Forum Topic

How to stop the BNP on June 4th

A recent nationally-conducted YouGuv poll of voting intentions for the forthcoming Euro elections found: Con 26%; Lab 21%; Ukip 16%; LibDem 14%; Green 9%; BNP 7%.Although the London area sometimes votes differently to the country as a whole, it usually does vote in a broadly similar fashion.If these figures DO represent the share of vote in London on June 4th, then people might be interested to know how this would translate into seats.There are EIGHT seats up for grabs in the capital.As the party with the most votes, the Tories would be awarded ONE seat; their vote would then be halved from 26% to 13%. Because Labour's 21% is higher than this new Tory figure of 13%, Labour would then be awarded ONE seat. Hooray!! (That's me being strictly unbiased, by the way). Labour's vote would then be halved to 10.5%.Because Ukip's 16% is higher than both the new Tory figure of 13% and the new Labour figure of 10.5%, Ukip would be awarded ONE seat; Ukip's vote would then be halved to 8%.Because the LibDem's 14% is higher than the new Tory figure of 13%, the new Labour figure of 10.5% and the new Ukip figure of 8%, the LibDems would be awarded ONE seat. The LibDem vote would then be halved to 7%.At this point, the Tories get allocated a SECOND seat. This is because their revised figure of 13% not only exceeds the revised figure for Labour, Ukip and the LibDems; it also exceeds the Green Party's 9% and the BNP's 7%. The Tory vote is then HALVED AGAIN, leaving them with 6.5%.And so the process keeps on going. So far, five seats have been allocated. This is how the other three seats would go ...Those nice Labour people get a SECOND seat, their figure is HALVED AGAIN, leaving them with 5.25%;The Greens get their FIRST seat; their figure is HALVED, leaving them with 4.5%.Finally, Ukip get their SECOND seat (because their revised figure of 8% is just ahead of the BNP's total of 7% and the Lib Dems' revised total - which is also 7%).The final total: Con 2; Lab 2; Ukip 2; LibDem 1; Green 1. I'm sorry if this sounds complicated but hopefully it informs people of how best to keep the BNP out. You need to vote for a party that will come AHEAD of the BNP in the popular vote. If you are to the left of Labour and want to stop the BNP then it's no good voting for Bob Crowe's party (or for Arthur Scargill's Socialist Labour Party) because they are barely registering in the polls.Having said that, I would be lying if I was to say to people on the left that they should vote Labour to stop the BNP. It is just as likely that a LibDem or Green vote will have the same effect; it simply depends upon how the cookie crumbles. The polls have varied wildly in the Euro election and the above is only one example of how things might turn out.The above poll puts the BNP on 7% - yet another poll gave them only 1%. (In the 2004 Euros, they polled 4%). It is possible, though, that some people who do intend voting BNP may deny it to the pollsters because they are (rightly) ashamed. If this is so, then their poll rating is an underestimate of their true level of support.Another factor is this: the polls are showing that Ukip's vote is on the slide and it seems that they may have peaked too early. The fall in their popular vote is likely to benefit both the Tories and the BNP.My hunch is that the BNP will not gain a seat in London. People point to the fact that they won one on the Greater London Assembly - which operates on the same electoral system - but remember that there are 25 seats on the GLA (against only eight for the London region Euro election).   The only prediction I will make is this: I feel pretty certain that Labour will win TWO seats (nothing more, nothing less) - because just about every realistic estimate arrives at that result. So you may well ask "Why vote Labour". Because it would still be good for Labour to get a good aggregate vote in order to try and keep their vote total as close as possible to that polled by the Tories.To people on the left, yes you have every right to be pissed off with Labour. But always remember its HISTORY and its IDENTITY. Most of all, never forget that it is the party that is most closely associated with our multi-racial society: and that, more than anything, is worth a vote.

Robin Taylor ● 6054d29 Comments

Aha! Buy and read BOTH the Mail and the Guardian - am a marketeer's nightmare. I attribute it to early conditioning: my father hated breakfast table chatter so he bought the Mail just for me from the age of about nine to stop me talking of a morning. I still remember the pre-tabloid paper and the frisson every Tuesday when Fe-Mail was included (can you imagine?)

Sara Nathan ● 6046d

Sara - I'm deeply shocked you BUY the Mail; I'm not sure I would read it if I found it on the seat next to me on the Tube. Poisonous paper on every page. I had you down an an Indie or Guardian reader.Colin - Failure to drive ahead with social housing - totally agree. Lamentable! I have always thought the provision of attainable housing should be the highest priority of both Government and the local council. In fact I used to think that provision was more important than price, i.e. I thought rents of public sector housing were wrongly artificially held down as it meant repairs were inadequate, and major repairs were too often funded from capital resources so depriving that pot for its higher purpose.Yes it is true the BNP does not appear quite close enough to the take-off threshold. Were those London or national figures though? The 8th seat is very much in play.I think the poor have been better served by this Government than most in recent history but the ground keeps moving away from them. The measures to alleviate child poverty made meaningless by the comparison with the runaway wealth creation caused by the - until now - explosion in property prices for those who owned property bought on margin. The whole right-to-buy thing was about gratifying one generation at the expense of those who followed.

Dan Filson ● 6046d

Sara - I'm deeply shocked you BUY the Mail; I'm not sure I would read it if I found it on the seat next to me on the Tube. Poisonous paper on every page. I had you down an an Indie or Guardian reader.Colin - Failure to drive ahead with social housing - totally agree. Lamentable! I have always thought the provision of attainable housing should be the highest priority of both Government and the local council. In fact I used to think that provision was more important than price, i.e. I thought rents of public sector housing were wrongly artificially held down as it meant repairs were inadequate, and major repairs were too often funded from capital resources so depriving that pot for its higher purpose.Yes it is true the BNP does not appear quite close enough to the take-off threshold. Were those London or national figures though? The 8th seat is very much in play.I think the poor have been better served by this Government than most in recent history but the ground keeps moving away from them. The measures to alleviate child poverty made meaningless by the comparison with the runaway wealth creation caused by the - until now - explosion in property prices for those who owned property bought on margin. The whole right-to-buy thing was about gratifying one generation at the expense of those who followed.

Dan Filson ● 6046d

Have weaned myself off Chiswick and Ealing - just too time consuming...and Acton is home...so I will abandon this one as soon as it learns to fly!And then it's Maltesers...much trickier as addictions go.

Sara Nathan ● 6046d

Much like these neighbourhood fora, it's a scab you can't stop picking. Now if I can just wean myself off LBC...

Colin Murphy ● 6046d

And Richard Littlejohn in the Mail today telling people not to vote at all.Could someone remind me whya) I  still buy that paper andb) why I EVER read more than the headline on the Littlejohn page.Dunno about about BNP but my BP is off the top of the scale.

Sara Nathan ● 6046d

Dispossessed Labour voters (specifically white working class) feel abandoned by the party of government these last 12 years, feeling significantly poorer, but fooled by equity driven wealth and the cheapness of Chinese goods. Now that cycle is ending, the scapegoat is being sought.To my mind ( and the issue I may campaign upon at the next election ), the failure to institute a massive programme of social housing construction is the most damning indictment of the party of the working man. As a local boy once sang "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss".12 years of authoritarian micro-management have left this country on its knees, yet the rag tag and bobtail of Nu Labour have the temerity to dictate to the electorate that it should not exercise its democratic rights.BTW, you shouldn't be focusing on the BNP smokescreen -  the more recent Populus poll has these numbers:Tories are on 30%, UKIP have surged to 19%, Labour fell to 16%, the Liberal Democrats are on 12%.  The Greens are on 10% and the BNP trail with 5%

Colin Murphy ● 6046d

Well done, he! Good to see not all the young are apathetic.

Robin Taylor ● 6046d

My son (who is spitting because he turns 18 on Friday and therefore misses out on voting) has been setting up an anti-BNP facebook group, distributing anti-BNP cards (supplied, I suppose understandably, by his Jewish youth group)canvassing madly among his friends and is rather pleased that he has persuaded several of them to "vote mainstream".Some of the young are engaged - just a shame he can't actually vote!

Sara Nathan ● 6047d

I've received a whole pile of leaflets from various political parties but still nothing from either the Conservatives or labour. I really think they've taken their eye off the ball on this one.

Lina Leaman ● 6047d

I sincerely apologise for the fact that the description I gave of the voting system at the start of this thread may be (slightly) inaccurate! There's a comment on another forum to the effect that rather than HALVE each successful party's vote, they instead DIVIDE IT BY THE NUMBER OF SEATS THEY'VE ALREADY BEEN ALLOCATED PLUS ONE. In practical terms, the only difference this will make to the example I gave at the opening of this thread is that the Tories may struggle to gain their third seat - and a smaller party lower down the list may benefit. Having said that, the Tories MIGHT still just make it to three. If they don't then possibly Labour or Ukip will manage to gain a second seat.I still doubt if the BNP will win a seat: but please do not allow complacency to let them in by the back door.As for myself, I'm slightly cheesed off because I've now discovered that I've been left off the electoral register.Apart from the BNP not breaking through, my main anxiety is that my party (Labour) may be beaten by Ukip. This will be simply awful for a great international city like London.Although it is true that the latest national poll puts Ukip 3 points ahead of Labour (19% vs. 16%) I still cannot quite believe they will beat us in Greater London. Yesterday, when attending a birthday celebration at Southall's "Glassy Junction" pub I noticed some of my friends who are Labour councillors over the road distributing literature. They were outside one of the local Gurdwaras (Sikh temples). I went over to chat to them and picked up a copy of a leaflet warning about the BNP threat.No matter how bad it gets for Labour, a large section of the elderly Indian community here will stick with us. It's about tradition and history. With its diverse communities, I just think there is a certain level below which the Labour vote will not fall in Greater London.

Robin Taylor ● 6047d

I've just received the The Christian Party Christian Peoples Alliance leaflet. I don't know why the party name alone makes me slightly shudder, maybe because their first listed policy is "A Christian Europe : Recognition that Christianity brought Europe the freedom, culture and values that we must return to" - I  don't recall Christianity on the barricades for freedom, but mostly on the other side defending the status quo, and this goes against recognising and valuing other faiths and those with values but no faiths. They are also, no surprise, anti-abortion (with no exceptions mentioned).It contains some misinformation though as a plus it does quote Edmund Burke (who was not necessarily the ultimate author of "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good mean to do nothing" but I'll let them off that one):-"Fact 2: In London the EU Elections will be contested over 8 rounds for 8 available seats""Fact 3: The BNP can only win a seat in the 8th round of the London EU Elections"Fact 3 doesn't follow from the voting system. There is no reason, in theory, why a BNP candidate should not be elected under each round, though if that happens I'll gas myself before they do."Fact 5: Voting for Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat or Green is the worst thing you could do if your intention is to stop the BNP winning in London" Interesting omission of UKIP in that list!"Fact 6: Last year under he same Proportional Representation system of voting 80,000 voters wasted their votes voting for Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat or Green"Again interesting omission of UKIP in that list!They define a wasted vote as one which did not affect the outcome of the poll - well it stands to reason that not every single vote can get someone elected, I've yet to meet a system in which there are no losers."Fact 7: Voting Christian is the surest way to stop the BNP according to latest figures" In support of which they cite that The Christian Party Christian Peoples Alliance came 6th in last year's Greater London Assembly elections!In their favour they quote certain BNP policies and explain their consequences:* Limits on funding of groups that BNP don't like (you can guess which)* Ending National Non-Domestic Rate Relief for charities the BNP don't like (again you can guess which)* Ending Charitable status for organisations the BNP don't like* Ending recruitment of foreign staff by the NHS or local authoritiesI wonder if these people really realise the effect diversion of votes to them could achieve - letting the BNP in the back door. The one thing Europe does not need is a revival of the American style religious right, even if it is hostile to the BNP.

Dan Filson ● 6047d

Oh I wasn't advocating complacency - and for our many readers outside the capital - as well as the teeming throngs of Shepherds Bush - I say go for it - Vote early - though not often - unless you are in Northern Ireland, where it a fine old tradition.

Sara Nathan ● 6047d

Probably because polls somewhere are showing that in London the Tories are getting just over the 33% threshold for 3 seats and the BNP not reaching the 11$ threshold. Possibly the BNP threat is greater outside London, in Staffordshire and Lancashire for example. PR prevents them doing a sweep of seats but even one in Europe "speaking for us" will appal many in the UK and outside it.

Dan Filson ● 6047d

The Guardian this morning seems to think three London Tory seats and no BNP - but how they can tell when the vote seems to be bouncing all over the place - especially for the smaller parties, I have no idea.

Sara Nathan ● 6047d

I gather the system of counting the votes in not correctly described in the opening post of 25/05/09 10:15:00, but the correct system is equally complex and I cannot explain it coherently so won't try. Just don't sit up on the night of 4/5 June expecting to see things happen as there described. Not least as I think they don't start counting until daytime!Vote as you please, but VOTE. And in my humble opinion a vote is better cast for Tory, LibDem, Labour or Green than any of the rest! If you really want to waste your vote and possibly let the BNP in, vote for an Independent, or indeed stay at home and wake to a fascist delegation to Brussels.

Dan Filson ● 6047d

uninterested means they don't care, disinterested means they aren't biased or are neutral. At least that's how I have always used them.Some Mail columnist (who should know better) was opining yesterday on who he should vote for - because of course he couldn't support the BNP. He concluded that Libertas or Jury were the only ones he could contemplate because the big three were too corrupt, never mentioned the Greens and then preened himself on his contribution to democracy. I wanted to yell at him that he was going EXACTLY the way to let the BNP in. Second only to not voting at all.

Sara Nathan ● 6048d

It is appalling the voter interest is so low and I partly blame the national politicians for this, trivialising everything to do with Europe into Little Englandism nationalism. The achievements of the EU are ignored or claimed as those of national Parliaments.Labour's leaflet devotes one side wholly to education, for which the EU has nil responsibility. You can be sure the investment in education in Ealing (I presume Hammersmith's leaflet is similarly worded) will not be the prime driver of how voters vote, and any glory for the spending outcomes will be claimed by the Conservatives in power.Personally, I think it was a mistake to expand the EU eastwards without carrying the then EU population with the idea. Whilst I feel I have a lot in common with Germany and Italy etc., and am happy to surrender a modicum of sovereignty to the common pool to achieve common ends for uor mutual benefit, I feel I have less in common with Roumania or Bulgaria or the Baltic states. It is also so provocative to the wounded bear Russia, a country desperately aggrieved at its loss of face when the Iron Curtain fell (a good thing) and eastern Europe broke into a lot of small nations (possibly a good thing) often snarling at each other and at Russia (a bad thing though perhaps understandable).If the Greens are the beneficiaries of the fall in popularity of the big 3, that may not be so bad, even if they are now split on whether nuclear power is acceptable or not. However the polls don't suggest this is happening. UKIP seems now set to gain at least one more London seat. The BNP might just scrape one seat (I have just read that on a minority of votes in total, they hold numerous, if not all, the council seats in Burnley, which if true is appalling). But my instinct is the Conservative vote will not collapse - they may get a reduced vote compared to 4 years ago, but a higher percentage. Tory voters are usually quietly determined - no window posters, but they vote in battalions.My forecast for what it is worth is now Tory 3, UKIP 2, Lib Dem 1, Labour 1, Green 1, though nothing is certain - the BNP might get a seat instead of UKIP getting 2. This means 5 ouy of 8 seats go to psrties deeply hostile to the EU, and who do not work with other parties in the EU - so their seats there are effectively wasted seats. A factor we don't realise here in London is that the local elections are also being fought outside London, and this means that workers are scattered across many wards, instead of, as at a General Election, focusing on stacking up votes in strongholds if such now exist anywhere. Across the UK, where Labour held more seats at the last Euro election, they will get slaughtered (no pun intended) as punishment for rising unemployment and the expenses scandal (even though MPs of other parties are also guilty). The press headlines will say Body Blow to Brown etc., but he will soldier on to the General Election where defeat surely awaits.

Dan Filson ● 6048d

ALmost everyone I speak to has said they won't be voting for the usual three.... should be an interesting result, although it is sad that so vast a percentage of the population is so uninterested, or do I mean disinterested? No doubt someone will tell me.

Vivienne James ● 6048d

Posted daughter's postal vote today - but I imagine they have to go pretty soon to be sure to be there by Thursday - cue a "dreadful post" thread!

Sara Nathan ● 6049d

In one of the 1968 or the 1972 US Presidential elections they gave out gifts like books of matches saying "Vote as you please - but Vote" in a desperate plea to get a higher turnout. Possibly the Democrats were behind this, as a low poll usually works against them.I don't altogether agree that it doesn't matter whether you vote Tory, Liberal Democrat, Labour or Green so long as you vote, but I would always rather someone voted than abstained.Labour's record on workers' rights : heads and shoulders ahead of the other parties, over and over again. It's one of the areas where there has been 11 years of solid achievement on a field of many other failures. Also true of the 1964-1970 and 1974-1979 Governments. Labour never drove up unemployment (from 1.4million at the 1979 General Election to 3.2million two years later) to tame worker industrial unrest and claimed it was a price worth paying!I don't altogether understand how they count the votes but I would rather the votes overshot the number required to get 2 Labour seats than undershot, and so possibly handing a seat or a second seat to UKIP or BNP. It seems likely Green and UKIP will each get at least 1 seat, and I can believe 2 each for Tory and Labour, with 1 for Lib-Dem, so it is always the 8th seat that is in play, unless Labour's vote falls through the floor putting another seat into play.

Dan Filson ● 6054d

Doesn't really matter which of the largest four you vote for does it - if your only real purpose is to keep the BNP out?

Sara Nathan ● 6054d

Sorry to be cynical again, Robin, but I'm not convinced about Labour's record on workers' rights. Wasn't it Gordon Brown who tried to block agency workers' rights? So no sick pay or maternity pay for temps. Quite disgusting, if you ask me.

Lina Leaman ● 6054d

I would add Bob Crow to that list - someone who rails against the rich yet creams £100,000 off his members in the form of his salary. He recently appeared with the (IMHO) odious John Gaunt on a news programme and made absolutely no attempt to distance himself from the latter - even though the Sun columnist was shouting his mouth off in his usual nationalist way. In fact, it seemed at times as though Gaunt was speaking for both of them. They were both obsessed with Europe (and Gaunt additionally obsessed with immigration).Why should I, as someone who works in the private sector and is on a low income be against Europe when I've benefitted personally from the European social chapter? Bob Crow says it should be our own parliament that passes pro-worker laws. What a disgracefully nationalistic view - and he claims to be on the far left! I don't care where the laws come from - so long as they benefit us. I have more in common with a French national earning the equivalent of £10k a year than I'll ever have with a union fat cat.As far as our lack of influence in the EU is concerned, that is our fault: if we had embraced the opportunities that Europe offered more enthusiastically from the start, then we might have done better out of it.Anyway, to get back to the subject of the thread: anyone who backs Scargill or Crow is wasting their vote because their two parties will each poll LESS than the BNP. Thus, they will be completely useless (and counter productive) in the fight to prevent the BNP from gaining a seat.On both Europe and workers rights (and as a means of sticking two fingers up to the BNP) it's got to be Labour all the way.

Robin Taylor ● 6054d

I am not sure it is true that in the "1983 and 1987 general elections when Labour were committed to withdrawing us from Europe", though I haven't checked the respective manifestos which I have somewhere. There was still residual hostility to the EU following the 1975 referendum, but it is my impression that for many people (who did not leave to join the SDP) there was an acceptance that for good or ill the country was stuck with the EU and had better make the best of it. I say "stuck with" because what we joined under Ted Heath was a club whose rules and budgetary system had already been established; we as new members were not able to change the fundamental structure until a major change was needed on the accession of further new members, and even then only on a modest scale.Certainly the position of the TUs, and even more so their members in the manual unions, was at one stage deeply hostile to immigrant labour, but the rot of furtively racist anti-immigration laws began with the 1962 Act. The sacking of Enoch Powell was greatly to the credit of Ted Heath, though in reality he had no alternative, but he benefited from Powell's Rivers of Blood speech in the 1969 local elections and the 1970 General Election.The past is another country. What to me is distressing is the Little Englandism to which politicians of all parties turn. Th abuse heaped on some EU leaders has been extraordinary and totally undeserved - Jacquss Delors for example, highly intelligent, but the victim of The Sun. When I think of the intelligence of Helmut Schmidt, Willi Brandt and even Valery Giscard D'Estaing, and compare them to some of the pygmies on our benches, past and present, I blush with embarrassment. As for the Euro-phobes - BNP, UKIP etc but Scargill's mob too - beneath contempt for their playing to the basest fears of the gallery.

Dan Filson ● 6054d

Lina is right to be sceptical about the Labour Party. The issue of protectionism in the Labour & trade union movement has often conflicted with its desire to take an internationalist perspective. Myself, I voted for the SDP in the 1983 and 1987 general elections when Labour were committed to withdrawing us from Europe; however, Labour has long since reformed on that issue and is now more pro-European than the Tories.Labour has done some quite appalling things in the arena of race relations over the years: one only has to think of the 1968 immigration act. On the other hand, if you go back to Ted Heath's time - he not only allowed in the Ugandan Asian refugees (and took us into Europe) but he destroyed Enoch Powell after the latter's inflammatory 'rivers of blood' speech. So there you have an example of a Tory with a better record on race than most Labour prime ministers.Having said that, Heath is now reviled by the Tory rank and file precisely because he was such a decent person. Added to this is the fact that just about all of our equality legislation has been enacted by Labour.Speaking anecdotally, I've known quite a few Tory party members with extreme views on race (including a young Tory who admires Oswald Moseley).The final point I would make is this (and I use it to highlight my argument that people associate Labour, often negatively, with Britain's multi-racial society):-While "knocking up" in a heavily black housing estate in the Croydon Central constituency on the morning of the 2005 general election, I started to become aware that someone nearby was shouting at me. Standing on a doorstep (with clipboard firmly in hand and with a red rossette affixed to by lapel) I turned round to see a middle aged white guy get out of his car and start shrieking "Aaahhhhhggg you're only down here cos of all the F***ING FOREIGNERS". He walks to a nearby house, puts something through the letter box, returns to his car and shouts "Five more years of S**T". He then gets in said car and reverses back down the road.What was it about my red rosette that prompted this outburst? And would I have had the same reaction if I had been wearing a blue one? I doubt it.

Robin Taylor ● 6054d

I was rather discounting the political affiliation - the advice looked good.

Sara Nathan ● 6054d

Labour is "the party that is most closely associated with our multi-racial society"? I'm not sure that that's true. I read a really good book on this a while ago which said that it was the Conservatives who felt a paternalistic need to take in people from former colonies and give them jobs (can't remember which time period precisely but maybe after one of the world wars). The trade unions (i.e. Labour) were very much against this, fearing foreigners would take their jobs. So, historically, I think it's the opposite of what you expect.

Lina Leaman ● 6054d

That is really helpful Robin. People keep asking me how to ensure their vote counts against the BNP and I will now refer them to your posting.

Sara Nathan ● 6054d