Young candidates

Press, 23 November 1976, Page 6

Young candidates

Three of the four North Ward Labour Partv candidates selected for City Council Kats last evening are less than 30 years old. Other Labour candidates for the 1977 local body elections will be chosen in ward meetings later this week and and next Tuesday.

Selected last evening were Messrs D. F. Caygill. aged 28. a solicitor and sitting councillor the past five years: M. W. Gourley, aged 20, a Labour Party fund raiser; D. F. Rowlands, aged 27. a high school teacher, and H. Turner, a senior Ministry of Transport clerk.

They were chosen from six nominees. The partv’s Mayoral candidate (Mr H. Alex Clark) said the early selection of candidates was part of an over-all strategv of giving them time to understand the issues and make closer contact with ward

“Too often candidates have i been selected late, have been' kept ignorant of policy mat-1 ters. and as a result have l failed to make an impact in .the communitv.” Mr Clark! I said. ! “Neither you nor I can — or indeed should — expect' to swim into office on the tide of rejection of the National I Government,” he added. Candidates would be 1

expected to attend both council and committee meetings, and Mr Clark said he wanted every home to be called on by at least one Labour candidate. ■ “1 am not advocating a style of execessive parochialism in local body affairs,” he said, “but 1 do consider that candidates must be personally well-versed in all sides o'f local arguments and needs.”