Aunty Beeb and The BNP

This was the first essay I did for my 3rd Year Feature Writing class. I wrote it after the fallout over Nick Griffin's appearance on Question Time. Just to give you a flavour of my writing style as it is now-


Auntie Beeb and the BNP

History was made this past Thursday with the BNP’s appearance on Question Time, amid a sea of controversy that was broadcast into over eight million homes. With this milestone event still resonating in the press, has the BNP created a shift in political opinion? And what affect has this had on the average person at large? Matt Robinson explores…

It began many weeks before the 22nd October edition of Question Time had even reached the airways, in the June 2009 European Elections. Before the BBC had even raised its head into the maelstrom, a change was happening nationwide, and these elections would set the stage for what was to come in more ways than perhaps any election of recent times. For someone who personally has a great interest in all things political, it was an exciting time for me for numerous reasons. The scene had been set in the run up to the elections, with the tide turning against the mainstream political parties that was unprecedented in its ferocity. The Expenses Scandal had rocked the political foundations at the worst possible time, as the average voter got ready to once more tick their ballots.

With the headlines emblazoned with the shame of MP’s expenses for all eyes to see, and with the Credit Crunch still chugging on in the background, it wasn’t difficult to imagine that something was brewing. As the voters turned away in great numbers from the major elites of Labour, Conservative and Lib Dem, others were waiting in the shadows to take the advantage.

It was amidst this background of controversy and anger that I found myself glued to the television news, joining I’m sure millions of others, as a political thunderstorm not seen in my lifetime unfolded before my eyes. Politics has always been a passion of mine for a good number of years now, and what I saw on a daily basis either on the TV screen or in headline newspapers was gripping entertainment. In recent times it had seemed that politics in the UK had become a dead-end topic, elections hardly making me raise an eyebrow of interest and voter apathy seeping into my very consciousness. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a political zealot foaming at the mouth and wishing to chain myself to Number 10 in the name of change. But for those of my generation and age, it seemed politics no longer mattered. It was old hat, boring, something only old people who had been around to remember when politics had once been exciting cared about. And then…Whoof! Suddenly, politics was exciting! And I was living in the moment!

Within the fallout of the European Election, a major shift had happened. UKIP, the party I had once only distinguished with once upon a time having something to do with Kilroy, were the second largest gaining party. And an even bigger shock…the BNP was now in Europe. The BNP? The ‘Nasty Party’? The party you only heard about in hushed whispers and disgruntled tones? Surely not, but yes indeed.

For me growing up, the BNP was something you only heard about in the highbrow political programmes you would now find on BBC4 hosted by Jeremy Paxman, a prospect that a young kid like me more interested in cartoons and James Bond would have no urge to sit down and watch. But suddenly there it was, the so called ‘Nazi’ party was now in Europe representing British interests, and for those who had become used to the all Labour circus show, times were a-changing. How much so was yet to be seen…

In the weeks leading up to 22nd October, the battle lines were being drawn for what was going to be a showdown the likes of which the BBC and the general audience had not seen prior. The previous weeks Question Time set it up, the panellists debating on what was to come and whether or not it was a good idea. I watched Shadow Immigration Minster Damien Green’s stoic defiance of the threat of the BNP, Nigel Farage’s almost defence of Nick Griffin’s imminent appearance, and Alan Johnson’s faith that Labour’s heavyweight Jack Straw would take it to the ‘Nasty Party’ and show their true colours to the public at large.

End Game was approaching as all sides set up their heavy hitters in readiness, a prospect that would have been unthinkable not five years prior. It was clear to me, and I’m sure to many others, that this was history in the making. The fact that each side seemed to be almost forced to put up their biggest punches against Nick Griffin highlighted the change in the wind. No ordinary MP was up to the challenge of talking down the BNP. It needed the likes of Chris Huhne and Jack Straw, a political slugfest of the highest degree. And we weren’t disappointed as 10:35 rolled on, set up by the hourly long protest outside the very gates of Television Centre, and I found myself watching my very first anticipated Question Time.

I’m going to come right out and say it, Question Time is boring. It’s a boring show with boring people slotted at a boring time of the night that ran concurrently with the BBC3 reruns of ‘Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps’, a more attractive prospect in my eyes. The only time I had ever sat down to watch QT had been on the few occasions when Boris Johnson had been a panellist, and only then it had been in the hope of seeing similar highlights of the kind that had brought a smile to my face when Boris had been on ‘Have I Got News For You’.

This, I’m positive, was the same feeling of many of my generation who would have never before sat through an entire airing of the David Dimbleby ‘happy hour’. But in the wake of 22nd October 2009, that is no longer the case. In the days following the broadcast I have been in dozens of conversations with my fellow peers, many of them who had probably never heard of David Dimbleby prior, and it has always at some point led to the same two questions- did you watch Question Time that night? And what did you think of it?

My best friend Ryan is one such example of this new phenomenon in my life. A guy who has never taken a single shred of interest in politics in all the years I’ve known him, and only raised a slight note of approval when I mentioned the existence of a little thing called ‘The Monster Raving Looney Party’. And yet in recent times that suddenly stopped being the case. We found ourselves discussing numerous topics that had once been ‘taboo’, the news that a list of BNP members had been leaked onto the web and why he was against this, the sometimes ludicrous findings of the expenses some MP’s had pocketed etc. Before my eyes was a change in someone who I’d known for over ten years, and if it could happen to him I could only imagine how it had affected millions of others, young and old, devoted voter and apathetic vote dodger alike.

And Ryan was not alone in this. The last two days alone I’ve had numerous conversations with people about the topic, in places not limited to a metal bar in Ashton and on the floor of another pals house. And not all of them were entirely against what Nick Griffin had said. How times have changed it seems.

Whilst I’m not expecting at any point in the near future a sudden surge in support for the BNP that Nick Griffin was undoubtedly dreaming of, a fact made all too clear by the mass protest gathered outside Television Centre that began early in the day and lasted long after Griffin’s convoy had sped away, I do think their appearance on Question Time has changed our opinions on numerous things. No longer can it be the case that the other mainstream parties can ignore the BNP, and no longer can the BBC be regarded as everyone’s beloved ‘Auntie’ in the wake of the vitriol caused by its decision to invite Nick Griffin onto the panel in the first place. I’ve seen for myself in my own circle of friends how things have changed, and I can only imagine the same is true for millions more around the country. People are now talking about subjects that were once ‘taboo’ for them, and the present generation now has its own political story to talk about in the years ahead.

Whatever your opinions, whatever your feelings regarding the topic and the party itself, the BNP now matters much more in UK politics, and Question Time is suddenly a far more attractive prospect to watch when Thursdays roll along…in my opinion at least.