The battle for fourth place in the Oldham by-election
BNP Leader Nick Griffin and BNP candidate Derek Adams
The Leader of the British National Party, Nick Griffin, was in Oldham East and Saddleworth for his first day of campaigning on Tuesday.
There was plenty of speculation that Mr Griffin himself would be the candidate.
But he is not on the ballot paper.
"I was probably going to be the candidate," Mr Griffin told me.
"But over the Christmas and New Year period when I needed to get the election addresses done and photographs, I was snowed-in in Wales.
"I couldn't get here.
"Derek Adams was available. He's a big local character. So I'm very happy to be supporting him."
Derek Adams is probably best known for running the Ace of Diamonds - the BNP's favourite pub in Manchester, before the city council subjected it to a compulsory purchase order.
The BNP got almost 6% of the vote at the general election.
The UK Independence Party was narrowly behind them with 4% of the vote.
Drive through the constituency and it's difficult to miss the billboards advertising UKIP's candidate, the North West Euro MP Paul Nuttall.
Nigel Farage, UKIP's Leader, started a two-day campaign visit on Tuesday to support his colleague.
And the BNP is very much in his sights.
"I was absolutely determined we chose a strong candidate and fought a big campaign," Mr Farage told me in a local pub.
"I want us to thrash the BNP here.
"There's no room for that kind of extremism in British politics."
This apparent battle for fourth place might have more significance than is immediately obvious.
In previous elections the Liberal Democrats have won a large number of protest votes.
Where will those voters turn now that the party's in government?
UKIP believes that many voters who supported them in the European elections, turned to the Lib Dems at the general election. Despite the fact that the parties have such divergent views on Europe.
How many of those disenchanted Lib Dem voters exist is one of the critical unknowns in this by-election.
How many will turn to Labour?
How many will turn to minor parties like UKIP or the BNP?
And how many might turn to their coalition partners, the Conservatives? Not as a protest vote but because they believe the Tories can now win.
The answers to these questions will help decide who wins here.
~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~42~RS~)
If you're interested in political issues in the North West, this could be the blog for you. I'm Arif Ansari the BBC's political editor in the region, covering controversy from Cheshire to South Cumbria.
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If the Lib Dem candidate does not win they can always hold another kangaroo court to eliminate the winner. This could be the future of British politics - if so, it will distort the readings from the BBC's elaborate proceedures on election nights. Maybe have a swingometer with a picture of the courts and a judge in the middle.
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What a biased blog! where is the BBC's impartiality? From what I hear from people that have been to the Constituency the Lib Dems are doing well and it is still very close. so sorry BBC can we please have more objectivity and less partiality
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With the lies that the Lib Dems and the Tories foisted on the electorate, one has to wonder how any thinking person could possibly be so gullible as to vote for either of those parties. In my view, the Lib Dems sold out their principals for a role on Government, and the Tories reverted to type the moment they got in.
It is high time we ditched party politics in favour of truly independent candidates who are not controlled by the whips office the moment they enter the Houses of Parliament.
We need to put the EU back in its box, hold the banks accountable to pay back the money we gave them, and above all, control immigration. (No, this does not make me racist) Australia seems to manage this, but here in England, some bleeding heart brigade rides forth to tell us we can't say who can and cannot enter our country. If we withdrew from the EU, we would pay the deficit off in less than a year, and it would have no effect on jobs because Europe only allows us to have the jobs they don't want. Time to act.
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I agree, in part at least, with Dr Llareggub. It is a very slippery slope when Courts, or anyone other than the electorate decide who has won a seat. If a constituency feels the MP has acted wrongly, there is already a means by which they can pass a vote of no confidence. We are also seeing "alternative" voting whereby your vote and mine can be reallocated to another candidate. If I vote for Candidate "A", I do not want to find my vote allocated to Candidate "B" under any circumstances as all this will do is eliminate any chance for minority parties or independents. The main three parties are trying to ensure that no one ever gets a look in. Our political system is an utter disgrace. We have our current MPs complaining about the revised expenses system. They say that it is "too complex", yet they are still not required to produce receipts or justify the claim, unlike the rest of the population who can be put to such proof with remarkable ease by the Inland Revenue.
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Finally, our government should exist to look after the interest of the country, yet I seem to see them do nothing more than appease the USA, and bend over backwards to accommodate every stupid "ruling" that comes to us from Brussells. Example; The wings for the Airbus are made in Wales. They can only be moved by barge, and unfortunately only at high tide. Why? Because the EU says that we can not dredge the harbour. THe French and other EU countries chose only to apply this to non-navigable waterways, yet we applied it to ALL waterways. So our ability to build and move these aircraft parts is limited by the life cycle of an invertebrate. The Greeks didnt even inspect their beaches. They merely said "They are all clean" That is why you can still swim in excrement around the Greek coast and we spend billions cleaning up already clean beaches.
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The Greens, English Democrats and Pirates are all standing to, wouldn't they be interested in getting fourth place as well?
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Yeah..sound about right. Must not let the fact the candidate told deliberate lies about an opponent to the point of allegedly accusing of them being backed by terrorists. That's all right isn't it? Good grief. We have a Labour party pretending the current cuts have nothing to do with them and defending a record that saw the gap between richest and poorest grow massively in their 13 years in power. They condemn any cuts that have to be made saying we would have cut something but not that. It is quite obvious that the Lib Dems and Tories are not going to be able to back every election pledge they made because ..wakey wakey.. neither of them won the election. They have both set out where they have drawn their lines and as far as I can see are both trying get this country back on its financial feet.
The Governor of the BOE had it right when he said before the election.. "Whoever forms the next government will be deeply unpopular and out of government for a generation because of what they will have to do."
I think the Lib Dems may well lose this and few up and coming elections and who knows maybe this coalition will destroy them as a political force for a generation. But I have no doubt they are doing exactly what they have to do for the good of the country and whilst in government trying to replace our civil liberties, protect the most vulnerable and narrow that rich poor gap that Labour shamelessly ignored. If they are destroyed for trying to do that then so be it.
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