Alleged Fraud and Intimidation in Bradford West

A source close to one of the candidates in the Bradford West by-election has revealed that as newsworthy as yesterday’s victory for George Galloway proved to be, there is much more of interest that will shortly be forthcoming. Not only was the result itself unusual, but so was some of the behaviour that attended the campaign. For example, I have been informed that

“Labour supporters had to have a police escort out of Odsal Sports Centre last night after threats from Respect supporters.”

How strange. Why would Respect supporters threaten their Labour equivalents, and what was the nature of these threats? Were they simply a display of an overly vigorous partisan verbal aggression, or something more substantial and sinister?

Unsurprisingly, given the demographic makeup of Bradford West, there have also been serious allegations of postal vote rigging, with the claim being made that residents at some addresses had voted over 100 times. Apparently, The Daily Telegraph is conducting an investigation into these allegations so we should hear more about this in the days or weeks to come. If these allegations prove to be true, this will not be the first time that widespread abuse of the postal voting system has taken place in Bradford West, for such misconduct occurred in the constituency during the 2010 General Election.

Whilst the journalists at the BBC purport to be puzzled by the result of this election, any objective observer can see that the Islamic factor was key to determining its outcome. As such, it highlights the reality that Respect is an emergent Islamist party, irrespective of the fact that Galloway himself is not a Muslim. Galloway has thus far proven to be adept at saddling and riding the Islamist tiger, and has been willing to employ inflammatory oratory to stir up Muslim emotions as illustrated in this video of one of his speeches made in Tower Hamlets. Now that he has successfully demonstrated the appeal of Islamic demagogy, how many others might follow in his footsteps? Labour have sown the seed of identity politics, and now they are reaping the Islamist whirlwind. Galloway certainly hopes to capitalise upon his success by fielding Respect candidates in each of Bradford's wards during the May 2012 elections, but will they win seats?

As you can see from the video of his victory speech below, Galloway was rather pleased with himself. For full election results and commentary, click here.

BBC Polling 'Scandal'

Why does the BBC think that it's such a scandal that hundreds of people in various locations couldn't cast their vote because they turned up to polling stations too late? If these idle slugabeds cannot be arsed to get to the polling station in good time, that's their lookout. Surely the mature voters interviewed by Kirsty Wark in Sheffield had been through enough elections to know what the rules are? Pathetic. Anyone could be mistaken for thinking that they'd turned up late on purpose to cause a fuss and thereby disrupt the course of the election.

The real scandal in this General Election that the BBC have not bothered to get that upset about is that of widespread postal voting fraud which is particularly characteristic of certain so-called 'communities' (i.e. Muslim colonies of Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, etc). Now, why might this be?

Kerry McCarthy: a Tweet too Far

Labour parliamentary candidate for Bristol East - Kerry McCarthy - is quite rightly under police investigation following her tweeting to supporters about the preliminary results revealed in counting 300 postal votes. This episode demonstrates once again that the postal voting system is wide open to abuse. By leaking this information today, McCarthy can be seen as trying to influence the outcome of the election in the constituency that she is contesting. She should be disqualified from her candidature having revealed that she is willing to abuse the democratic process.

As with Brown's comment yesterday, McCarthy's abuse of the voting system shows that many Labour politicians hold the general public in contempt. Metro reports that

Ms McCarthy, who is defending Bristol East and is the party’s media czar, said she was ‘kicking herself’ after sending the outcome of 300 votes to her 5,700 followers on the site.

It is illegal to reveal votes cast before the end of polling day because this may influence the outcome of the election.

The post has since been removed from Twitter.

An Electoral Commission spokeswoman said candidates who see the front of a ballot paper ‘must maintain the secrecy of voting’.

Releasing the information early can lead to a fine of up to £5,000 or six months in prison in England and Wales. In Scotland, the offence carries a maximum jail term of 12 months.

Ms McCarthy, who won the Bristol East seat at the 2005 general election, said she had been to a ‘training exercise’ in which staff verified personal identifiers on the postal votes.

On publishing the results, she added: ‘I was pretty silly. It was thoughtless. I was being overexuberant.’

In her blog, she later described herself as ‘another penitent sinner’ – the phrase by Gordon Brown on Wednesday after he apologised to a grandmother for calling her ‘bigoted’.

A 'penitent sinner'? What rot. What we have here is an embarrassed unprincipled candidate who is now rattled by the fact that she has been found out. If you are a voter in Bristol East, show your displeasure at McCarthy's attempt to undermine democracy by voting for Brian Jenkins, your local BNP candidate. Whatever you do, don't vote for McCarthy!