How can they put up candidates who don't even live in the area?

[AvadaKedavra]

Should there not be some rule about the candidate put forward by a party actually living in the same town or even county at a push?
Our Lib Dem candidate lives 150 miles away from the area he wants to represent

Our Tory one lives on the other side of the country & says he will move if he wins

our Labour one moved here last year & has been working with the current MP

All the others are locals

our labour and tory candidates were born and bred here, went to school with the tory guy - really cant stand him

the lib dem woman lives in the next constituency and the snp man grew up and worked several constituencies away although has lived locally for a few years (and I say that loosely as he's in the very outskirts, literally the border of the next constituency which is one of the richest in scotland as opposed to our constituency being the highest for unemployment, teen pregnancies etc).

If there are low numbers of voters within a constituency for a particular party, and none of them has the inclination or ability to become the "local" MP then it is bound to be the case that a non-local might stand as a candidate.

In the case of the Lib Dems, I suspect they are matching the candidates of both Labour and Conservative parties in number, in part to prove a point when the count of votes shows they should have a similar number of sitting MPs but the "first past the post" system doesn't allow it to happen.

As for your local situation, AvadaKedavra, has it been a "safe seat" for years, and was there a Lib Dem candidate in 2005 (can check on the BBC Election 2010 website pages). In either case I'd expect the Lib Dems to put up a candidate, partly for the votes count, and partly to see if people who are fed up of "punch and judy" constantly bickering will vote for an alternative, even if you find the prospect of it being someone from 'afar' a little disconcerting.

(Especially given the fact they are likely to be working with staff and/or volunteers in a local office, who will be able to fill in gaps in knowledge about local issues, and will be dealing with lots of the day-to-day issues while an MP is down in London.)

I always think this.
It's bloody unbelievable isn't it?

We are frinds with our MP (lived next door to him for many years) and he says level of talent and ability in average shortlist is dismal. So, lesson is, we need more able people as I suspent very easy..