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9 July 2015

The Returning Officer: Warwick II

Walter Leslie Dingley's hunt for five policewomen, plus local curriculum quandaries.

By Stephen Brasher

Walter Leslie Dingley was the Liberal candidate for Warwick in 1929 and 1945 (the last time the party stood here until 1964). His agent was C E Asquith, a relative of the former prime minister and a future general secretary of the National Labour Party. Dingley served with the Cheshire regiment and the RFC in the First World War. He was elected to Warwickshire County Council in 1927. In 1931, he complained that the local education curriculum was not practical enough and said a knowledge of binding machines would be useful in rural areas.

By 1944, he was an alderman. He noted that the council’s request for policewomen hadn’t been answered. The clerk replied that the chief constable had “done everything he could to find five but had failed”.

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