Morley and Outwood has been for some time considered to be a key seat in this election. The incumbent Labour MP, Ed Balls was widely regarded to be fighting for his tax benefits and his ministerial expense perks on two fronts. One from a massively overfunded Tory party who have been spamming the residents here for several months, and the other from the rise in support in seats such as this for far right party, the BNP.

A small conurbation on the commuter belt for Leeds, Morley and Outwood is a reasonably typical constituency to other such areas with one major difference. The proportion of people from minority backgrounds is noticably lower than in similar areas, and indeed to its neighbours such as Dewsbury and of course Bradford.

The small village of Drighlington, home to none other than Kevin Watmough, leader of the ultra far-right group the British Peoples Party and webmaster for fascist sites such as Redwatch and Aryan Unity, is a reasonably closely knit community as such places go. At the centre of the village is Adwalton Common, scene of fierce fighting during the English Civil War and located on which is the village community centre and primary school. It is worth pointing out that this is an urban and not a rural village, and many would consider themselves part of either the city of Leeds or Bradford, sitting on the border between the two as it does.

As part of my job, as someone who helps a disabled person to live an independent life, I often come into conflicts with my own closely held beliefs. As part of the interview for the job, my employer has what she considers to be the most important question when deciding on someones suitability for the role. She has a knack of working out what the interviewees most passionate belief is and asking a question tailored to provoke a response.

"So, supposing I asked you to help me join in with the local fox hunt?" was my question. Naturally, every ounce of myself is opposed to such a thing. The key difference however is that I would not be doing this as myself, instead I would be assisting a person to make the kind of choice that any able bodied person would quite rightly be able to make and act on for themselves. I should point out that my employer is as firmly opposed to foxhunting as myself so there is no confusion, but suffice to say my response was satisfactory enough to get the job.

There are many times that I need to seperate my own beliefs for the sake of enabling this right to be taken, yesterdays polling day was no exception: depite the fact that I know my employer well enough to be certain that it would never happen, there was always the chance that she would choose to vote BNP, and that I would have to assist her hand to the correct box to mark her cross. Since she is completely blind, she would never know if I had in fact guided her to the correct box, and so she had to have absolute trust in me that I would do as she had asked. As with the foxhunting question, it is not my choice to make, though to have done so would have broken my heart.

The polling station for her neighbourhood was at the village community centre. We set off at around lunchtime so she could cast her vote as she wished to do.

I have never been to a polling station before and so I had no idea what to expect. There are two chief reasons for this: firstly I do not believe and have never believed that voting will achieve the kind of change that we so desperately need to move forwards - it simply maintains the status quo and lends a temporary legitimacy to a small group of privileged individuals to work against the essential requirements socially just community for the financial benefit of the few. Secondly, as a traveller of no fixed abode I am not entitled to vote, though I am expected to abide by the increasingly repressive laws that attempt to govern me.

Driving the short distance to the polling booth, I was disturbed to see the number of signs that had been put up with the union flag emblazoned logo of the BNP on them. They were everywhere. Most disturbingly of all, the vast majority of these already numerous signs had been erected opposite and facing the local Primary School. It seemed the intent was to sway the many parents who would be voting on the way to or back from picking up their children, but an ominous side effect of this effort soon made itself apparent.

The village is home to a large number of fairly bored youths of all ages. Despite the 'best' efforts of the local council and church (largely based on an outrageously outdated view of society and attempts to smother a problem with middle class anxiety money), and a 200% increase in Community Support coppers (raising the numbers to two), there are still big problems with mistrust and the inevitable lashing out such as car windows being smashed and abuse being hurled at passers by. This is all pretty normal for any satellite town and at a fairly low level considering the location nestled in amongst a large conurbation with easy access to the city. Despite this, the tongues wag furiously in the village pubs and other meeting places looking for someone to blame. Much of this goes on in the school playground in audible range of the children.

Predictably, and despite the noticable lack of many asian or other minority groups, the accepted opinion here is that "muslims are largely to blame". Where this notion comes from and why no-one has noticed that it is their own children who are wreaking havoc is anybodys guess. This is a community in fear, feeling surrounded by the high muslim populations in Bradford, Dewsbury and Huddersfield, and easy pickings for the BNP who stoke this paranioa whilst presenting themselves as the solution.

There was much talk of this being a potential first parliamentary seat for the BNP, perhaps even more so than Barking where the Nicky himself was standing, though he maybe did himself no favours for his chances last week when he exclaimed in an interview "The Irish will still be let in because as far as I'm concerned they're British". Thankfully, with the results being announced at 4.45 this morning as I started work, this wasn't to be the case and they stumbled into 4th place, but with close to 4000 votes.

Driving back from the polling station, the older youths that hang around the streets on days off school and holidays were in their usual huddles. The big difference yesterday though was that most of these groups had taken some of the BNP signs from the verges around the town, and were proudly waving them to passing cars chanting "BNP, BNP, BNP", "No Surrender" and "EDL, EDL", urging people into drastic and violent action that I will leave to the readers imagination to "solve" the muslim "problem". This was flat out disturbing and not isolated. It was occuring all across the town. Most worrying of all was that there were many primary school children, some as young as maybe 7 or 8, walking back to their homes with their parents proudly (and naturally oblivious to the meaning) waving these placards in the air whilst their parents were happy and in some cases encouraging them to do so.

For this to have happened in such a widespread manner paints a grim vision of the future. Whilst their parents could not actually muster enough votes to get the BNP into office in this ward, these children who in a few ballots time will have reached voting age seem to be enamoured with the fascistic ideas and illusions being cast around the playgrounds and front rooms of this town. To say that a responsibility has to be taken by these parents for their children to grow up without fear and prejudice, and for them to not proudly raise a generation of racists and bigots is obvious to most right thinking people, but this seems to be lost on this town.

My first experience of voting was indeed an eye opener. Would I ever be encouraged to do so myself? I very much doubt it. The overwhelming majority that I have spoken to about this in the last few weeks have talked about national immigration policy, the nations finances, who will be prime minister, British foreign policy. I don't recall anybody mentioning their local candidate by name or talking about the specific things their MP will do to represent them and their community. What changes will be made locally to benefit the people living in the same street but don't know each others name, to get them talking to each other and working together.

The obsession with the bigger picture and the smoke and mirrors politics of offers made by these big parties has led to a culture of utter panic in places like this: if you are in a difficult situation, there must always be someone who's fault it is. All too often this blame falls on the groups within communities who are understood the least and so become the finger-tagets of the far right, who whip up a frenzy of panic to further their own agenda, dressed up as "pride". This has led directly to 7 year old children, still in their school uniforms, chanting racist slogans at complete strangers whilst still tentatively clutching their parents hands. Is this really something to be proud of?

Arriving back at my employers house and getting the kettle on, for the first time ever I was actually glad to be indoors. Not through fear of her neighbours views, fear of the outcome of the ballot in this ward or fear of the local gangs of bored teenagers hanging around on the corner outside her house waving their placards, but fear of this generation growing up before we have chance to show them the far right for what they truly are. It will take me a little while to learn the lessons of this experience and work out how I can respond in a useful way, but it has showed me more than ever the need for urgent action to be taken now to stop the rise of the BNP and the far right in the North. My only hope is that others wake up too before the torches are lit on our neighbours doorsteps and it's too late to get our fingers in the dam.