It is ironic that George Galloway (Respect Party) is opposed to Scottish independence because I cant think of a politician who has served the cause of nationalism more than Galloway thru his victory last night. He won the safe Labour seat in Bradford West. He got 18,000 votes to Labours 8,000. Bradford West has a 45% Muslim population and Galloway, a former Labour MP in Scotland is an outspoken critic of the war in Afghanistan.

The old image of a homogenous “United Kingdom” based on the Stanley Matthews Cup Final and the 1953 “Coronation” has been discarded. We are invited to believe in a new kind of “UK”….. multiculturalism and diversity and all that. Yet it is hard to see the folks in Bradford West being overly enthusiastic about Jessica Ennis and Tom Daley at the Olympics and having street parties for the “Royal Jubilee”…….welcome to the “United Kingdom 2012″ Of course as the campaign began several British soldiers from nearby Huddersfield were being killed in Afghanistan. On the eve of poll an inquest was held into the death (verdict “unlawful killing”) of a young female army bomb disposal expert in Afghanistan. She was also from Yorkshire. So Bradford West does not seem a place fit for heroes.

In 2012, it is clearly no longer enough that Labour MPs in Bradford, Burnley, Blackburn or Bolton keep a calendar in their constituency offices marking out the holy days in Muslim, Hindu or Sikh life……so that they can publish some good wishes in the local weekly newspaper or visit the local Temple, Festival, Mosque or Curry House……………before travelling to London to be lobby fodder in a vote on a war in the Indian sub-continent. It doesnt work like that anymore. Nor does it work to head hunt local Muslims for the Labour Party.

Of course there is only one George Galloway but there are several places like Bradford………where Respect councillors can be elected. More critically it can take votes from Labour in marginal areas at General Elections.  Respect wont go away…..ya know. Notwitstanding his occasional buffoonery, questionable relationships with dictators like Saddam Hussein……..tempered by suberb oratry and being right on the money about Iraq and Afghanistan…..but from a purely nationalist perspective, the election of Galloway is to be welcomed. A bad day for Labour. But a worse day for the “United Kingdom”. Of course, the chattering classes in Islington make a big issue out of marginalised young Asians and passive older Asians and indeed the wider question of involving people in the political process. They should have been more careful what they wished for. Islington dinner parties tonight will be interesting. Perhaps they would have preferred if the marginalised and passive had stayed at home.

In his moment of triumph George Galloway is entitled to ramp up the hyperbole. But surely the 1981 Fermanagh-South Tyrone by election was the most stunning.In a straight fight between a “Terrorist” and a “Democrat”.the “Terrorist” won.