This is a request for assistance. Some readers know me and might have formed a view of whether or not they think I could contribute positively in parliament. Others don't know me but I hope you will take the time to form a view.

I'm not stuck on being the MP for a specific constituency. I think it's partly because of my London upbringing, where the parliamentary boundaries don't all have a significant relationship to a geographical identity.  In 1992, the Boundary Commission decided I had gone from Woodford to Ilford without even having to move, so it seems a bit arbitrary to me.

I prefer to think that an MP should be judged on what they do for local people, and it goes without saying that someone who has achieve a great deal in an area over time should of course be in with a good chance of selection in that area.

Frustration is probably the reason why I want to be an MP. I'm frustrated that I learned about the harm we are doing to our environment as a child in the 80s, yet 20 years later, progress is still slow. I'm frustrated that poverty is still a reality in Britain, one of the wealthiest nations on earth.

I find it cruelly illogical that a person can go to work full time yet still be paid so little that they can't survive without benefits because of the low level of the minimum wage. Aren't these benefits a state subsidy of poor employers? Yet it is not the employer that has to be means tested to receive that subsidy.

It should not be the case that an entire generation of young people who don't have money to spare should be enriching those getting fat in the buy-to-let bubble because of the lack of affordable housing.

As a Labour member, I am thankful for the progress made in the past ten years, particularly the investment in education and health. Perhaps my own father is one of the tens of thousands of people who are alive after a heart attack who would not have been were the Tories in government at the time. I'm grateful we implemented a minimum wage in the first place, even if the rate is too low.

Yet time has moved on - there are new challenges and we need new impetus to enable us to meet those challenges. I think, perhaps, that frustration will provide some of that impetus.

If we want a fair society, we can't ever be comfortable and satisfied - and when I become comfortable and satisfied, I hope I'll have the good sense to leave politics.

So very briefly, I have said why I am in politics - and I mentioned before that this is a request for help.

If you think I might make a good candidate in your area, or if you might be prepared to help me get selected elsewhere, please do get in touch, preferably by email or through Facebook.

Many thanks.

Alex Hilton
alexhilton@gmail.com
07985 384 859