How do you solve a problem like Nick Griffin?

(With apologies to the Sound of Music)

We've had a big debate regarding whether or not it was justifiable to allow Nick Griffin, the leader of the BNP, to participate last week on Question Time' on BBC1. At the time I was in Normandy and I saw no reference to it in the French newspapers. They had their own debate of the moment - the proposition that the 22 year old son of President (Emperor') Sarkozy should become the chairman of a public organization which deals with the redevelopment of the main commercial area of Paris, La Defense' - a very prestigious area. He has no relevant qualification for the appointment - in fact he is a university student and just retaking the second year of his law degree. Finally, last week, after all the clamour against such obvious nepotism, the son decided not to put himself forward for the position. The presence of a fascist or a Trotskyist on French TV, however, isn't considered to be anything special. Whether from the extremes of the left or the right, it is normal to hear a wide range of opinion. But not so in England.

Even though we can hear and read everything on the internet and in the papers, it seems that we ought not to hear such opinions on publicly funded television. Not because it is likely that Nick Griffin will say something that is against the race relations legislation, but because he has an opinion which is not acceptable to many people. And because the fact that he would be sen on the tele could mean that some people would be convinced by his argument of England for the whites. It seems that we are children who have to be protected from a malign influence rather than adults who live in a democracy - adults with a right to listen to everyone's opinions, even if they are not politically correct or are plain irrational.

I saw the broadcast and, obviously, the members of the audience (who had written their own questions) did not share his opinions.  It was also obvious that, when he was not surrounded by sympathisers, Nick Griffin was lost.  He was not capable of presenting arguments to persuade normal people of his (irrational) opinions.  His policy of presenting himself as the non-racist face of fascism failed.  To do so and at the same time to defend the leader of the Klu Klux Klan as someone who is not very violent at all, was not a brilliant idea.  In reply to the accusation that he had denied the holocaust, neither was it very clever to say in his defense that he had never been convicted of it - particularly when it is not even a crime in this country.  But he is not a very intelligent man.  I do not think that we shall have a prime minister called Nick Griffin in the foreseeable future.

But Peter Hain and the other extremist protestors are also in an irrational position. What the antifascists think is, as far as they are concerned, true and so it is not possible that the fascists have a point of view which is in any sense justifiable - thus, they do not have the right to express themselves. The anti-fascists have for many years tried to silence the BNP and its friends rather than argue with them. From time to time we see this attitude to aspects of social behavior arrive and then depart rather like the tide. The difficulty of talking openly about immigration started in the 50's and has continued until almost now. It was connected to the fact that a large proportion of the immigrants were people of colour' and we managed to mix racism (an important ethical question) with the practical problem: how and to what extent can we house and integrate into our society all the people who want to come here? The refusal to see these two things as different has put us in a position where it is almost only the fascists who have been willing to talk about it. The liberals, mainly of the middle classes, have demonstrated, but only to show their disapproval of the fascists and not to propose solutions to the practical problems suffered, for the most part, by the working classes.