I've seen quite a few polling day surges of support, and I've never
seen anything like this one. Yet we didn't win. There are only two
possible explanations (perhaps they overlap). One is that a very
significant number of people in places like Stoke want us to win, but
are either too idle to go and vote themselves, have dropped off the
electoral register or are scared to vote for us (in successive mayoral
elections in the city council workers have been told by their left-wing
union reps that they will be sacked if they back the BNP). If so, then
while this in unfortunate, it shows that there is a pent-up head of
support for the BNP still trapped behind the Old Party and media dam,
and it means that the really big shocks to the system are still to
come.

Alternatively, we were robbed. Stoke was one of the places where our
very recently discovered right to fix our own seals on the ballot boxes
was not exercised by our overworked and exhausted local campaign team.
In Yorkshire, literally the only seats we won were the five where we
put seals on at close of polls. Elsewhere, as in Stoke, seats which
previous results, our local work rate and the decline in the Labour
vote virtually guaranteed falling to us saw a rise in the Labour vote
that bucked both national and local trends.

The worst example comes in Ovenden ward in Halifax, where two seats
were up for grabs, and where the local BNP has put in a great deal of
very good work over the last year. The election authorities there
maintained until the very last minute that we would not be allowed to
affix our own seals, with the result that by the time our Legal
Department beat them into submission it was too late to organise the
operation.

Numbers don't add up

At about 2.30 pm that afternoon our local team were told that 223
people had already voted in the polling station at St. George's
Church, and just before 10 pm they were given the revised figure of
350. This polling station was in the most middle class part of the
ward, where there is a particularly high level of support for the BNP
(a pattern reflected in the nearby Bradford metropolitan seat of
Queensbury, where our Paul Cromie took a once safe Tory seat). As such
the turnout would invariably be the highest in the ward.

Yet, when the votes were counted, the ballot box from St. George's
Church was found to contain a mere 218 votes - five fewer than should
have been in it early that afternoon, and 132 fewer than we were told
were in it just before the close of polls.

Assuming that all the 'lost' votes were BNP (and what else are we
to suppose, given the rabid hostility of the pro-Labour, 'ex'-SWP
apparatchiks who infest the bureaucracies of our towns and cities?)
then those missing from this single box for which we have the figures
were enough to cost of one seat, and very nearly enough to have robbed
us of the second one.

How many times has this utter disgrace and fraud against the
democratically expressed wishes of the British people been perpetrated?
All we know is that disgusted (but scared) Labour councillors have told
us that the vote has been rigged, usually by the theft of ballot papers
or by fraudulent postal voting, in places as far apart as Essex, the
West Midlands, Lancashire and Yorkshire.

Add in what we know about BNP ballot papers being found dumped in Post
Office sorting rooms in Oldham, Burnley and Bradford, in local council,
parliamentary and European elections, and it is clear that
'Zimbabwe-style' elections are not confined to the Muslim wards of
Birmingham.

Riding rough-shod

Of course, we've taken these complaints to the Electoral Commission
time and time again, but it's a paper tiger. The old parties
routinely flout its rules on not accepting funds from foreign donors,
ignore its guidelines on handling postal votes, and Labour and their
far-left allies regularly drive coaches and horses through the law on
election expenses, and ride roughshod over the spirit of the law on
'disparagers' attacking one particular party. Every time we
complain, the Commission say they'll look into it, or wring their
hands, or shrug their bureaucratic shoulders.

I discuss the Commission's cowardice and uselessness with our
national treasurer, John Walker. Hitherto we've bent over backwards
to come up to the very highest standard of compliance with their
recommendations for 'best practice'. Not any more! From now on
we'll gladly do everything we need to ensure internal probity in our
financial affairs, but we will do the absolute bare minimum required to
maintain our legal status. The Electoral Commission is a very good
idea, but until their get a backbone its staff have lost their right to
the slightest bit of respect from us.

Still, despite all the sharp practice, the national media smears and
outright fraud, the results that start to pour in as we get towards
midnight on Thursday show that we've won a famous victory. Seat after
seat goes to the BNP, and we become the main story of the night for the
media commentators.