Why has the BNP grown?

How is it that a party with such unacceptable doctrines as the BNP could achieve almost one million votes in the election last June?

There may be a little of British sympathy for the lame dog, but the main reason, I suspect, is two fold:

1) Since most of the people who supported them were working class people, and many previously supporters of the Labour Party, it is probably due to the experience in the areas they come from. If unemployment is high and there are vast numbers of identifiable immigrants, anyone could be easily persuaded that there is a connection between the two. "They" are taking over our country and our jobs. Instinctively and irrationally it is easy to blame the foreigner. This was why Enoch Powell after his famous speech became lionised in some working class sections.

I think that the BNP are reaping success arising from anger at living conditions and lack of money.

2) Without Proportional Representation, at a national level small parties would struggle to win any seats, - they are too few in any one constituency. This applies to respectable parties like the Greens as well. It is for this reason that many countries which employ PR also stipulate a minimum percentage threshold, often 5% of total votes. This not only keeps out the undesirable and evil, but also avoids unstable coalitions which result from too many smaller parties in an assembly.

It could be done even with our "first past the post", as one or two brave independents have shown, but our present system would generally keep out parties like the BNP. To adopt PR everywhere, especially with a "top up list" nationally to maintain strict proportions, would greatly increase the prospect of BNP and the like obtaining seats at Westminster.