Fair and prosperous UK
This is the manifesto which would get my vote, which I would like to see.
I would like my country to be well governed, to be harmonious, prosperous, and de-carbonised, as well as being tolerant, welcoming and socially liberal.
Politics
Politics should be democratically representative
. In the UK or US systems, anyone voting for a losing candidate in a voting region has wasted their vote. Elections just depend on ‘swing states’ or ‘swing constituencies’. The rest of the country is irrelevant to the result. This cannot be called democracy. Some form of proportional representation is essential for votes to mean something.Political decisions should be evidence-based
Medicine is becoming this way. It should make reference to other countries who have tried the same thing. New policy initiatives should be trialled first. For example, the government wants to stimulate growth by cutting taxes? How many examples are there of this working in recent times?
Politics should not be buyable with party donations
The UK system is tailor made for corruption. Could anyone imagine that a businessman would pay millions into a political party and not expect some influence as a result? Even worse, a businessman could make donations to the party and the party could award public contracts to that same businessman. So the party would be using public money indirectly to boost its own coffers.
Political parties should be funded by the state, proportional to the votes they received at the most recent election.
Donations should have a monetary limit, say £1000, and be only permitted from individuals. Making, and accepting, donations from organisations should be a criminal offence.
I initially thought that donations should be banned outright. However, in a situation where the incumbent government had a large majority, but it has lost support, it would gain an undeserved advantage if funds were only based on the previous result. It would create an inertia resisting change. Allowing individual donations also allows new parties to emerge, if they have a large amount of public support.
Economy
There should not be widespread poverty
This is a failure of the benefits system, as well as the economy. In the UK, Universal Credit has a lot of good ideas but it is not adequately funded to achieve what it needs to achieve.
In particular, child poverty must be eradicated. All children in primary and secondary education should have free school meals available.
Immigrants, appropriately screened, must be welcome in this country
We need them to maintain our economic wellbeing in the face of a continually ageing population.
The country should be energy independent
As it happens, this requires harnessing renewable resources on a grand scale, which conveniently also helps us to achieve de-carbonisation.
The country should be as food secure as possible
Water should be publicly owned
It should not be possible for rich people to pay a lower rate of tax than poor people.
The financial and banking systems in the country should be designed to maximise investment in this country.
Society
The government should not wilfully create divisions within society
Education should be a priority at all levels
Otherwise how can we compete in an increasingly knowledge-driven world economy?
The country must have a stock of state-owned housing
This will provide quality housing for all that are not able or don’t want to buy. Private landlords should be phased out through taxation and rent controls, as they do not contribute to the supply or the quality of housing. If this is regarded as too draconian, and unfair to conscientious landlords who maintain their properties and charge fair rents, then a system of quality checks on rented accommodation should be instigated, with the power to compulsory purchase properties which are not at an adequate standard. These properties would become part of the local authority social housing stock.
Amazingly, only 2 days after I wrote this, I saw exactly the same ideas in Andy Burnham’s mayoral manifesto for Manchester.