COSTLY SEAT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 April 1939, Page 9

COSTLY SEAT

BRITISH MEMBER’S COMPLAINT. £37,000 IN SEVENTEEN YEARS. Mr G. R. Hall-Caine, M.P. for East Dorset, admitted that his parliamentary seat had cost him £37,000 in 17 years. “I have not been lavish,” he said. “Every item of expenditure has been carefully checked up. Many M.P.’s spend far more than I do.” Mr Hall-Caine, who made these disclosures, is joining a revolt against the system whereby Conservative seats are said to be put up for auction and sold to the highest bidder. Mr Hall-Caine emphasises that he is not making his protest personally, but that he is acting in the interests of promising young men whose lack of'means debars them from candidatures. “Poor candidates, no matter how brilliant their qualifications, are debarred because they have not the income to cover expenses of elections, agents, secretarial work, donations to a hundred and one charities,” Mr Hall-Caine added. Conservative associations should be self-supporting through larger subscriptions of supporters. “While I have paid out £37,000 over 17 years, I estimate that the subscriptions from my association have not exceeded £lO,OOO over the same period,” he declared. “That is all wrong.”