetest to savour. I do sometimes get criticised for playing down expectations, but the Moston result provides the necessary proof that in the majority of cases, this is the best policy to follow.

Just after reporting the result on the main website, the Comments Section was jammed with those wanting to share in the glow of satisfaction that a better than expected election result brings. Everyone is bubbling with enthusiasm and no one is disappointed with last night's effort.

Yesterday I said that I would be happy with 8% and 'over the moon' with 10%, and I would have been. We just didn't know what level of support to expect, so it would have been quite wrong to unjustly raise people's hopes. Privately both Clive Jefferson and Mike Lester had said they were hoping for a vote around the 20% mark but 'on record' neither wanted to make any predictions.

I received numerous emails from those involved in the campaign who talked about "the brilliant reception we have received in Moston". Two or three confidently predicted our second place and the collapse in the Tory vote, while one even thought we might win.

Reporting these prediction yesterday would have raised expectations and, although they would have been exactly right with their take on how the result was going to go, if they had been wrong, people would have been left deflated. If we had just polled the 12% vote share, which was our target, it would have just been seen as disappointing, when in the bigger picture this was exactly what we wanted.

The blanket coverage of 12 Pakistani Muslims wanting to blow up Manchester's Trafford Centre, must have boosted our vote and this is something we must bear in mind as well, so we mustn't get too carried away.

Managing expectations is going to be key over the next 8 weeks in maintaining the morale of our campaigners who will be working harder than they have ever done before in their political lifetime. Also it doesn't end for the BNP after June 4th - it will be just beginning.

If we succeed in getting an MEP elected it will make things that much easier both financially and with greater representation in the media that this new status will afford us - but our battle will still have to be fought, with an MEP or without one.

For me it's head down on Freedom for the next three weeks so that the newspaper is out for the first of May - I had the Chairman of the Party on the telephone yesterday describing all sorts of horrors that will befall me if I miss this deadline. After that I shall be concentrating on Maryport West where I am standing in the Cumbria County Council elections. I will thoroughly enjoy this campaign, especially if the weather's fine in May, and there's no better way to lose a bit of weight and to keep yourself fit.

The Church in a dilemma

This is Michael Elliott with family and friends at Saturday's Battle for Britain fundraising social in Cumbria. Michael (stripped shirt) is one of our candidates on the North West list for the European Elections. Yesterday I received some superb photos taken during the evening by a professional photographer and no doubt many of these will appear in various leaflets, newspapers and on local websites in the coming months.

Freedom deadlines are hanging over me yet again so it's a truncated blog this morning. Our 'Jesus Poster' made both today's issues of the Daily Telegraph and The Scotsman. Those political church leaders who like to manipulate the Gospel to suit their own ends seem to be having a bit of trouble with this one. And I think this story could run on a little because the media quite likes to see sanctimonious clergy struggling with biblical interpretations.

And just this minute there has been another offering on the subject from Ekklesia which IS the political church. There appears to be some dissension in the ranks as to what Jesus would have said about the poster. Enjoy their dilemma here.

Four elections on Thursday and the word from Yorkshire is that our vote is holding up quite well in both Leeds and Halifax in the face of huge campaigns from Labour and the Tories. I hope to get some more info from all four contests during the day.

Labour's coat trailing exercise

THE Labour Party's dangerous game of inflating our chances of success in the European Elections continued apace yesterday with the findings of Gordon Brown's own poll into how the BNP might fare published in the London Daily News.

You can read it here.

Another briefing, this time talking up our chances in Yorkshire, appeared in the Yorkshire Post and you can read it here.

As long as our supporters understand what this strategy is all about, I'm quite happy for it to continue. "Scaring people into turning out against the BNP," is how such tactics are described by one political pundit.

While it might do that, it is certainly motivating our people at the moment with my inbox full of messages reporting Brown's internal poll and how it has sent our morale sky high. If it has that effect on BNP activists for the next 72 days, then let them play their mind games.

Here are some other comments on this Labour strategy which are worth repeating from election anoraks aligned to the main parties:

"Am I the only person to be deeply cynical whenever "shock private polling" is mentioned??"

"The point of that sort of leak isn't to provide accurate information."

"Why on earth would Labour want to do a coat trailing exercise with a story like this? I can't see what they are aiming at. Maybe they want to generate a backlash"

"Yes, I'd say that it may be a way of managing expectations in advance."

In this office yesterday we hosted an overflow enquiry telephone line and I took half a dozen calls while covering a lunch break. Half of them came from people who had seen the previous night's Look East news programme on our Battle for Britain campaign. It probably shows the importance of fair media coverage for our Party. When we get it, there is an instant response from the public.

And finally please visit Clive Jefferson's excellent blog here. The Penrith activity is another first for the Party in an area where we need to start preparing for the Euro Elections as well as the county council elections.

In Eden five years ago, at the last European Election, we polled 3.1% of the total vote so we need to nearly treble this to ensure victory in the North West on June 4th. Yesterday's activity will certainly start the ball rolling in this process.

Another £2 million spent on discriminating against British people

APPARENTLY our Fire and Rescue Service's main challenge isn't to save and rescue people any more . . . it's about meeting new equality and diversity targets!

New recruitment targets have been announced for the Fire and Rescue Service because representation and promotion rates for people from the ethnic minorities is still too low.

The Fire Minister Sadiq Khan said that the biggest challenge to the Fire and Rescue Authorities was to improve their performance on equality and diversity by meeting the new ethnic minority recruitment target of 2 to 5% above the percentage of the population . . . a target that would make nearly one-in-five of those working in the service either Black or Asian.

His Department is making £2million available to make sure these targets are met.

John Evans (above), the British National Party's candidate in the Wanstead by-election for Redbridge Council, must be rubbing his hands with delight this morning.

For last night the local newspaper, the Wanstead & Woodford Guardian, gave his campaign the greatest boost it could ever have wanted when it reported that politicians from the Old Gang Parties in Redbridge were uniting to campaign against the BNP.

What better endorsement could a candidate have than to be criticised by the discredited political parties that have brought our country to its knees?

Just read what the Tory, Labour and Liberal Democrats dinosaurs had to say:

Council leader and Conservative party head Alan Weinberg said: “Something that unites all the main political parties in Redbridge is our condemnation of groups like the BNP.

Labour leader Cllr Elaine Norman said she thought the party were fielding the candidate in preparation for the upcoming European elections. She added: “They have been leafleting around Wanstead with leaflets focusing on Europe recently.
“I’m disappointed that an extremist fascist party are standing but we will strongly fight against them.”

Redbridge’s Liberal Democrat leader, Cllr Hugh Cleaver, added his concerns.
He said: “I would hope they won’t get much support in the area, we don’t have any time for their views and outlook at all.
“I hope that they don’t get very far."

The newspaper even invited our old friend Gerry Gable, of Searchlight, for a comment and he said: “They're a party with a fascist ideology. I would say to people in Wanstead don’t waste your vote on them.”

Not surprisingly, the comments section on the newspaper's website was quickly filled with messages left by voters saying that any political party that was opposed by all three main parties was the one they wanted to vote for.

But what was surprising was that the majority of these pro-BNP comments were then deleted from the website, leaving just the ones that were critical of the BNP!

Fancy trying to redress the balance . . . .then click here.

When am I going to learn?

Bitterly disappointed this morning.

Bitterly disappointed with myself for breaking, for the umpteenth time, the number one commandment of electioneering . . . .

Thou shalt not be over optimistic about your election prospects.

When am I going to learn? Since 1976, and the Walsall North by-election, I have been getting over optimistic about election results - committing the cardinal sin of nationalist politics - believing that the impossible can be achieved, when I should be happy with just achieving the improbable. I had thought that in recent years I had conquered this shortcoming in my character, but obviously that isn't the case.

Last night in this office when the result of the Carlisle Castle ward by-election came through on the Vote-2007 website I should have been punching the air and dancing around shouting: "YES! - 20% in a ward we have never fought before. We are on course for a seat in the European Parliament." Instead I felt a little deflated, having hoped to poll even better and take second place off Labour.

And I should have been just as happy when the Belah result came through. Doubling our vote from two years ago and polling 10% in a ward that is true blue Tory. But then again here I was hoping for 12%, so still wasn't satisfied.

My sin was compounded furthermore by the announcement of my over-optimistic expectations on this website burdening nearly 2,000 other people with the same unrealistic hope for the Castle ward election.

I fully deserve the ridicule that appears on the pages of various political forums this morning as our opponents snigger: "The BNP believed their own hype over Castle ward", although in fairness it wasn't all our own hype but that of The Independent newspaper as well. This in itself is an interesting point and is a story for another blog. At the back of my mind I have the feeling that it might signify a change of tack by our opponents.

Well, that's my sackcloth and ashes bit over with. Will I learn from this mistake? Well, I haven't yet after 33 years, so please don't hold your breath.

The big picture for the European Elections is looking very good and I was able to snatch a few words with Nick Griffin yesterday morning while leafletting and he said that every aspect of our campaign is on target. Yesterday afternoon Tina spoke with Jean Griffin at fundraising and she reported that two huge mailbags of donation envelopes had just been delivered by Royal Mail. The new Euro-Election orientated BNP website should be launched next week and the website continues to attract record numbers of visitors.

It has been another excellent week for the British National Party - let's just hope Workington Reds can provide the icing on the cake with a victory at Gainsborough tomorrow afternoon.

Could he mean me?

I'm really under the cosh this morning with Freedom deadlines approaching, but just had to share this story with you.

Labour MEP Glyn Ford, believes the British National Party could win SEVEN seats in the European Parliament in June.

Well I'm wondering where he has got the seven seats from, and can't help but get excited at the thought that he might have included me, as No. 2 on the North West list, in his calculations.

According to my understanding we need over 16% in the North West for the BNP to get that second seat, which is probably beyond us - but maybe Gyln knows different!!

Anyway, he has certainly cheered me up this morning - here's the link

Taking the protest vote away from the Lib-Dems

DO you remember, back in December, that there were some eyebrows raised when the Lib-Dems in Bexley asked the UAF to help with its campaign in the East Wickham by-election? It was a bit of a surprise because in the past it had always been Labour that had worked hand-in-hand with the 'anti-BNP' group run by the Socialist Workers Party.

I believed that I mentioned at the time that there was more to this than met the eye and it was not just about the Lib-Dems wanting to parade its anti-BNP credentials in order to pick up the immigrant vote.

This has come to mind again after a report on the Kent News website this morning - Lib-Dems organise anti-BNP rally. Now the Lib-Dems weren't even able to put a candidate up in Swanley, so it is a bit of a surprise that they feel able to organise a rally. It would have been something you would have expected from Labour with us having just taken its seat.

Now cast your mind back to last Thursday. No, I'm not thinking about the Sevenoaks by-election, but the contest in Thringstone. What was the real surprise about this result apart from the huge 28% vote for the BNP? It was the derisory vote for the Lib-Dem candidate - just 76 votes which amounted to 4.6% of the total vote. What makes this vote even worse is that it was down by a massive 20.3% from the Lib-Dem vote back in May 2007.

When at Steyning Grammar School back in the early 1960s, I joined the Young Liberals, and then when I was 18, the Liberal Party itself. I did so because I felt a 'plague on both your houses' attitude towards the class based Tory and Labour Parties. I was looking for a Third Way and the Liberal Party was all that was available . . . until the National Front came along.

I believe that there are many people out there who feel now, how I felt then. They vote Lib-Dem because they can't stand New Labour or the Conservatives and are showing their opposition to the two main parties - it is just a protest vote. In fact, I would venture to propose that nearly half of those who vote Lib-Dem have little idea what its policies are all about at a national level. Yes they like the community politics, but I'm pretty certain would shy away from any true 'liberal' agenda.

Today, with its shallow Cameron-like leader, the Lib-Dems has lost that edge that made it an alternative and the home of the protest vote. Now, for people who see through the media spin and are tired of the cosy relationship between the Old Gang parties, there is the chance to lodge a real protest vote, a vote that has the establishment quaking in its shoes, a vote for the dreaded British National Party.

That's why the Lib-Dems are in a tizz over the BNP because they see us taking the protest vote which has been theirs by default for the last 30 years. This is very important for us as the European Elections are all about our 'vote share'. If we can shave a percentage point or two off the Lib-Dem vote and put it on to ours it could mean the difference for a region between having a BNP Member of the European Parliament, or not.

My theory might be tested tomorrow in the Greasley by-election in Broxtowe. This is a safe Conservative seat with Labour as the main challengers. The BNP candidate polled 17% here last time and the Lib-Dem 10% which should already prove my theory but I'm hoping that there still might be a little more movement here despite the already low bottom-line of the Lib-Dem vote. The last minute intervention of a UKIP candidate might also skew the figures but it is worth checking out the percentages when the result comes in tomorrow evening.

Very good letter from Alistair Harper in The Scotsman this morning. Alistair has the knack of getting his letters published which is no mean feat with the anti-BNP stance of the media. You can read it here.

And finally thanks to Freedom's trusted Subscription Manager Colin Goodgroves, for this photograph of the Wingfield Castle taken at the marina in Hartlepool. I love anything like this and for many years have lobbied for family holidays to be taken 'barging' on a river or canal on the Norfolk Broads or in France, but I have always been out-voted 4-1. Hopefully with the chicks flying the nest at a rate of knots and hence the anti-barge holiday vote losing its majority, I might just get my wish in the not too distant future.

No time for moping

DISAPPOINTMENT this morning. The BNP might have jumped up from 5th to 3rd in the Waddon by-election for Croydon Council, but our vote share of 5% was depressing - I had been hoping for double that. As I have said on many occasions, and will say so again, our results from now until June are all about vote share and there's no way of glossing over what was a poor result for us last night.

I suppose that I am depressed because 85% of those who voted in the contest supported either Labour or the Tories. The very two parties that when in Government have failed miserably in protecting the interests of the British people. Anyway here is the full result from last night.

Thursday 12th February 2008
CROYDON COUNCIL
Waddon Ward
Clare HILLEY (Con) 1462
Ian PAYNE (Lab) 1222
Charlotte LEWIS (BNP) 157
Patricia GAUGE (Lib-Dem) 150
Mary DAVEY (Green) 115
Kathleen GARNER (UKIP) 48
Mark SAMUEL (Ind) 13
John CARTWRIGHT (Loony) 11
BNP Percentage: 4.9%
May 2008 GLA LIST:CON 1353, LAB 893, LD 323, GRN 234, BNP 211, UKIP 103.

One crumb of comfort comes to me and that is something I was told back in the 1970s by a sympathetic Conservative MP. He said that if a nationalist party was ever to have an influence in British politics it would first have to replace the Liberal Party as the home of the protest vote. When looking at the results of the last two years, I think there's certainly some evidence that we are beginning to do this.

Thankfully there's no time to mope over last night's result as tomorrow is a big day for us locally in the Castle and Belah wards where we are contesting seats for Carlisle Council. And next Thursday there are no less than FOUR local council elections taking place and in two of them, at least, we should be back above the 20% vote share mark.

I have to admit that I'm not a Fitna fan. I watched all the news bulletins last night and I found the contributions of the majority of those involved in the debate, cringeworthy to say the least. Lord Pearson and Chris Huhne both made me want to reach for the 'off' button while, surprisingly, the gentleman who talked the most sense was a Muslim spokesman on Channel 4 News - and unfortunately I missed his name.

When you are confronted with a dangerous snake you don't antagonise it by poking it with a stick. What you should do is to cajole and manoeuvre it into a safe and secure place where it can do no harm, and then return it to its own environment.

Well, I witnessed first hand last night an example of the BBC's ethnic quotas at work - on BBC2 at 8.00pm in Masterchef. The only White contestant was a mile in front according to the comments of the judges and what had taken place during the programme (and as a former head chef at the Abbotsley Golf Hotel near St Neots run by one time ladies golf champion Vivien Saunders, I do have some knowledge on the subject) yet she failed to get through. When the result was announced the Indian contestant had come from nowhere to qualify for the next round and it very much seemed as though someone had had a word in the judges' ears at the 11th hour to ensure her progress.

And finally there's a good plug for the BNP's European Election aspirations on, of all places, the Guardian and Observer website this morning . . . here.

I don't believe in conspiracy theories but . . .

FRIDAY has always been the best day of the working week, but over the last few months waking up to a string of excellent BNP election results, has given the day an extra shine.

Make no mistake, that was a massive result in Tameside last night. The Old Gang Parties had a specific agenda for this election campaign and that was to reduce the vote share of the British National Party. While both Labour and the Tories were of course "in it to win it", all the anti-BNP campaigning that went on was specifically orchestrated with only the one goal in mind - to reduce the BNP vote so that they could all claim, whoever won the seat, that support for the BNP was in decline.

Now I know this is the case because I was tipped off by a disgruntled Tory that an all-party meeting had taken place and that this strategy has been put into place.

As I said on this blog earlier in the week, our experienced elections manager for Tameside, Mike Lester, said that he had never witnessed an anti-BNP campaign of such intensity before and that he was worried that our vote might indeed suffer under the constant barrage of anti-BNP publicity.

But thankfully the British people of Hyde Newton weren't about to be bullied and our vote not only held firm, but actually rose by 2% and that is something that we should be shouting from the rooftops about. We withstood all that the Old Gang parties and their agents in the establishment and media could throw at us and came through not just unscathed but even stronger.

Years ago I would have felt uneasy writing something like this. I hate conspiracy theories and talk of secret meetings and hidden agendas. Back in the seventies and eighties, the Nationalist movement seemed to attract the conspiracy theorist by the busload and to coin a phrase, it used to do my head in. I'm afraid I used give them short shrift and made a number of enemies because of my lack of tolerance in listening as they expounded on their convoluted theories.

But something now is going on behind the scenes - the whole of the political establishment organising against the British National Party.

I don't think this is wishful thinking and an exaggeration our importance just to make us feel we are something that we are not. I seriously believe that there is an OFFICIAL hidden agenda against the BNP.

On this very subject there's a little snippet in The Guardian this morning with Martin Kettle writing in support of a Government of National Unity to tackle the economic crisis. But there's another reason why he is advocating a coalition Government . . . "for the BNP to be resisted"! You can read the full article here.

And finally the Church is bragging that its intervention in the Hyde Newton by-election stopped the BNP from winning the seat - talk about turkeys voting for an early Christmas. You can read that story here.

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