WITH the general election just four months away, The Bolton News is running a series of features with candidates vying for your vote. Here, political reporter Elaine O'Flynn speaks to Tory candidate for Bolton North East James Daly.

A TORY councillor is hoping to swap the courtroom for the House of Commons, as he joins the race to become the next MP for Bolton North East.

James Daly, a councillor in Bury, will challenge sitting Labour MP David Crausby at the General Election this May.

The father-of-two, who works as a legal aid solicitor for people who cannot afford legal representation, says he is determined to join the ranks of Conservative MPs and deliver their economic plan to bring the country’s books back into balance.

He told The Bolton News he decided to become a Tory for the party's its ethos of hard work, after being inspired by his mother.

After his parents split when he was four, his mum took him to live with his grandmother in the Yorkshire town on Netherton and went to night-school while working to gain the necessary qualifications to become a social worker.

Cllr Daly, now a father-of-two himself, said: “I remember she was very determined to make a better life for herself and a better life for me.

“My mum had nothing but worked hard until she was in the position to become a social worker.

“For me that was, and always will be, the reason I am a Conservative.”

Cllr Daly said he believes under the last Labour government the benefit system became skewed, and that the steps taken by the coalition government since 2010 are making work pay.

“The level of benefits that were being given out were not encouraging people to work. People were becoming dependent on them and it was trapping people into a lifestyle where they would remain on them.

“By reducing taxation, by creating jobs and employment and by creating opportunities to make work pay, that is how you create the best opportunities for people.”

Cllr Daly says he ‘passionately’ believes in low taxation — “people are the best judges to spend their own money” — and disagrees with the nickname given to opponents of the government’s under-occupancy charge.

“I don’t like the term bedroom tax — it is not a tax," he said.

“We have a major issue with housing in this country in that we have many families that want to be houses in flats or accommodation with two or three bedrooms, and there are single people who don’t need the extra bedrooms.

“In state-provided accommodation you have to match need with demand. I would support looking again at the exemptions, particularly for disabled people, but I agree with the policy in principle.”

The Conservatives, Cllr Daly adds, are the only party who have agreed to a referendum on EU membership, which he says he would vote against.

Unlike his opponent Mr Crausby, Cllr Daly says he believes UKIP are a "great challenge" in Bolton North East that could bite into the Tory vote.

He said: “There are clearly at this moment in time a number of people who previously voted Conservative who are worried on a number of issues, and I can understand why they would be tempted to vote for UKIP.

“But I cannot think of a coherent policy that they have save for leaving the EU.

“They have no credible economic policy, no credible health policy. I understand the appeal of UKIP but we are electing a government, to govern the country on all the issues that are important to people.”

As the constituency of Bolton North East covers much of the town centre, Cllr Daly says if elected he would champion the area and encourage more investment to get it back on its feet.

“David Crausby has been an MP since 1997, and I think it is bordering on unbelievable to allow the town centre to get to the state it is in, with all the empty shops and difficulties it has experienced”, he said.

“There should be free car parking 12 months of the year, and I don’t see how wasting £6.5 million refurbishing the Albert Halls is going to increase footfall.

“We have three Labour MPs since 1992 and the impact has been precisely zero.”

Cllr Daly also criticised Mr Crausby for blaming the government for rocketing emergency admissions to Royal Bolton Hospital, which led the trust to declare a major incident.

He said: “We are maintaining spending on the NHS. To blame the Department of Health for the rise of admissions is utter nonsense, and smacks of scare tactics to gain votes because they have no policies of their own.

“For Mr Crausby to suggest cuts to social care as a reason is totally misleading.

“You don’t see them with any policies that would set them apart from the NHS than the Conservatives.

“And the reduction of GP opening hours is a direct result of Labour party GP contract renegotiation.”

What do you think? Email letters@theboltonnews.co.uk

See tomorrow’s Bolton News for our interview with UKIP candidate Harry Lamb.