FACTS AND FIGURES

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 141, 11 December 1935, Page 11

FACTS AND FIGURES

THE BRITISH ELECTION

The population of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is 46,000,000, and 31,000,000 of them are voters, said the "Manchester Guardian" shortly before the British election. The General Election is being fought on a new register, in which are the names of two-thirds of the population. These are majestic figures. Gladstone once said at the opening of a General Election, "A great State trial is proceeding, the trial of the majority of the late House of Commons at the bar of this nation." These words have a fuller meaning now than they had when Gladstone spoke them. Some more prosaic figures have a sharp political meaning today The majority of the late House of Commons consisted of 460 Conservative members. The fifty Liberal National and National Labour members did not count statistically or in any other way except to swear by when the Government claimed the name of "National." The Conservative Party is honourably keeping up the deception in allotting the candidatures. The "National" list consists of 493 Conservatives, 41 Liberal Nationals (37 members at the dissolution), 20 National Labour (13 members at the dissolution), and three Nationals without prefix or suffix. This makes up a total of 557 Government candidates, leaving 58 seats uncontested. The Labour Party will put nearly, as many candidates in the field, probably 550.'

COST OF A CANDIDATE,

For some of these figures we must acknowledge the courtesy of the Conservative Central Office and for some other arithmetical details. There are 6J.5 Parliamentary constituencies, and the populaiton is almost equally divided between the counties and the boroughs. Country constituencies are not necessarily, or even usually, rural. It is long since it was reckoned that 75 per cent, of the population of this country was urban, and the ratio will not be less now.

The cost of a General Election is calculated in various ways, but there is one sure minimum figure. It may be taken that there will be spent by or on behalf of each candidate at least as much as the law allows. On this basis not less than £700,000 may be spent by candidates of each party in this election, and as nearly all the seats are being fought and for many there will be more than two candidates, it is safe to say that not less than £1,500,000 will be spent altogether. The legal limit is determined by the number of voters in each constituency. In county constituencies each candidate may spend 6d a voter, in one-member borough constituencies sd, and in twomember borough constituencies 3§d.

THE LABOUR PARTY.

The burden of about £1000 a candidate is a heavy one for the "Labour Party, and for that matter for the Liberal Party. "We are fighting at the moment on a fund lower than, in 1929," said a Labour Party organiser. "We have to gather our pence while the fight is on. That is always so to some extent, but it happens that we are tighter for funds in hand than we have been since 1929. But bur individual membership (as distinct from the trade union membership, which is affiliated in a body) has gone up by over 150,000."

Time and work freely given are as good as money, and of the workers I was told, "Our rank and file were never in finer fettle. Virtually the whole of our work is done voluntarily. Others have to pay for this. Men. and women will sit up all night addressing envelopes, for instance. They pay their own subscriptions and .give spare time when a fight is on." In one respect the Labour Party is well provided —that of "literature." It has a great abundance of posters, leaflets, pictorial appeals, and slogans. It is going in especially for pictorial propaganda.

As to prospects, Labour is hoping for a great deal from the effect of its late victories. In London especially it believes that the work of the Labour majority on the London County •Council will be an asset to it, snd it expects to capture more than half the London borough seats.