Winchester's would-be Tory MP, George Hollingbery, has come under fire for sending a "patronising" leaflet to the over-60s.

The pamphlet depicted an old woman's claw-like hand crossing off a bingo card and described the prospective parliamentary candidate for Winchester and Meon Valley meeting "older citizens" at lunch clubs, tea dances and bingo.

Around 20 people have complained to Mr Hollingbery and the Conservative constituency office in Winchester. While some were cross at being classified "old" at 60, others bristled at the idea of playing bingo.

Art lecturer, John Hicks (64), of Hatherley Road, Winchester, criticised the mailshot as "patronising". He said: "I'm still working, as is my wife, so we don't have much time for bingo and tea dances."

After taking voluntary redundancy from a teaching job at Portsmouth University at the age of 56, Mr Hicks returned to study for an MA in Art and went on to secure several lecturing posts at universities and colleges in London and the South before setting up his own art studio in Winchester.

He says the over 60s are a vast untapped resource and that attitudes like those expressed in the leaflet contribute to that waste.

He added: "At first, I was angry. Then I realised it was just an amazing blunder. I think someone like that has an awful lot to learn about other generations. It seems an unfortunate way to begin an election campaign to alienate a large section of the community."

Another to complain was Pauline Walter, of Grafton Road. In an open letter to the city councillor, she said: "I think that when you are producing what you wish will be a vote-catching pamphlet, one of the most important things to understand is that most 'older citizens' do not spend their time at tea dances, lunch clubs, or playing bingo, but live lives just as frustrating, difficult, sometimes fufilling and active as you presumably do yourself."

She finished: "You also ask me to let you know if I understand your leaflet. Let me set your mind at rest. I do, believe me, I really do - in spite of being 68."

But Mr Hollingbery (41) says the leaflet is "his most successful yet", as over 300 returned a self-completion questionnaire. And, he says, it raised important issues.

In the leaflet, he wrote: "Doing what I do, I meet a great many older citizens for the lunch club in Denmead, the bingo in Winchester, the friendship club in Shedfield and tea dancing in Otterbourne - just to mention a few places.

"Every time I meet with older people, I'm asked the same thing. What are the Conservative plans for us, particularly on pensions and long-term care of the sick?"

He outlined Tory proposals and invited people to fill in a questionnaire on "issues affecting older people".

But Mr Hollingbery does admit the mailing was wrongly targeted and should not have included people in their 60s.

"The targeting was, frankly, not what it should have been. The language was skewed to the over-70s. It was dim to write it like that. It was my fault. I wrote it.

"If it has upset some people, then I can only apologise. But most of those who complained did so with a sense of humour. One even offered me his back collection of Saga magazines."