1. Preventing these people from speaking will not make them go away.

2. Behaving badly while the loonies behave politely will make the greater British public sympathize with the loonies, not you.

3. As Australia learnt — bitterly, over several years, with Pauline Hanson — the only way to manage these people is through the parliament, not on the streets.

And the Beeb is right, this time:

The BBC has defended the invitation to the leader of the anti-immigration party to appear on the programme [Question Time, the BBC's flagship politics programme], saying it had a duty to be impartial.

During the show the panel covered topics including whether it was fair for the BNP to “hijack” images of Winston Churchill, whether immigration policy had fuelled the BNP’s popularity and whether Mr Griffin’s appearance was an early Christmas present for the party.