EXCLUSIVE POLL: 45% TO VOTE FOR British National Party

Sunday Mirror April 2006

By Vincent Moss, Acting Political Editor

THE British National Party is set to make sweeping gains in the town hall elections, according to a shock Sunday Mirror poll.

It shows that 45.5 per cent of voters in parts of east London will back the far-right party next month.

That means the BNP, which in the 1980s replaced the National Front as Britain's most extreme party, could snatch a record number of seats.

Our survey reveals the race-hate party is rapidly gaining ground in some deprived inner city areas.

In the first survey of BNP targets for the May 4 elections our poll found 45.5 per cent of voters will back them in Barking and Dagenham. In three key wards of this Labour-run borough the poll puts Labour second on 36.3 per cent and the Tories third with 12.7 per cent. And only 4.5 per cent said they'd back the Lib Dems.

Employment Minister and Barking MP Margaret Hodge was dismissed as alarmist last weekend for warning that eight out of 10 white people in the area could vote for the BNP. But our poll suggests the BNP will make major gains. It is fielding 13 candidates in Barking and Dagenham and could gain six of the 51 council seats - giving the BNP its biggest council foothold. It is also fielding 350 candidates nationally in a bid to treble its 15 seats. We also surveyed three target seats on Bradford Council where seven per cent said they'd vote
for the BNP - almost double their 4.3 per cent share of the 2005 General Election vote. That figure almost doubled to 13 per cent in BNP stronghold Keighley West. Our poll will confirm fears in Downing Street that Nick Griffin's party is picking up votes with its anti-immigration policies. Fiona Masterson, 24, of Barking, warned: "If the BNP get into power we'll have riots on the streets."