Back in the 1970s, two figures stood out on Britain's far-right. One was John Tyndall, a mean-looking, balding wanna-be Hitler with a curiously plummy voice and a penchant for dressing up in SS uniform. The other was Martin Webster, a gruff, working class street thug. Though they looked very different - a kind of Nazi double act - both were simply racist bigots with particularly nasty anti-Semitic obsessions.

The National Front, as it then was, campaigned on a programme of compulsory repatriation for all non-white immigrants. Supporters were predominantly skinheads and the white working classes, presumed to be Labour loyalists until Enoch Powell's Rivers of Blood speech in 1968 made them defect. In the end, the National Front disintegrated, as fringe parties so often do, into backstabbing and fratricidal fascist in-fighting.

Three decades later, its successor, the British National Party, has tried to clean up its act. Realising that its jackboot image was a vote-loser, the party has tried to broaden its appeal by jettisoning its ostensible anti-Semitism and its policy of compulsory repatriation. Doubtless, fascists still reside in the party, just as many socialists reside in the Labour Party, but the party has now drawn more respectable elements into the fold. Its leader Nick Griffin, who was a vehement Holocaust denier, has instead targeted Islamic extremism.

This week the details of thousands of BNP members were publicised on the internet. The membership list included police, teachers, university tutors and even a member of the clergy. The culprit who leaked the list remains unclear, although it's mooted to be a disgruntled ex-activist angered by the party's path towards "moderation". The publication of the list prompted a wider debate. Unions said that membership of the BNP should be incompatible with public sector employment because the party's ideology clashes with concepts of equality and fairness - the abiding ethos of public service.

Distasteful though the BNP may be, we are travelling down a very dangerous path if we allow the establishment to dictate what constitutes "acceptable" views. Just as membership of a socialist or communist organisation should not preclude one from membership of a particular profession, so membership of a far-right party should not disqualify one from certain posts - provided the people in question fulfill their positions competently and do not break the law, that is. We must combat what we perceive to be wayward or dangerous ideologies with ideas, not with censorship or sackings. Besides, in Britain we prosecute people for what they do, not for what they believe.

Unfortunately, there's now a worrying chasm in Britain between what mainstream politicians say and what the public feel. Many decent people are concerned that our approach to violent crime and immigration has been too lenient. That doesn't necessarily make them Nazis any more than someone who calls for greater equality and redistribution of wealth is a die-hard communist.

Banning people from membership of a political party only pushes people underground and makes them more embittered. We must remain watchful and vigilant about political extremism on all sides. But the British establishment, by which I mean the two main political parties, should realise they have no divine right to rule. Britain today - particularly in our inner cities - reeks of social decay. It's up to the political establishment to address these aspects of "broken Britain" and win hearts and minds. A McCarthyite witch-hunt of the right or left will do nothing except drive more recruits into the extremists' camps.