Report by Clive Jefferson, North West British National Party regional organiser – Well, my friends, I have rested, and then rested a little more. I can honestly not remember being as tired as I was after the count and declaration in Manchester.

That was followed by two hours of intense media frenzy, a reception and then the three hour drive home. I got two hours rest and then it was up and out again to go live on BBC Look North and then prepping for the press conference on Wednesday. (I honestly have no idea how our Chairman does it. A vital factor in this win was that he worked on the streets and with the media as hard if not harder than the rest of us.)

It was a draining week coming on the back of the most intense and arduous election campaign any of us have ever been involved in. But, you know what? It was all worth it. We have completed our mission and we send not one but two of our best to Brussels.

We will now regroup, debrief, convert the tens of thousands of enquiries into members and activists, assess our weak points and build for the future. Very soon we will be opening constituency offices in both regions and planning our next twelve months.

Let me take this opportunity to thank the 132,000 people in the North West who saw through the media lies and resisted the constant pressure of the unions and left wing zealots, the disgraceful, immoral, emotional blackmail from the churches and the smear after smear from the Labour Party and the media and who voted BNP. Thank you all, you have made history!

But my greatest respect and thanks goes to our small but dedicated bands of activists across the North West. It has been a pleasure and an honour to have worked with you all under the most intense pressure. The results were so close that I can say in all honesty that if one of our units had let us down, we would have lost.

It was a true team effort and a victory for us and for democracy. We set out our plan some months ago and stuck to it. I would also like to pay my respect and the party’s thanks to the 39 teams who watched every postal vote opening, verification and count all through this massive region. These people are the unsung heroes of our campaign and if any one factor gave us this victory, it was the hundreds of hours our teams spent in those council offices and the 10,000+ seals we affixed on the ballot boxes.

We move on from here, stronger, wiser and with a North West BNP MEP.