THE BNP THREAT

Is the threat of Nick Griffin getting elected to promote his racist agenda really as great as people say? I know it wouldn't take much but I'm not entirely convinced. Seems to me that the press is talking up their chances beyond the reality. There's always someone on the TV ready to say that they are voting BNP, but mostly they don't look as though they have ever been into a polling station or would know what to do if they got there.

Gordon Birtwistle took advantage of my latest visit to Burnely to add to my scepticism with one of his tales:

"I saw this old guy in Burnley on the TV, and he said he was voting BNP. "No you're not," I thought, "you're voting Lib Dem, and I know because I've got your proxy vote!"

DON'T BURY OUR VOTERS!

To Burnley, for a meeting with the Lib Dem council leader, Gordon Birtwistle, who has a chance of becoming the town's first Lib Dem MP. I'm a born Lancastrian, but Gordon is born and bred. He's blunt, dry as a bone, and he creases me.

We stand outside the General Hospital, and he tells me of the campaign he is running to get an A&E facility restored. "What's the service like at Blackburn?" I ask. "Shocking," he replies. "A man ended up there in a body bag the other week. He wasn't even dead. And he puts up a poster for us at election time!"

Apparently the BNP have reported him to the Standards Board. "It's the fourth time," he explains. "I said their councillors were lazy and never contributed anything at meetings. Bunch of idiots."

I want this man on a party political broadcast.