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Communications Allowance

Of course, I shall come straight to the communications allowance. I agree with the remarks of the hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice) on spending prior to the election. To my mind, as an old-time agent, the figures that have been mentioned are quite obscene. They do have a distorting impact on elections. It was foolish to enact the law that allowed such sums to be spent, and I thought so at the time. The figures we see today confirm that my judgment then was correct. All I can say is, why the hell did Labour bring that law in? I did not understand that for one minute. It was never going to benefit Labour, even if it was introduced from a political perspective. It was absolutely crazy. I agree with the hon. Gentleman, but want to introduce a bit of balance about where the law came from. Receiving so many leaflets would put me off. In some respects, it does harm to put such nonsense through people's letterboxes week in, week out, month in, month out. I know that I am doing harm to our worthy candidate in that part of the world, but quite frankly I get totally pissed off with it. Sorry, Mr. Cook, I withdraw that remark.