The Bristol Evening Post has rebuffed a complaint from a former BBC worker who is standing for the British National Party in next month’s European elections.

Michaela MacKenzie, a former Labour Party parish councillor, is standing for the far-right party in the South West constituency.

In an exclusive report earlier this month, Michaela told the Evening Post she believed the BNP best represented the policies she wanted to see adopted in the UK.

She denied the BNP was a racist or “fascist” party and said it had “coloured” supporters.

In an editorial comment, the Evening Post said many people would agree with the BNP that the UK should not be run by “unelected bureaucrats” in Brussels.

But it also warned of the party’s right-wing policy which advocated the return of all immigrants to their “homelands”, a policy which appealed to the “knuckle-dragging minority”.

Now the candidate, who worked for six years as a management assistant with the BBC’s natural history unit in Bristol and who once sold ad space for the Post’s sister paper the Bristol Observer, said she had started legal proceedings against the Evening Post.

In a letter to editor Mike Lowe, she said: “Your Comment was deeply offensive since it implied that I was one of a ‘knuckle-dragging minority’.”

In her letter she referred to the European Convention on Human Rights.

She said: “The European Convention on Human Rights states that a person’s dignity is inviolable. You have violated my dignity.”

She added: “I am now seeking legal advice on proceeding against you personally.”

In her letter, she wrote of organising a “mass leaflet drop across Bristol by our numerous activists” about the Evening Post.

She also called for a printed apology “by Tuesday at the latest”.

Evening Post managing editor Rob Stokes, in a written response to Michaela, told her the newspaper’s Comment column was fair comment.

He said: “You have chosen to stand for the most extreme right-wing party in Britain today. By doing so you don’t merely attract criticism, you actively encourage it.

“You say we referred to BNP policies as appealing to the ‘baser instincts of the knuckle dragging minority’ and by doing so implied that you possess a ‘Neanderthal mentality’.

“We were criticising the policies, not you personally. It is you who have chosen to draw that inference. The criticism we levelled at the BNP was contained in the leader article of May 12. As such it was comment and fair comment at that.

“It was serious, sincere and hard-hitting because we find your party’s views odious, as do the majority of people in this country today.”

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