Tory Chairman Eric Pickles: BNP to become 'serious force' in British politics
Love Europe, Hate the EU
mainstream parties should tackle them head-on, Tory chairman Eric
Pickles said today.
He said Labour, Tory and Liberal Democrat politicians should "work
harder than we have ever worked before" in areas where the party he
labelled "fascist" and "Nazi" had gained ground.
Mr Pickles said it might concentrate MPs' minds when they bumped into
BNP leader and newly-elected MEP Nick Griffin in the corridors of the
House of Commons - to which his European parliament status gives him
unfettered access.
The Conservative chairman also accused Labour MPs of being ashamed of
some of the areas they represented, living in a "posh house" while not
engaging with residents of inner city estates in their constituencies.
Mr Pickles, speaking at a Westminster Press Gallery lunch, said of the
BNP: "They are going to be a very serious force in British politics
and the mainstream political parties have got to get their act
together and start confronting them.
"We have got to start working in those areas where they have got
contact, harder than we have ever worked before.
"That's the way you are going to defeat the BNP - you have got to take
the BNP on.
"They have filled that vacuum which Labour retreated from so long
ago."
The Tory chairman said there was "an enormous disconnect between
politicians and the electorate" and he had grown up on estates where
that disconnect typically occurred.
"It is on those Labour estates where this kind of disconnect occurs,"
he said, adding that Labour MPs sometimes "didn't feel part of it" but
lived instead in a "posh house" on the other side of town.
"If you feel ashamed of these communities, you shouldn't represent
them," he said.
Mr Pickles, a former Bradford councillor, said he was "not in favour
of holding hands together and marching against the BNP".
He said they were "lousy councillors and lousy attenders" and had to
be tackled on that basis.
"To remove them is not going to be about rhetoric, it's about re-
engaging with people to let them know that politics actually matters,"
he went on.
On Mr Griffin, who will receive a pass to the Commons like all MEPs,
Mr Pickles said: "The guy is now elected and we have to come to terms
with that.
"If the idea of Nick Griffin walking along the corridor or drinking in
the (MPs' bar) Pugin Room - if that's what it takes to wake up
politicians to (voters) having elected a Nazi and a fascist, then it's
no good pretending he's not here."
The BNP were right they don't even pretend to be separate parties. ALL
multiculturalists. ALL want Britain in the EU. ALL want to bail out
the Bankers. ALL are pro mass immigration. ALL are in it just to get
elected.
Only the BNP is in it for Britain.