If you were standing for election, what would your policies be?
Election; what would your policies be?
I like some of the ones in Mark Thomas' Manifesto, particularly the one about anybody who is in favour of ID cards being banned from owning curtains.
One of the things I would do would be to make it so that the country cannot go to war without a referendum, with the proviso that casting a vote in favour of war would automatically include enlistment in the armed forces.
Ok good question.
1 Switch to 100% nuclear energy production in 20 years including making battery cars mandatory.
2 Create a flexible tax credit that ensures anyone working always gets 10% over what they would have in benefits. Also to allow support for those on flexible contracts.
3 Raise income tax. And punish serial tax evaders with exile (well they send their money over seas?)
4 Bring in mandatory prison sentences for all crimes of violence or potential violence. Bring in internal exile for habitual antisocial offenders. Make community service far tougher and ensure it is enforced.
5 Reorganise libel law extensively.
6 Allow individuals to top up NHS payments with insurance. The unemployed to only be allowed to use services during office hours.
7 Benefits to be paid partially in vouchers. Satellite TV etc to be barred from people unemployed over 6 months.
8 A special area of the judiciary to be established to enforce racially sensitive areas of the law. Including banning restrictive dress, cousin marriage and forced criminality and illiteracy.
9 Automatic revokation of citizenship for any immigrant commiting a substanial crime in their first year in the UK.
10 All people recieving government services of any description not to be referred to as customers.
Oh yeh and arm the police with permission to shoot anyone drunk in a city centre wearing a baseball cap and shouting.
I didn't expect you of all people to answer seriously.
Quote: sootyj @ April 17 2010, 12:33 PM BST7 Benefits to be paid partially in vouchers.
We could offer them lottery tickets too. Since the chances of winning the jackpot are about 17million to one, the country would still save loads of money even if we gave out several tickets for every £1 of benefit. And by increasing their chances of winning, unemployment would be reduced.
Good idea Noggett provided there was a 10 million pound windfall tax for unemployed lottery winners.
I'd like to replace money with something more useful. It seems that money is great for some stuff, but it tends to encourage commercialisation, which turns everything to crap. What we need is new, improved, 'virtuous' cash.
http://www.fridgemagnet.org.uk/toys/dave-met.php
Create an entire Conservastive manifesto at the push of a button.
I'd make benefits payable in fruit and veg.
A bit of quoting, and a bit of rewriting. Some good ideas laid down by sooty.
Quote: sootyj @ April 17 2010, 12:33 PM BST1 Switch to at least 75% nuclear energy production within 20 years (save any even cleaner technologies being perfected in the interim)
2 Create a flexible tax credit that ensures anyone working always gets 10% over what they would have in benefits. Also to allow support for those on flexible contracts.
4 Bring in mandatory prison sentences for all crimes of violence or potential violence. Bring in internal exile for habitual antisocial offenders. Make community service far tougher and ensure it is enforced.
5 Reorganise libel law extensively.
7 Benefits to be paid partially in vouchers.
9 Automatic revokation of citizenship for any immigrant commiting a substanial crime in their first year in the UK.
10 All people recieving government services of any description not to be referred to as customers.
Oh yeh and arm the police with permission to shoot anyone drunk in a city centre
Impose an annual cap on immigration (see: Conservative Party manifesto 2010).
Give victims of crime greater rights, and re-jig the law to work in their favour. To include quashing the conviction of Tony Martin.
Scrap ID cards.
Repeal and significantly re-write the Digital Economy Act.
Cut MPs by at least 10% of 2005 levels, freeze ministerial pay for 5 years, raise MP salary by 5%, and tie it to the Bank of England base rate in perpetuity.
Citizenship, work permits, benefits, council housing, etc, only provided to those with a specific level of literacy and numeracy: including fluency in English.
Prohibit outsourcing of call centres, particularly to India, 'cos you can rarely tell what they're saying.
Reinstate hereditary peers in the House of Lords.
Establish a compulsory register of lobbying activity and interests, to include: names of lobbyists, who they are working for, and which decisions they are trying to influence.
Repeal the Human Rights Act and re-write it from the ground-up.
Make prisons places to actually fear.
Slash overseas aid and development budgets by at least 90%. Levels can be re-assessed in 10 years, or once certain internal conditions are met, including a substantial reduction in government borrowing, debt, and re-filling of the nation's coffers; whichever comes later.
Restructure the NHS, removing middle-managers.
Eradicate top-down targets and guidelines in public services: nurses and doctors are hired for their ability to heal and help, not to follow orders; teachers know more about how to handle, control, teach, and enrich the children in their charge than the state does. One size does NOT fit all.
Introduce legislation to prohibit income tax from ever topping 43%, for any level of personal income: this should bring more people to base themselves within the UK, thus increasing tax revenues overall. However, individuals may CHOOSE to contribute more, should they so wish (this will not come with additional privileges or rights).
Quote: Aaron @ April 17 2010, 2:36 PM BSTCitizenship, work permits, benefits, council housing, etc, only provided to those with a specific level of literacy and numeracy: including fluency in English.
Because the average person seems to vote on the basis of stupid things like how nicely the candidate smiles, I'd like to see some link between a voter's intelligence and the power of their vote.
More grammar schools.
Much lower university fees. Money shouldn't be an object to getting into university, but intellect/talent should, so also make it harder to get in.
Oh yes, and inspired by this week, closing down airports for a few days on a rota system, so everyone gets a nice regular period of peace and quiet.
Quote: Nogget @ April 17 2010, 2:44 PM BSTBecause the average person seems to vote on the basis of stupid things like how nicely the candidate smiles, I'd like to see some link between a voter's intelligence and the power of their vote.
Ha, that's quite good! (Would be a little difficult to measure, quantify, and maintain the necessary records though, I fear.)
Quote: zooo @ April 17 2010, 2:49 PM BSTMore grammar schools.
Much lower university fees. Money shouldn't be an object to getting into university, but intellect/talent should, so also make it harder to get in.
Yep, good ones there. On the university point:
Make more funding available to universities, but restrict the number of places. Targetting that 50% of people should go to university is utterly ridiculous and shows the most basic ignorance of what the point of universities are. Ability and need should be paramount, not quota-filling.
The above to be matched with an expansion in small colleges and apprenticeship programmes.
Impose legal volume limit on mobile phones' external speakers.
Some great policies from Sootyj and Aaron
some of mine:
A referendum on the EU (obviously).
Repeal all New Labour's authoritarian laws.
Reduce the size of government.
Abolish the BBC.
Move towards a more direct democracy modelled on Switzerland.
Eradicate any notion of "multiculturalism": there are just people. Teach children about different faiths, cultures, ways of life, but they don't need to be pandered to and highlighted so much. This only breeds division and resentment when people see others to be getting a better "deal" than them.
Proceed with construction of a comprehensive national high-speed rail network.
Review public transport in urban areas and city centres, with a view to rebuilding the nation's tram network.
Raise taxes on air travel, particularly so-called 'short hall' flights, and on petrol.
Introduce dog licences.
Work for the destruction of (any and all political ambitions and ideas of) the European Union.
Abolish France.
Why abolish the BBC? 