The BNP on the BBC: A worthy exercise

THE BBC can feel vindicated by their decision to allow British National Party leader Nick Griffin a place on the Question Time panel.

Although it was always going to be an imperfect debate, it seemed to me to be a worthy exercise which was in the public interest.

There was no question that the BNP leader merited his invitation, despite this giving him the platform to espouse his vile beliefs.

Success in the European elections in June, when the BNP recorded just under one million votes and won two seats, had earned him his place on the panel.

Certainly, previous panellists had been on the show having achieved less.

Though it was inevitable, the threat of the BNP gaining from this exposure was heightened by the build-up Griffin's appearance was given in the press.

And the anti-fascist protesters who were looking to gag Griffin did more harm to their reputation than his by taking the ludicrously fascist stance of opposing free speech.

I will admit that, even as a viewer, I was nervous before the show went to air.

Griffin is known as his party's best orator and he has looked comfortable in front of the cameras in the past. Could he seize the opportunity and force the BNP into the mainstream?

Thankfully, the answer was a resounding 'no'.

I wrote in my previous post that "we may yet get the best result where Griffin loses all credibility it proves to be the end for him and his bunch of racist thugs".

While this somewhat dream-like scenario will not happen and the BNP retains a core of support, Griffin will have failed to impress unsure voters with a disastrous performance.

As Iain Dale wrote on his blog, Griffin bombed. Mr Dale wrote, "He was nervous, trembling, acting with exaggerated gestures, grinning at inappropriate moments and at times incoherent."

Perhaps his jitters should not be surprising as Griffin came under sustained attack from all the other panellists and the majority of the audience.

Among other matters, they were able to expose his links to other far-right groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, his inability to define 'genocide' and his prejudice on race and homosexuality.

Most startlingly of all, citing European law, he refused to explain why he has denied the holocaust in the past, only saying he has now changed those views.

This focus on Griffin's personal views has come in for some criticism in the programme's fall out.

But, though it may have looked unedifying, he was fair game. He put himself up for the show by accepting the invitation, surely knowing what to expect.

I agree that the chair David Dimbleby could have done a better job at steering the debate to ensure that more time was dedicated to other issues.

But Griffin should not have been surprised at the jeers and the number of hostile questions which he faced. That was purely a fair reflection of the general hostility to him in the country.

Meanwhile, it was a shame to see that the other party political panellists seemed preoccupied with scoring political points by contrasting their views against those of the BNP, rather than debating the issues.

This was most in evidence when Justice Secretary Jack Straw made a botched attempt of explaining the government's immigration policy.

American playwright Bonnie Greer was excellent, however. Without the ties of party political dogma, she was most adept at tripping Griffin up and generally patronising his ludicrous views.

The BBC will, of course, be happy with their own work, with a record-breaking eight million viewers tuning in, massively raising the profile of Question Time.

But it would be churlish to suggest that the broadcast did not also adhere to the corporation's public service remit and, as such, it was a worthy exercise.

I will personally choose to remember it, with great satisfaction, as the night that Griffin bombed.

The BNP on the BBC: Undue exposure?

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

Evelyn Beatrice Hall

The vile British National Party must be loving this week.

A guest slot on the BBC's flagship political programme, Question Time, reams of articles in the build up and countless blog posts, including my own.

Party leader Nick Griffin is probably smirking, thinking his work is done. He will gain credibility for his party by appearing on BBC One. He will get their vote to increase at the general election.

Unsurprisingly, this has led to calls for the BBC to pull the plug and deny the fascists the oxygen which they crave.

But, as Fleetstreetblues writes, the rise of the BNP is unfortunately too big a story to ignore.

Their total vote in the 2001 general election was just 47,129.

In the last general election in 2005, it had increased four-fold to 192,746 as the public showed their disgruntlement with the political mainstream.

More recently, the party has won a seat in the London-wide assembly and two European Parliament seats.

Those two seats in Europe is the same representation as that of the Green Party and its leader Caroline Lucas has appeared on Question Time twice already this year.

But Nick Griffin is wrong. Just by being chauffeured to the studio and appearing on television, he does not give his party legitimacy.

For a start, despite the huge increase in numbers, the performance of his party in general elections remains poor.

The BNP started the decade at a low base and has never come close to winning a seat at Westminster, even when pooling all its resources into an area such as Oldham.

And, for all the arguments that the BBC are giving the BNP undue exposure, my instincts tell me that the best way forward is to oppose their politics directly.

For this reason, I would have chosen different panellists - perhaps Diane Abbott for Labour and/or the highly-principled David Davis for the Tories.

As it is, Jack Straw appears for Labour, Baroness Warsi for the Conservatives, Chris Huhne for the Liberal Democrats and playwright Bonnie Greer are around the table tonight.

We may yet get the best result where Griffin loses all credibility it proves to be the end for him and his bunch of racist thugs.

But I doubt that will happen. As well as being a bigot, Griffin is often a smooth operator in front of the rolling cameras.

Odd that the BNP website which espouses their nauseous views is offline today, though.

A message appears instead, which states, "We have had to take our normal website offline due to the enormous amount of ordinary people, just like you, visiting our website."

Or is it not the fact they are not prepared for the spotlight suddenly shining on them and their ridiculous views?

Question Time is on BBC1 at 10.35pm