From today’s Guardian:-
Stoke-on-Trent used to be a Labour stronghold, but now it has nine BNP councillors. Some fear that the far-right party could be running the town hall by 2011. Patrick Barkham reports on how the left is losing the battle for white working-class votes.

Up the hill, past trimmed privet hedges and rows of interwar semis is Bentilee neighbourhood centre. Opened last year, the £10m building has panoramic views of Stoke-on-Trent and sparkles in the sun. At its front is a bustling butcher, baker and small supermarket. Behind is a library, doctor’s surgery, dentist, community centre, youth service and “one-stop shop” for every kind of environmental and housing inquiry. Without the Labour-led city council and its private finance initiative-funded project, the Bentilee estate would still have its shabby old shopping precinct. But this glittering building, the new nursery down the road, immaculate streets and a 39% fall in crime on the estate do not fill many residents with joy and appreciation.

“They haven’t just let me down. They’ve broken my heart,” says John Oldcroft, sitting outside the centre. “Stoke-on-Trent has been Labour for 60-odd years and they’ve taken everything for granted. Labour are just turning into Conservatives. We’ve got a local BNP lad who lives on the estate and he came and had a word.”

Oldcroft voted for the BNP this month, and the far-right party now has nine representatives on Stoke-on-Trent council, including all three representatives elected from Bentilee’s ward. Three gains in the May election gave the BNP their second largest council group in the country, after Barking and Dagenham’s 12 councillors. Stoke City’s promotion to the football Premier League has spread a feelgood factor across the city but there is also foreboding: it is not just the BNP talking up its prospects of power. Labour activists fear the BNP is now the strongest single party in Stoke. On May 1, Labour polled 14,000 votes in 20 seats; the BNP polled almost 8,000 standing in just 10 seats. A minority Labour administration struggles on; the council chamber is fragmented by independents and neither the Conservatives nor the Liberal Democrats are bigger than the BNP. Senior local politicians, commentators and residents believe this city of 250,000 could be controlled by the BNP within three years. How has Stoke got here?

Patrick Barkham on Labour's decline in Stoke-on-Trent | Politics | The Guardian