Eastleigh'S UK Independence Party (UKIP) parliamentary candidate Christopher Murphy has hit out at Liberal Democrat rival Chris Huhne's attack on Hampshire's poor track record of above-average primary school class sizes.

Claiming Mr Huhne had missed some crucial points, Mr Murphy said: "Eastleigh, Chandler's Ford and Hedge End boast some of the best-achieving schools in the area and to suggest that students suffer from lack of personal attention is insulting to the teachers in all of our schools. In reality, it is disruptive students in the class that present a major barrier to effective classroom teaching - and that is going to happen whether the class size is eight or 28."

He said teachers should be allowed to teach to a receptive audience, but successive legislation had hamstrung the teachers and "handcuffed" the police in dealing with juvenile nuisance and unruly behaviour.

Mr Murphy added that he had worked closely with teachers, dealing with students of all ages, during five years as a school governor of a local secondary school.

"Hampshire teachers perform excellently in the most difficult of circumstances, but suffer ill-health and stress because of threats from students and parents alike."

He added that a constituent who was a department head at a local school described teaching as more like "crowd control" than imparting knowledge.

Also standing in Eastleigh are Conservative Conor Burns and Labour's Chris Watt.

For more on the 2005 General Election campaign see pages 8 & 9 of today's Daily Echo.