hall artiste under her maiden name of Betty Frankiss, Johnson won by 3,001 votes. He made his maiden Parliamentary speech in May 1950, on the subject of controls on housing, about which he had professional experience as a director of land and property development companies. Johnson opposed restrictions except to control the size of new homes. Taking up a constituency interest, in June 1950 he called for reform of the licensing laws. Local campaigns At the 1951 general election, Johnson found his Labour opponent was his friend Lewis Cohen. He increased his majority to over 5,000. In November 1953, Johnson prompted laughter in the House of Commons with a question to the Secretary of State for War asking whether he would employ troops to clear seaweed from the south coast to exterminate the breeding grounds for a new type of fly, Coelopa frigida. Johnson claimed that the flies were advancing on London and urged the use of troops with powerful flame-throwers. He was in touch with his constituents in urging restrictions on the sale of obscene postcards, and in calling for action against 'Teddy Boys'. Grand National campaign Johnson began a campaign against animal cruelty in 1954 when he first tabled a motion about the death of four horses in that year's Grand National. Johnson asked for Parliamentary time for a debate on the subject and was rebuffed. He then raised the question in an adjournment debate, pointing out that in the last five Grand Nationals, out of 192 horses which had started, only 36 had finished and nine had had to be killed. Johnson called for an inquiry and demanded the end of heavy whipping. Johnson was in a minority of 32 Conservative MPs to support an increase in the Parliamentary salary in May 1954; the issue caused some concern among his constituents but the executive council of Kemptown (Brighton) Conservative Association passed a unanimous vote of confidence in him. Police corruption It was only after winning re-election in 1955, again against Lewis Cohen, that Johnson became more controversial. He began to feed information about local police corruption to a team from Scotland Yard investigating it, which caused annoyance. He kept up the pressure and in 1957 a major inquiry was called into bribery and corruption, which involved officers running protection rackets among Brighton bookmakers and nightclubs. Early in 1956 Johnson backed moves to end capital punishment, and when