Election Time

I don't know how representative Question Time audiences really are. Obviously the BBC pre-selects to try to match whatever notion the metropolitan elite has of a representative audience but what they end up with is anther matter. They were however wholly hot for an election now.

Ben Bradshaw felt he had to defend the party line and developed a sophisticated argument that all the expenses information should come out first and be dealt with before the electorate could be trusted. Equally, the elitist Yasmin Alibah-Brown insisted that to trust the electorate at this time would result in the election of BNP candidates. To which we have to respond, if we are secure in our democracy, so what! During the 25 years I lived in Canada (and I don't think anyone would argue that Canada was a banana republic) a number of small parties came, enjoyed some limited success, and went. Democracy was not impaired.

So it must be with the BNP and if we are sensible we will allow this safety valve to work. The BNP will never gain mass appeal with its present raft of policies, but it does have some appeal to some voters who might have been traditional labour voters but who have become disillusioned. You might have thought that this would be the spur for Labour to get its act together and treat their voter base with some respect, but no, it is far easier to take the lazy option and condemn the opposition and despise voters who might look for an alternative. Apparently elitism survives and the Yasmin Alibah-Brown's view of the world has not oved on from Victorian times. "God has called us all to a certain station in life."