Government would rescind the Air Ministry's decrees on planes, pilots and policing. Many newspapers backing the opposition Conservative Party wanted to put pressure on Ramsay MacDonald's National government. One newspaper sent a telegram to MacDonald stating that, "To prevent the socialist government from being spoilsports, Lady Houston will be responsible for all extra expenses beyond what Sir Philip Sassoon (President of the Royal Aero Club) says can be found, so that Great Britain can take part in the race for the Schneider trophy." The gift gave Lady Houston an opportunity to attack the Labour government, with the declaration "Every true Briton would rather sell his last shirt than admit that England could not afford to defend herself." Later life In 1932, she offered to give £200,000 to strengthen the British Armed Forces. The National Government refused. She hung a huge electric sign, "DOWN WITH MACDONALD THE TRAITOR", in the rigging of Liberty and sailed round Great Britain. In a telegram to MacDonald, she wrote: She funded disruptive campaigns against the National Government at nine by-elections in 1933. In 1933, she financed the Houston–Mount Everest flight expedition, in which aircraft flew over the summit of Mount Everest for the first time. This was to show opposition to granting independence to India. In October 1934 Lady Houston sent a cable to the winners of the MacRobertson Air Race, Tom Campbell Black and C. W. A. Scott; "Your achievement has thrilled me through, oh brave men of my heart... If this does not make the Government sit up, nothing will ... Sleep well and feel proud of yourselves, as we all are ... Rule Britannia. God bless you both." Following her purchase of the Saturday Review in 1933 at the age of 76, she threw herself in a frenzy of activity as a newspaper proprietor determined to alert Britain to the weakness of its political leaders and the dangers of Communist infiltration of Britain. Frustrated by what she saw as the weakness of Ramsay MacDonald and then Stanley Baldwin as Prime Ministers she tried to push Lloyd George, Winston Churchill, and ultimately from 1935 the new king, her friend Edward VIII, into the role of virtual dictator of the country. In that she believed that Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler were strong leaders who pulled their countries, Italy and Germany, round from a state of decay, she wanted a strong British leader to