UKIP has selected a lawyer with 40 years’ experience on the Cornish legal scene to contest the St Ives and Isles of Scilly seat in the forthcoming General Election.

Graham Calderwood began practising in Penzance in 1972, and built up his firm to represent clients through offices in St Ives, Falmouth and the Isles of Scilly. His two daughters were born and brought up in West Cornwall. He and Margaret, a nurse, live in Lelant.

Educated at St Probus and Bishop Wordsworth’s school in Salisbury, Graham qualified as a solicitor in London before returning to the South West. He became senior partner of his firm in 1979. Since 1996 he has been qualified as a Solicitor Advocate, enabling him to appear on behalf of clients, without a barrister, in any court in England and Wales.

Though now semi­retired, he specialises in criminal law and acts as a duty solicitor, representing those who are being interviewed under caution or attending court, and both defending and prosecuting criminal cases several days a week.

Graham said: “I know the area of the St Ives Constituency. I have worked here for just over 40 years. I have had a ‘proper job’ unlike so many politicians, and even political leaders, who have no real work experience other than as political advisors or party officials.

“I have been a High Street solicitor advocate, not a fat cat city lawyer but one dealing with legal aid, so much diminished and under threat from the coalition, local people as they buy and sell properties and businesses, divorce and children's cases, especially dealing with whether children go into care, unfair dismissal and work problems – dealing with real people and real problems.”

Graham’s message is that Cornwall’s potential is hampered by a remote unitary authority and Euro rules, saying that it is "one of the poorest areas in Britain for wages, while the Common Agriculture and Fisheries Policies are disastrous for our farming and fishing".

Adding: “Tourism is essential for our economy – but we must preserve what tourists come to enjoy. We must stop Cornwall being concreted over faster than England, and stop other councils paying Cornwall Council to send people here, taking precedence over local people.

“UKIP protects the countryside. We need brownfield sites developed first, with genuinely affordable homes.

Elected councillors have lost their democratic powers, as planning can be decided by Eric Pickles’ London office on appeal.”