Non-Stories

At least so far as the media are concerened:

- The Lib Dems coming sixth behind the BNP and Tommy Sheridan;

- The Tories managing only 62 more votes than the deposit-losing BNP;

- The BNP vote coming manifestly from the Tories, as anyone who knows anything about the history of Fascism, or about the dynamics of the sort of communities about which we are speaking, could have told them anyway; and

- A collapsed turnout in a constituency characterised by traditional Labour economic views, by traditional Catholic moral views, by the very strong Unionism characteristic of Scottish and Welsh Catholics (and soon, if not already, of English ones), by the very strong Eurosceptical and other patriotism of the working classes, and by the particular working-class consciousness of having its young men harvested in other people's needless wars, all positions no longer represented by any party.

No one must know these things. They must not be mentioned.