The release onto the internet on Monday 17 November of a detailed list of British

National Party (BNP) members by a disgruntled former worker has given a

unique opportunity to examine the distribution of individuals living in Britain

today who associate with the politics and ideologies of the far right. This article

illustrates the geography of BNP support and identifies the types of areas where

support is concentrated

Dennett, A

UCL Discovery

29The Yorkshire and Humber Regional ReviewWinter 2008The BNPmembershiplist causedquite a stir in thepress, not leastbecause a number ofteachers and policeofficers appearedamong the 12,600individuals registered.Whilst this informationis of interest to some,the inclusion ofresidential postcodes presented anopportunity to gain insight into adistribution which previously had onlybeen informed, less accurately, bypolitical election results. To begin with a cautionary note, it isnecessary to recognise that, unlike manysources of secondary data used forresearch purposes, the integrity andaccuracy of the data BNP list cannot becompletely verified. However, seniormembers within the BNP hierarchy havepublicly given some credibility to thecontents, so we can continue with theanalysis with guarded confidence.BNP in BritainFirstly, the national rate of membership isvery low and the gender balance isheavily skewed. As Table 1 shows, acrossthe whole of the UK, only 2.2 people per10,000 appear on the BNP list comparedto around 10 per 10,000 for the LiberalDemocrats, 30 for Labour and 50 for theConservativesBNP membership inBritain and Yorkshire andHumber The release onto the internet on Monday 17 November of a detailed list of BritishNational Party (BNP) members by a disgruntled former worker has given aunique opportunity to examine the distribution of individuals living in Britaintoday who associate with the politics and ideologies of the far right. This articleillustrates the geography of BNP support and identifies the types of areas wheresupport is concentrated.Adam DennettUniversity of LeedsTable 1. BNP members across BritainRegion Population BNPmembersMembershiprate per10,000 peopleMembershipshare (%)East Midlands 4,172,174 1,498 3.59 11.90Yorkshire and Humber 4,964,833 1,686 3.40 13.39North West 6,729,764 1,725 2.56 13.70West Midlands 5,267,308 1,327 2.52 10.54East of England 5,388,140 1,353 2.51 10.74North East 2,515,442 574 2.28 4.56South West 4,928,434 986 2.00 7.83Wales 2,903,085 535 1.84 4.25South East 8,000,645 1,439 1.80 11.43London 7,172,091 1,007 1.40 8.00Scotland 5,062,011 463 0.91 3.68Britain 57,103,927 12,593 2.21 100.0030 The Yorkshire and Humber Regional Review Winter 2008(www.electoralcommission.org.uk). Theoccurrence of ‘Mr’s (and first names ofthe 41 ‘Dr’ titles) reveals that 81.7 percent are male. Table 1 gives an overviewof the spatial distribution of thesemembers by region.The distribution of membership rates isrelatively even across wards in Englandand Wales (Figure 1) although rates aremuch lower in Scotland – perhapsreflecting the particularly Scottish (andnot British) flavour of nationalism north ofthe border as much as a rejection of farright ideology. Whilst there is broadly an evendistribution of members, it is apparent thatthe rates of membership are higher in theMidlands around Leicester and the northin parts of Yorkshire and Lancashire. The‘hotspot’ in Wales reflects a low populationin that area rather than a very high count ofBNP members. Looking at the top 20 wards for bothrates and counts in Figure 2 also drawsattention to the Midlands, but moreclearly to areas in Yorkshire and Humberwhere counts are high.BNP in Yorkshire and HumberAt a regional level, Yorkshire and Humberexhibits the second highest count ofmembers, rate of membership and theshare of total members. At the districtlevel (Table 2), whilst two districts in theregion feature in the top 15 for highestrates of membership, when we lookacross the whole region, seven of the 21districts have rates less than one personper 10,000 above the national average,and four districts are on or below thenational average.The concentrations within districts inYorkshire and Humber are shown inFigure 3. The highest counts of BNPmembers are found in Morley South wardin Leeds (46) and Dearne South ward inBarnsley (34). Whilst the rate ofmembership is only around 1.5 per 10,000in Morley, it remains higher at around 3people per 10,000 in Dearne South. A distinct cluster can be seen in thesouth east of Leeds, bordering the northwest of Kirklees, east of Calderdale andsouth of Bradford.Geodemographic inferenceWhilst we have an idea both nationally andwithin the region about where those whoaffiliate themselves with the BNP live, weknow much less about the types of areathat these people inhabit, and byassociation, the types of people they are. We might expect, given the attention thatthe BNP give to immigration, stating ontheir website that the main stream politicalparties “support a level of immigration thatis turning our country into a foreign place”that members of the BNP might live inareas where proportions of immigrantsand ethnic minorities are higher. The BNPalso claim on their website that they do notappeal just to ‘knuckle-draggers’, but havesupport across all sections of society. Isthis borne out in the data? If we know something about thecharacteristics of the area, we can infersomething about the person.‘Geodemographic’ inference has provedhugely successful for commercialorganisations targeting products, but it isused here to assess typical BNP members.The geodemographic classification used isthe national classification of output areasdeveloped for ONS by Dan Vickers(Vickers et al. 2005). Are there types of area in Britain whereaffiliation with the BNP is more or lesslikely? And what does this mean forYorkshire and Humber? Figure 4 shows membership ratesacross all types of area in the classification,nationally and regionally. Where rates areabove 2 people per 10,000 they arehighlighted in red, below 1.5 in green. At these extremes the areas with moreBNP members exhibit generally older(above average numbers over 65)populations, more indicators ofdeprivation (such as lack of centralheating) and below averageconcentrations of ethnic minoritypopulations and immigrants. The BNPdoes not appear to have as muchappeal to people living in areas ofrelative affluence and with moreeducated populations. Table 2. Districts with highest BNPmembership rateslllllnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn nnnnnnnnnnnn2000 100kilometresi inB m ghr amr da oBr df rdinE burghdL non oic t ri teLei sternnTop 20 wards by rate of BNP affiliationTop 20 wards by number of BNP affiliatesFigure 2. Top 20 wards for BNP membersllllldB a or df rd ghE inburidL ononi i gnB hirmi amic teLei sterBritish National Party Affiliation(BNP members per 10,000 people)50+0Figure 1. BNP affiliation by wardRank Top 15 districts -ratesRate per10,000people1 Pendle 8.742 Burnley 8.043 Melton 7.944 Charnwood 7.695 Barnsley 6.656 North WestLeicestershire 6.557 Sedgefield 6.428 Blackpool 5.909 Ashfield 5.8410 Lincoln 5.7211 Hinckley andBosworth 5.6912 Amber Valley 5.6713 Blaby 5.6514 Calderdale 5.5115 Broxtowe 5.4831The Yorkshire and Humber Regional ReviewWinter 2008kilometres0 20 40BNP Members46234.6kilometres0 20 40BNP membership rateper 10,000 people1 to 3 (25)0.5 to 1 (86)0.25 to 0.5 (146)0.05 to 0.25 (128)0 to 0.05 (111)Figure 3. BNP membership count and rates of BNP membership across Yorkshire and Humber32 The Yorkshire and Humber Regional Review Winter 2008In Yorkshire and Humber, the pattern isbroadly similar to the national one, butnoticeably the peak has almost three times(8 per 10,000) more BNP members per10,000 people than the national peak. This peak is seen in SeniorCommunities (2) areas where there farabove the national average number ofpeople aged 65+, single pensionerhouseholds and people living in publiclyrented accommodation and below averageethnic minority and immigrant groups. It isinteresting that three of the other six areashighlighted in red are also characterisedby above average older populations andindicators of relative deprivation. ConclusionWe have seen that BNP members arealmost always male and that thenational distribution is relatively evenacross England and Wales, but withhigher concentrations in certain parts ofthe country. We can also see that whilst support forthe BNP is growing (votes for the partyhave increased at each of the last fourgeneral elections), the evidence points tovoters being more likely to be old; thoseliving in relatively deprived areas; and theold living in deprived areas.The main body of support does notappear to be from those living in areasvery close to immigrant and ethnic minoritypopulations, or indeed those who are moreeducated, suggesting that people may beaffiliating with the BNP not as a result oflived experience – for example the type ofnegative experience supposedly causedby increased immigration that BNP officialslike to portray – but rather as a result of aperception. It is difficult to offer a solution to thepropagation of far right ideology, bothnationally and in the region but analysissuch as this may certainly help thetargeting of efforts to alter the perceptionsof individuals, especially in those areasand types of area identified here.AcknowledgementThis article could not have been writtenwithout the help of Kirk Harland whogeocoded the original data andproduced the maps in Figures 1 and 2.ReferenceVickers, D., Rees, P. and Birkin, M.(2005) Creating the nationalclassification of census output areas:data, methods and results, WorkingPaper 05/2, University of Leeds,Leeds.1a1: Terraced Blue Collar1a2: Terraced Blue Collar1a3: Terraced Blue Collar1b1: Younger Blue Collar1b2: Younger Blue Collar1c1: Older Blue Collar1c2: Older Blue Collar1c3: Older Blue Collar2a1: Transient Communities2a2: Transient Communities2b1: Settled in the City2b2: Settled in the City3a1: Village Life3a2: Village Life3b1: Agricultural3b2: Agricultural3c1: Accessible Countryside3c2: Accessible Countryside4a1: Prospering Younger Families4a2: Prospering Younger Families4b1: Prospering Older Families4b2: Prospering Older Families4b3: Prospering Older Families4b4: Prospering Older Families4c1: Prospering Semis4c2: Prospering Semis4c3: Prospering Semis4d1: Thriving Suburbs4d2: Thriving Suburbs5a1: Senior Communities5a2: Senior Communities5b1: Older Workers5b2: Older Workers5b3: Older Workers5b4: Older Workers5c1: Public Housing5c2: Public Housing5c3: Public Housing6a1: Settled Households6a2: Settled Households6b1: Least Divergent6b2: Least Divergent6b3: Least Divergent6c1: Younger Families in Terraced Homes6c2: Younger Families in Terraced Homes6d1: Aspiring Households6d2: Aspiring Households7a1: Asian Communities7a2: Asian Communities7a3: Asian Communities7b1: Afro Caribbean Communities7b2: Afro Caribbean Communities0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 43.51a1: Terraced Blue Collar1a2: Terraced Blue Collar1a3: Terraced Blue Collar1b1: Younger Blue Collar1b2: Younger Blue Collar1c1: Older Blue Collar1c2: Older Blue Collar1c3: Older Blue Collar2a1: Transient Communities2a2: Transient Communities2b1: Settled in the City2b2: Settled in the City3a1: Village Life3a2: Village Life3b1: Agricultural3b2: Agricultural3c1: Accessible Countryside3c2: Accessible Countryside4a1: Prospering Younger Families4a2: Prospering Younger Families4b1: Prospering Older Families4b2: Prospering Older Families4b3: Prospering Older Families4b4: Prospering Older Families4c1: Prospering Semis4c2: Prospering Semis4c3: Prospering Semis4d1: Thriving Suburbs4d2: Thriving Suburbs5a1: Senior Communities5a2: Senior Communities5b1: Older Workers5b2: Older Workers5b3: Older Workers5b4: Older Workers5c1: Public Housing5c2: Public Housing5c3: Public Housing6a1: Settled Households6a2: Settled Households6b1: Least Divergent6b2: Least Divergent6b3: Least Divergent6c1: Younger Families in Terraced Homes6c2: Younger Families in Terraced Homes6d1: Aspiring Households6d2: Aspiring Households7a1: Asian Communities7a2: Asian Communities7a3: Asian Communities7b1: Afro Caribbean Communities7b2: Afro Caribbean Communities0 2 3 4 5 6 7 981a) b)Membership rate Membership rateBritain Yorkshire and HumberFigure 4. Rates of BNP membership per 10,000 in a) Britain and b) Yorkshire and Humber

BNP membership in Britain and Yorkshire and Humber

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BNP membership in Britain and Yorkshire and Humber

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