Britain’s most reviled man

A bouquet of red, white and blue flowers tied with a royal-blue ribbon has recently appeared among the scores of tributes tied to railings in the street in Pollockshields, Glasgow, from where 15-year-old Kriss Donald was abducted and later murdered, allegedly by an Asian gang. ‘In our hearts,’ the message says. ‘From the Southside British National Party.’

On Saturday the BNP leader Nick Griffin went to Pollockshields and was greeted with the usual abuse. Scotland’s First Minister Jack McConnell said that Griffin and his party were ‘poisonous’. Others described Griffin as ‘inhuman’, ‘opportunist scum’ and ‘evil’. It’s the same wherever he goes. Mr Griffin must be the most reviled person in the country. If Old Nick himself campaigned for a seat in Parliament, he’d get an easier ride than the one Young Nick is getting at the moment.

If there’s a race riot going on anywhere in Britain, Mr Griffin is there ‘visiting friends’. He was ‘visiting friends’ in Pollockshields on Saturday. I suppose that a man as hated as Mr Griffin is obliged to keep the few friendships he has in good repair.

‘There is nothing to be shown by going in and swaggering about the place,’ Mr Griffin is reported to have said. When pressed, Mr Griffin placed the blame for the murder fairly and squarely on the shoulders of the police, accusing them of halting an investigation into Glasgow’s ‘violent’ Pakistani youth gangs after it was branded as racist.

So what is the most accursed man in the United Kingdom actually like? Has all the bad karma directed at him given him galloping eczema or made him impotent? We met a fortnight ago, in the restaurant at Chester Services on the M56. He was on his way to his home in mid-Wales after ‘visiting friends’.