[Tealeaf]

I think you'll find that most party expenditure goes on a) maintaining an expensive party HQ with staff and b) on national advertising campaigns around election times. The latter amounts to no more than useless ideas, false promises and blatant untruths - by all three parties.

If political parties were competitive business's, they would have been bankrupt, dead and buried long ago.What saves them is the fact that they are an effective oligopoly, offering the voter/consumer little choice. If they were breweries then we would be drinking Double Diamond, Red Barrel and Brew ten, with nowt else available; if they were motor car manufacturers, we would be driving A40's, Allegros and Cortinas. The simple fact is they are parthetic and the sooner Labour, Conservative and those fools the Lib-Dems fade away, the better.