BNP Assembly Member Richard Barnbrook, 47, opposition leader on Barking and Dagenham council, campaigned on a platform of strong opposition to immigration and to special treatment for minorities.

He told The Times he would fight to ensure that in future "every single Londoner is treated exactly the same - no political correctness and no positive discrimination. Nobody will be favoured over anyone else regardless of creed or colour."

His election is likely to tarnish the capital's image as a model of racial diversity and alarm the one third of Londoners who are foreign-born. But he denied he was an extremist, insisting: "I speak far more common sense than the other three parties."

Mr Barnbrook is a former artist who trained at the Royal Academy and says he is engaged to Simone Clarke, until recently a leading ballerina at the English National Ballet. She supports the BNP but played no part in the campaign and was not present for his election yesterday.

He said he expected to be ostracised by other members of the assembly, but insisted he would not be cowed. He would be a voice for "true Londoners" who feel disenfranchised by the mainstream parties. "If I have to be a lone wolf I will be one," he said. "I haven't been elected to simply sit back and be like the other parties, sticking with the status quo and the gravy train movement."

He intends to propose that St George's Day be officially celebrated, that the Union flag fliexs over City Hall, and that burkas and other head coverings be banned from London's public buildings.

He opposes the Olympic Games because Londoners are footing so much of the bill- "If they are going to benefit the whole nation why is the whole nation not paying for them?"

He will also vigorously oppose the building a huge new mosque in Newham, East London. "This is a Brtish culture," he said. "If I was to go to Iran or Iraq and say I wanted to build St Paul's Cathedral smack in the middle of their capitals they would say 'no way'. I'm terribly sorry but the same thing applies here. Next we'll have Sharia law."

Mr Barnbrook plans to use his assembly seat as a platform to dislodge Margaret Hodge, the Labour minister and MP for Barking, in the next general election. He ran against her in 2005 and came third with 16.9 per cent of the vote, but the following year the BNP gained 12 of the 51 seats on Barking and Dagenham council to become the official opposition. "I'm 80 per cent confident that Margaret Hodge will go," he said yesterday.

Labour opponents on the council deride Mr Barnbrook's performance and that of his BNP colleagues, accusing them of poor attendance, gesture politics and budgetary ineptitude. Mr Barnbrook counters that Labour mocks the BNP's policies then quietly adopts them.

His election comes just days after Rome elected a former neo-fascist, Gianni Alemanno, as its mayor. "Maybe people not just in the UK but across Europe and the world are saying their (national) identities are being abused," Mr Barnbrook said.

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