Panel beating

It has been revealed that the BBC is to invite a member of the British National Party (BNP) to be a panel member in the upcoming edition of 'Question Time.'

According to various sources Labour politcians may stage a campaign of protest at the decision, based on their belief that having a BNP member on a show such as 'Question Time' may give the BNP's views an appearance of legitmacy and give the right wing nationalist party unnecessary and dangerous publicity.

The BBC must be congratulated for taking it's public service role seriously and taking the step of reflecting all strands of society. I have to say however, that if reports of this proposed protest are true it is both patronising and more than smacks of Labour control freakery.

The fact is that at last June's European election the BNP won 2 seats in England and 6% of the popular vote. Regardless of what the party's views are, such a result means they have a mandate - their views, while not to everyone's taste, have been shown to represent a section of British society and as such are legitimate.

Viewed in this light it seems absurd that some refuse to acknowledge this.

Unpalatable mandates are no strangers to Northern Ireland with the post Hunger-strike electoral success of Sinn Fein posing many difficult questions, both for Northern Irish politicians and media who had to deal with this new legitimate electoral force.

Section 31 in the Republic of Ireland which banned the broadcasting of republican's voices (but not their words) was one measure taken to deal with electoral republicanism. Although the meaure was dropped in 1993, to this day there are still members of some political party's who refuse to sit next to Sinn Fein representatives on certain discussion panel shows.

I am not for one minute suggesting that Sinn Fein policy is comparable to the rhetorical racist nonsense espoused by Nick Griffin and his fellow BNP'ers, but the principle has to be the same.

In a mature democracy where free and fair elections are the backbone of society, the choice of political representative made by the electorate must be respected, regardless of the difficulites this may create.

It was a problem faced in Northern Ireland many years ago, especially at a time when Sinn Fein where openly pursuing their policy of a ballot box in one hand and an armalite in the other. The tactical use of electoralism was irrelevant, it was the fact they had elected representatives that had to respected.

Such respect, however difficult, has to be afforded to the BNP as well even if the desired result in doing so is different.

No-one believes for one second that BNP policy should be allowed to expand more than it has. Their policies on immigration, employment and race are morally repugnant and dangerous to the intellectually vulnerable in our society. At a time of economic crisis, their base nationalism must not be allowed to penetrate the mainstream consciousness of the UK working classes anymore than it has, nor to pursuade a wider audience.

Banning them from prime time television is not the way to do this. We live in a world of 24/7 media and technology. If people want to read about the BNP, they'll find a way to, and not necessarily from responsible and objective sources.

The only way to tackle the BNP's growing popularity is to face them head on in a neutral environment and debate the issues.

If the government has any faith in the people it claims to the serve the interests of, it must trust them to make valued judgements on these issues. To do this, government ministers and opposition members must take the BNP members task in a televisual debate and expose their message for what it is.

Only in allowing the people to see the BNP's message being decisively dissected and beaten as part of the same panel can the growing tide of ring wing sentiment such as that of the BNP be stemmed and defeated.