It is almost unbelievable. But the stain of far-right politics has been wiped off the face of Barking and Dagenham. Not only was the BNP thoroughly beaten in the general election, the council lost 12 councillors.
This means the number of councillors left on Barking & Dagenham council went from 12 to 0 overnight.
We cannot thank those who made this possible enough. Huge respect goes to Nick Lowles, Matthew Collins, Sam Tarry, Caroline Alabi and all those who have worked so tirelessly organising activists against the BNP in the Borough for many months.
And huge thanks to almost 1,300 people who have volunteered valuable time over the course of the election - in Barking & Dagenham (where we put out 130,000 pieces of literature), and in Stoke-on-Trent - where the BNP were also humiliated.
We have had brilliant support from pensioners, black and Asian voters, white voters, young voters, women and men. On Monday 385 people delivered 55,000 leaflets and even on polling day we had 175 people out knocking up the vote.
We also had huge moral and financial support from hundreds of thousands of people across the country, and fantastic support from the Mirror which kept us all going.
As ever our celebrity supporters have been magnificent, from Billy Bragg, Eddie Izzard and Speech Debelle, to the casts of The Bill, Hollyoaks and Emmerdale, plus too many more to mention.
Thank you one and all - you've done a wonderful thing.
Daily Mirror - Hope Not Hate
