{"id":5451,"date":"2009-04-23T22:07:15","date_gmt":"2009-04-23T21:07:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/contributions\/north-west-anti-fascist-hopes-rest-with-greens\/5451\/"},"modified":"2009-04-23T22:07:15","modified_gmt":"2009-04-23T21:07:15","slug":"north-west-anti-fascist-hopes-rest-with-greens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/contributions\/north-west-anti-fascist-hopes-rest-with-greens\/","title":{"rendered":"North West anti-fascist hopes rest with Greens"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"EC_attribute-short\">\n<p>TURNOUT is a key element of the Euro election battle against the BNP in the North West and Hope Not Hate should be applauded for its campaign to maximise anti-racist votes <a href=\"http:\/\/www.morningstaronline.co.uk\/index.php\/britain\/bnp_result_a_wake_up_call_for_big_three_parties\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"color: #0068cf;\">(M Star April 10)<\/span><\/a>.<\/div>\n<div class=\"EC_attribute-long\">\n<p>If the BNP polls more than 10 per cent because of low turnout, it will become a certainty that Nick Griffin will represent the North West in the European Parliament.<\/p>\n<p>No-one can dispute the fact that, if the BNP finishes as the fifth largest party in the North West, it makes the prospect of Griffin&#8217;s election far less likely.<\/p>\n<p>That makes the race for fourth place in the North West one of the most crucial battles of this campaign.<\/p>\n<p>For that reason the Green Party has welcomed the decision by Respect in this region to advocate a tactical anti-racist vote for the Greens to help keep Griffin out of Europe. The combined Green\/Respect support of 6.8 per cent in 2004 was greater than the vote share achieved by the BNP.<\/p>\n<p>It is disturbing that the BNP was able to gain 23 per cent in a North Manchester council by-election, even in an area with a target demographic for them, but this was only achieved with an intensive campaign effort.<\/p>\n<p>For some perspective, it is worth remembering that, in the 2008 local elections, intensive campaigning saw the Greens gain 43 per cent in a Liverpool ward, 40 per cent in a Manchester ward and 30 per cent in a white working-class area of Widnes.<\/p>\n<p>If the BNP gets the 7.5-9 per cent that many people are predicting, then relying only on the red, yellow and blue parties to come up with a combination of votes that will keep out the BNP is like throwing three dice and hoping for a double six.<\/p>\n<p>Voting Green to keep the BNP in fifth place is going to be one of the best ways to keep the BNP out and the nature of the D&#8217;Hondt system means that a tactical vote for the Greens is going to be three times more valuable than a tactical vote for Labour.<\/p>\n<p>PETER CRANIE<br \/>\nLead European Candidate<br \/>\nGreen Party, North West Region<\/p>\n<p>Copyright Morning Star, all rights reserved<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>TURNOUT is a key element of the Euro election battle against the BNP in the North West and Hope Not Hate should be applauded for its campaign to maximise anti-racist votes (M Star April 10). If the BNP polls more than 10 per cent because of low turnout, it will become a certainty that Nick [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,1615],"tags":[55],"class_list":{"0":"post-5451","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-contributions","7":"category-uk-news","8":"tag-uk-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5451","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5451"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5451\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}