TORY ELECTION EXPENSES
SIR,—Mr. Peter Woodard's letter in your last issue is such a travesty of the facts that it is difficult to know where to begin to reply to it. I am assured by the chairman of the Buckingham Conservative Association that not only has the Association waived the subscription of Lioo a year, promised by Mr. Woodard at his adoption meeting, but, in addition, they gave him a cheque for £too from the Association funds to reimburse some of his personal expenditure in the division. I should like to point out that the figures of Doo a year and half the election expenses, men- tioned by Mr. Woodard, represent the largest sums which an Association is permitted by the Conservative Party to ask of a candidate for Parlia- ment. Indeed, any association which asks for or connives at the payment of any higher proportion by a prospective candidate loses the endorse- ment of the Conservative Party for that candidature. It is, of course, recognised by the Conservative Party that even this very considerable advance on previous practice is by no means ideal. It must be remem- bered, however, that the Conservative Party, both in its constituency branches and its central organisation, is now the poor party, and that it may not always be possible for every constituency to attain the ideal, which is the complete payment of all the candidate's election and con- stituency expenses.
Your readers may like to know, however, that many constituencies have been able, as a result of their recruiting drives, to inform Lord Woolton that they are now in a position to pay the full expenses of their candidates, and some of these constituencies are by no means the most wealthy. We, who have to deal with the question of candidates, never cease to impress upon local associations that the goal of the Party is to enable any candidate, whatever his upbringing or circumstances, to enter Parliament on the Conservative side without fear of financial em- barrassment. —Yours faithfully, J. P. L. THOMAS, Vice-Chairman, Conservative Party.
Conservative and Unionist Central Office, S.W. z.
Previous page
