[DEBATE] : UK - A rightwing we will go a rightwing we will go...

[Riaz K Tayob]

BNP could get £2m EU funds, Hain warns

    * Patrick Wintour
    * The Guardian, Wednesday 29 April 2009
    * Article history

A BNP banner

The BNP could be transformed from a fringe party at local elections to a 
national party. Photograph: John Giles/PA

The British National party could transform British politics and get up 
to £2m from the EU if the main political parties fail to prevent the far 
right organisation from winning six seats in the European elections in 
June, Peter Hain, the former cabinet minister and founder member of the 
Anti-Nazi League, warns today.

Hain also urges his own party to get its act together at the grass roots 
to fight the BNP in the elections. Some close allies of Gordon Brown, 
such as his former parliamentary aide and current government whip, Ian 
Austin, argue that the best way to combat the BNP is not to predict its 
success, but to tell the truth about its extremism, and to combat it at 
local level.

But Labour acknowledges at the highest levels that the elections could 
transform the BNP from a fringe party at local elections to a national 
party with European funding. There is also a debate on whether leaders 
of established political parties should steer clear of leading the fight 
against the BNP. Campaign groups such as Searchlight, the anti-fascist 
magazine, believe that attacks from mainstream Westminster figures will 
only add to the BNP's anti-establishment credentials.

In an article for the Guardian, Hain warns: "Winning European seats 
would secure an unprecedented platform, and entitle the BNP to draw down 
hundreds of thousands of euros from Brussels indirectly to buttress 
their full-time personnel and organisation. With unemployment and job 
insecurity rising, with some major construction sites appearing to bar 
local unionised labour, and affordable housing in short supply, these 
are classic conditions for the BNP's racist and fascist politics to thrive."

Austin, one of Labour's most respected anti-BNP campaigners, said: "The 
BNP are not a mainstream political party and we won't beat them by 
saying how many seats they could win."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/apr/29/bnp-peter-hain-european-elections