Don, what they've done is far more insidious than the overt racism of the 80s. They have re-invented themselves as the acceptable face of racism, and have presented themselves as the solution to the kind of paranoia and delusional "news stories" about asylum seekers and immigration whipped up by reactionary newspapers like the Daily Mail. They have tried to rescue the notion of English nationalism from its sullied image of the 80s (an image that they themselves were largely responsiblefor, of course), and tried to present their form of patriotism as something representing the values of all nice, middle-class people.

In this spirit they have tried to align themselves with the "folkways" of Britain. They will complain that, while you can get funding for multicultural arts projects, there is no respect for English traditional arts (this is not true, but it's a myth that's been perpetuated for a long time). They talk about freeing classrooms from a "PC agenda" and making sure children are taught about their own culture.

I can already hear Richard Bridge saying "What's wrong with that?"

The problem is, there are different ways to approach nationalism and traditions. One, the BNP way, would have you believe that English culture and traditions should be the only ones taught in schools and celebrated in our festivals and carnivals. They believe in the dominance and supremacy of the indigenous culture. The other approach, which i think many of us who work in this area would advocate, is to try and promote and celebrate English traditions as part of the whole mix of cultures and heritages which exist on this island. I am passionate about indigenous traditions, and I think it's very important that they form part of the national identity - but I do not believe in their dominance or superiority.

When I talk about the BNP hijacking folk to support their agenda, this is the kind of thing I mean. Using it to engineer some construct of Englishness which not only separates some people on this island from others, it also says "Because this belongs to us, it makes us better than you."