WOLVERHAMPTON: Sathnam Sanghera

More than any other place in Britain, Wolverhampton has been defined by racial politics. It was the first town in Britain to experience mass immigration, Enoch Powell was for many years a local MP, and after his Rivers of Blood speech in 1968, it became a peg on which to hang a national debate about multiculturalism.

Forty years later, on the night of the Question Time special, the main challenge is to find people there who care enough about race to watch it. After trying and failing to get several pubs to put on Question Time, in the end a nice barman at the Hog’s Head on Stafford Street relents, and I settle down to watch the show in a corner, the volume turned down, hoping not to get glassed.

Gradually six other punters drifted towards the screen, pints of Banks’ Bitter in their hands, and what followed was remarkably low key. There is a quiet boo when Nick Griffin claims Sir Winston Churchill was Islamophobic, a murmur when Jack Straw remarks on the role of Asians and blacks in the First and Second World Wars. At other points people variously remark “Warsi’s poppy is much bigger than Nick Griffin’s”, “This is in danger of becoming a witch hunt”, “She’s quite fit that Warsi.” “They’re only getting votes because Labour is so crap.”

All in all vaguely encouraging. At least, it would be if (a) I wasn’t an Asian journalist and (b) the overall reaction in the bar wasn’t a general indifference. If a man who once said blacks “walk like monkeys” doesn’t put you off your £4.50 margarita, I wonder if anything will ever enrage you.

OLDHAM: Russell Jenkins

The several dozen men drinking mild and bitter watched Nick Griffin debate in absorbed silence for five or more minutes before one stated bluntly: “He is being set up here.”

Among the members of the Nimble Nook Sports and Social Club, formerly working men’s club, in Chadderton, Oldham, there is strong support for a tougher immigration policy.

Nigel Standring, 56, a driver, said: “I don’t think Nick Griffin was given a fair crack of the whip. Every time he tried to speak, somebody spoke over him. The presenter of the show allowed it to go on. I do not think that was right. He should have allowed him a chance to say his own thing”.

Martin Lampton, 52, an HGV driver, said: “The panel was five to one against him. The audience had obviously been handpicked because everyone who asked a question was hostile, and nobody was for him.”

Mr Griffin polled 16 per cent of the vote in the 2001 general election when he stood for Oldham West in the wake of the race riots that year. His party has yet to win a foothold on Oldham council.

Peter Scholfield, 27, who runs a small internet business, took the view that Mr Griffin looked not only beleaguered, with few friends, but also weak. “He has done himself no favours. He came on and was attacked but he did not have the proper arguments to beat back his opponents’ ideas and policies. That was really what I wanted because I don’t support him at all.”

EAST LONDON: Will Pavia

In the Lauriston pub the landlord had rolled down a big screen on which to broadcast Question Time and there was a certain amount of excitement as the BBC News concluded. Adam Key, 45, who runs a roofing company, said: “I will be interested to see people question him on ecology, green issues, banking, that sort of thing. I bet he hasn’t done his homework.”

John O’Driscoll, 45, was outraged that the BBC were screening the show and doubly outraged that it was being shown in his pub. “Turn it off,” he said.

Jim Leask, 22, who works for a film company said: “It’s all a bit of a pantomime.”

Anna Robinson, 38, from Eltham in South London, said: “Look at his body language. They are really putting him on the spot.” But by the end of the broadcast she had changed her mind about the wisdom of the programme. “It’s like advertising,” she said. “People are going to be wondering about his opinions. They call TV the idiot’s lantern, don’t they?”

One observer called her mother to compare notes. On the other end of the phone Jan Derham, 64, a retired social worker, said: “He’s come over well in terms of his views. He’s not coming over as a raving lunatic.”

Her father was a Labour councillor in Enfield. “He fought the fascists,” she said. “He would be appalled that he is on this show. He is coming over well.”

However, back in the pub, Max Goodlisse, 27, an account manager for an advertising firm said: “I think he’s being made a fool of, which needed to happen.”

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