The more publicity Nick Griffin gets the better

How is the BNP leader handling his extra public exposure in the run up to his appearance on Question Time?

Yesterday he:

• likened Britain's leading generals to Nazi war criminals;
• went on Newsnight to attack the British Legion;
• issued a press release that was clearly libellous.

A couple of weeks of that and he have succeeded in destroying himself in public.

The serious point is that the "No Platform" tactics of the left have clearly failed. The people voting BNP are not disgruntled Tories who wish their party were more racist, they are disaffected former Labour voters who have been hit by globalisation and hear the mainstream parties saying nothing that will help them.

Left-wing intellectuals tend to distrust the working class, believing they are quite racist as enough as it is and fearing that they will be attracted to the BNP if they are allowed to hear from them.

This is nonsense. The way to take on the BNP is to defeat them in debate and at the ballot box. Denying them a hearing only feeds the belief that they are telling the truth and the public is being kept from hearing it by a cosy political establishment.