Why is the BNP our favourite scary story? Friday morning’s election post–mortem was peppered with the usual ‘close–call’ rhetoric: ‘They did much better than expected,’ said one Radio 4 and Guardian commentator; ‘historic breakthrough,’ cried another.
But did they? The numbers come nowhere near indicating a ‘breakthrough’, and, despite one councillor’s assertion that the BNP was now ‘on its way’, this sounded like so much wishful thinking on the BNP’s part. In fact, they did not do very well, and much less so than their electoral and campaign investment suggests. The BNP clearly thought that it could collect on the dissatisfaction with Labour and growing anti–immigrant feeling. And as for the media, half of them predicted the BNP goose–stepping down the Mall by Friday morning. So while 46 seats isn’t nothing, neither does it smack of a breakthrough.
The BNP did well where they could be expected to do well, with its most impressive score precisely where it was handed to them. Of the 4,360 seats up for re–election, the BNP managed to get 33. By my calculations that’s 0.75 per cent of the seats. Overall therefore, out of 19,579 council seats, they now hold 46. That’s roughly 0.23 per cent of seats.
Paradoxically, the BNP traditionally do relatively well in areas that are adjacent to immigrant areas. This is a typical European phenomenon. Places like Oldham are a case in point: white communities within a stone’s throw of newly ethnic areas, where the BNP’s message can be boiled down to a warning of things to come to people who already feel vulnerable, if not yet directly affected. Other areas such as Barking and Dagenham, where transformation has been rapid and barely controlled, are also fertile territory.
From previous elections we know that the BNP vote – again like many European parties of the far or populist right – has changed somewhat over the years. While the party started out targeting older people, their support now comes from a much younger stratum of the (male) population. We also know that most voters for the BNP – aside from a tiny minority of hard–core supporters – are voters who did not previously vote.
This is an interesting phenomenon in light of the ‘Labour defection’ theory, but it needs to be verified. What we know so far is that, while the BNP may increasingly draw support from the young white working class, these are not generally people who have previously been Labour supporters. Rather, they are people who one might have expected – in traditional terms – to support Labour, but who in fact have been politically inactive. And while numerically there is a transfer of votes from Labour to the BNP, previous election results show that numerically support from previously uncommitted voters and from former Conservative voters was higher.
But let us focus on what does matter in these results: the reality of what this means in political terms; the context in which this election was held; and the prospects for the future.
Forty–six BNP councillors is not a tragedy, but it is a problem. It is not a tragedy for a number of reasons. First, the number of BNP councillors is very low. Second, given the BNP’s past performance in office, we will not have to wait too long before the numbers drop off and one or another of the BNP councillors ends up in jail or under investigation. Third, the BNP has a bad track record where it does have seats on councils; it does not deliver and therefore seldom benefits from fidelity on behalf of its voters. Finally, regardless of the number of votes the BNP gained, they are not distributed in ways that make much of a policy impact.
Their presence and small success is, however, a problem. It is not only their electoral success in certain local communities that poison community relations and make day–to–day life difficult, unpleasant and threatening for a great numbers of individuals. Their very presence in a campaign colours and damages the life of communities by changing the tone of politics, polarising and heightening particular issues, and thereby forcing mainstream parties into idiotic positions and no less idiotic statements.
In this local election campaign, the most astounding aspect was the demonising of vast swathes of the white working class who, in addition to having to cope with the usual problems associated with deprivation of one form or another and a low sense of political efficacy, also had to deal with the accusation that they were to blame for making fascism a part of the British political landscape. Well played indeed.
A party that thrives on the notion that a condescending liberal elite is at best taking no notice of them, and at worst patronising them, had but to reach out and collect what had been described as theirs by right or by default. The warning of the BNP threat was right, albeit a little late; but the tone was wrong and the alarm raised awkwardly and condescendingly. Both of which are fodder for the BNP and all populist parties.
But fortunately, the white working class is infinitely more committed to democratic values, diversity and tolerance than we seem to give it credit for. And one should probably not take the numbers in Barking as representative of a commitment to the BNP, but rather as a tribute to ordinary people’s resilience in the face of ludicrous accusations. This is something that we need to understand better – is it a protest vote? And if so, what kind of a protest vote?
After all, while BNP voters may not be committed to the BNP, many people in Barking and Dagenham – as well as in other areas that have been subject to badly managed social change – have legitimate cause for grievance. If anything, it is a tribute to people’s commitment to democracy (and to some of the tireless and discrete work being carried out on the ground by people like Jon Cruddas) that the BNP isn’t doing better. If, in this year of all years, the BNP cannot do better than this, then I am tempted to say that they will never break through.
Could the BNP have benefited from a better climate for the success of populist, racist, petty, insular ideas? In terms of conditions for far right party success, this election was close to a textbook case: an Islamic bombing, a Conservative party moving to the centre, the cartoon furore, escaped foreign prisoners, a government mired in scandal and succession woes.
What all this indicates is that the BNP is still perceived as a party that respectable people will not vote for. Furthermore, support for the BNP is localised and linked to a long–term sense of abandonment, not to momentary glitches. And this is the important point. An article in the New Statesman last year argued that one–in–five Britons might vote far right. The results at the general election, and now the local elections results, relegate this to the realm of noir fantasy.
Nevertheless, what needs to be understood by both analysts and politicians is that it is perfectly plausible for one–in–five Britons to be tempted. Unlike the NS authors, I do not want to underestimate both the positive barriers of people’s characters nor the more negative barriers of our electoral system, but it is perfectly logical to think (and the results of the Power inquiry make this plain) that one–in–five Britons may feel vulnerable, abandoned and powerless. Dismissing them as freaks or as pariahs is not the answer.
In the short to medium term, a re–invigorated Conservative party and the BNP’s lack of effective leadership shield us from the harsher effects of real BNP success. Neither of these should be counted upon in the long–term to act as barriers against it.