SWPE Manifesto: The Best Course for Britain

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  • Abolish and destroy capitalism,  and create a socialist state run by the proletariat. The economy will work according to a variation of keynesian economics, keynesian communism. This will be a mixed economy, but the only legal forms of private enterprise are workers cooperatives, similar to John Lewis and other firms which exercise workplace management, these workers cooperatives are allowed to make profit for themselves. The public sector will have more state control and will be run off the taxpayer creating money for the state, as is common place with nationalized firms, the difference is that in this society, the unions will have a major say in the running of these public industries and services, and the government will be heavily assisted by officers of each trade, helping the cabinet ministers decide the best course for their respective industries.

  
  

  • NHS to be completely re nationalized, ban private firms from taking up services. Reverse Health and Social Care Act. Restore NHS to it’s original state and bring health spending up to 12%. Retain GP workplace management but heavily reform it so that it does not include private companies. Reverse most reforms made to the NHS since 1969. Ban all forms of private healthcare. People who smoke, are obese, or drink too much alcohol receive much less stuff for free, and only emergency care and programmes to help them stop what they’re doing.

  
  

  • All forms of private education should be banned, this includes private tutoring. The only tutoring students should be given should be by the school, and all students who need help in their studies should be given it at an equal level. Also return all schools to the control of the local council, and ban faith schools. Home education and same sex schooling is allowed, but must be given a court ruling to determine if this is the best thing for the child, and should never be allowed for religious reasons. The child must also have a certain amount of contact with children his own age, or interaction with the opposite sex in the second case. Make R.E optional for schools and make sex education compulsory. Ban teaching creationism as a valid theory and sack every teacher who believes in it regardless of the subject they teach. Ban evangelical christians from coming within a certain radius of schools and anyone which does and hangs up billboards like ‘Jesus loves you’ shall be fined.

  
  

  All children will be required to do an hour of exercise every day during school. Sports and self defense are included in this, as well as more basic physical activity such as athletics. The promotion of a healthy lifestyle should be very present from a very young age. We will follow the Finnish model of education very closely, including compulsory pre school education from 1 - 7. All extra curricula activities will be funded by the state, allowing all children to get first class music and drama lessons, and we will introduce a new subject: Political Education, to be taught from year 5, where children are taught about how the political system works and how to be an effective and enlightened citizen.

  
  

  Also, it is compulsory that once a week there is an assembly about what’s going on in the world, and students should be encouraged to pay close attention to what’s happening and read the news. Students will be instilled with a sense of patriotism and raising the flag every morning would be a compulsory routine. History lessons will focus mostly on Britain at Primary school, however at Secondary school it is to have more of an international focus so that people are intellectual and fully aware of the world around them. All citizens also need to have a good scientific knowledge, so we must make unit 1 science harder make sure every child gets at least a C in science and politics, as well as english and maths. Abolish tuition fees and give every university student grants to help them get by.

  
  

  • Embark on a vigourous secularization plan. The burka will be banned everywhere, as well as the hijab in publicly owned buildings (private sector can make it’s own rules.) End prayers in parliament, abolish the Church of England, and remove all christian references from all government institutions. If Mustafa Kemal Ataturk could ban the burka in Turkey, why the hell can’t we in Britain!

  
  

  • Heavy constitutional reform. The House of Lords will be abolished, as will First Past the Post, and constitution as a whole completely restructured into a parliamentary republic. The political system will consist of a bicameral parliament: the legislative branch, a supreme court: the judicial branch, and a president, a prime minister and cabinet, the executive Branch.

  
  

  In the legislative, the lower house: the National Assembly will contain, 600 MP’s, and the upper house: the Senate, will consist of 100 senators. MP’s are elected through Mixed Member Proportional Representation (300 FPTP, 300 List PR.) Each area will be assigned a list MP of each party that they can contact in addition to their local MP, so that they can have an MP who sympathises with their views and to ease the workload of the constituency MP. Senators will be elected on pure Party List Proportional Representation. Senators cannot propose laws, and are there to scrutinise, delay, and amend bills, but do not have an absolute veto.

  
  

  The Supreme Court of Britain will consist of 8 judges which are appointed by the president and approved by Parliament. They can block a bill if a public body considers it to be violating the British Constitution..

  
  

  The president is elected for 10 year terms and he is the head of state. He is politically impartial and appoints the prime minister, who then appoints the cabinet. The prime minister however must be approved by the Assembly and cannot be removed unless the Assembly calls a vote of no confidence. He cannot propose legislation, but can advise, amend, delay, and veto. Usually, the president will rule for life.

  
  

  • Increase government grants to local councils, especially ones which are deprived. Make council tax more progressive by bringing in a mansion tax. Make empty properties illegal and force landlords to rent them out or sell them to the council to avoid speculation. Start a state owned housing company which would buy up private housing and make them social housing. Build millions of new social houses. Maintain Right to Buy but put the money back into social housing.

  
  

  Renationalize all infrastructure, and ban foreign governments and enterprise from owning any shares in it. These would include:

  
  

  • British Rail
  • British (formally Royal) Mail
  • British Telecom
  • British Energy
  • British Electricity Authority
  • British Waterways
  • British Nuclear Fuels
  • British Steel
  • British Airways

  
  

  All of these nationalized firms would have a certain amount of worker democratic control over the workplace, although it would be completely owned by the state and funded by the taxpayer. Ultimately the power is shared between the workers collectives and the government, with the government being at the top but with the workers, being specialists in their field, giving advice and influencing the decisions of the government.

  
  

  • Increase the top rate of income tax to 50%, increase corporation tax for large businesses to 35%, but lower to 10% for small businesses. Make consistent tax rate across all British territory. Ban companies not disclosing who the beneficial owner is and setting up in other countries for the deliberate purpose of avoiding tax.

  
  

  • Bring in carbon tax. Set incredibly ambitious targets for the phasing out of fossil fuels, and work extremely hard to create a country which runs entirely on as little carbon as possible in a short space of time. After a while, ban all fossil fuels imports and encourage other countries to do the same. All cars should be electric or run on renewable fuels such as hydrogen or biofuels, with all of our electricity coming from renewable, nuclear, and carbon neutral sources.

  
  

  • End reliance on foreign ownership interests and invest heavily in industry. Aim to become an industrial economy like Germany and Japan, and close the giant trade deficit. Bring back these industrial centers to the midlands, north east, Wales, and Scotland and breathe new life into Britain’s industrial heartlands. Become more self reliant, bring in exchange controls to control capital flight, and deflate our currency so our exports become more competitive. If we move from an economy which requires a strong currency to an economy which requires a weak one, it will mean that we can spend a lot more without worrying about economic repercussions. Create a development bank like Germany’s KFW and use it to invest in a huge industry revival project.

  
  

  • End the 35k threshold for non EU migrants who have already worked in the UK for 5 years. I believe it is economically counterproductive as immigration brings so many benefits to the country. I would like visas to be easier to get for skilled workers, and I would open up our borders to refugees, hoping to take in about 1 million. Our asylum process would involve thorough screening, and a requirement that they fully integrate into our culture. I would also let certain immigrants in based on their values and close the door on others who are devoutly religious. For example, it should be very difficult conservative christians and conservative muslims to get Visas, and they only should if they have exceptional skills. However, sex positive and scientific people will be let in much more easily.

  
  

  • Create a nationalised firm of the arts, which will support struggling writers, musicians, game developers, animators, and movie makers. The firm will work as follows: members of the public can become members of the organization and be paid a small amount of money, artists come to the organization with an idea, and that idea is taken to a certain amount of organization members. This could be an idea for a game, TV show, movie… etc. If the idea is received well, then the state will fund the production of the media and give the creators a base salary regardless of how well what they’re creating does.

  
  

  In the state cinema, all new movies which are not part of previous franchises and are from begining directors, will have an equal advertizing budget. There is no fixed price for any movie, instead, people are encouraged to pay however much they think the movie is worth on how good it was after they’ve seen it, with an additional form they can sign if they wish on what they liked and what they didn’t. Then, the movie’s which gross the most are slowly given more advertizing that the ones which grossed the least, and the movie may have sequels and the director and writer will be promoted. The creators will also receive 50% of the profits whereas the state takes the other 50%, and how the production teams share is divided is decided democratically based on contributions that actors, writers, and other production members have made. In these votes you cannot vote for yourself, and you must instead vote for someone else who you thought did a good job. All of this is a similar thing with other forms of media such as theatre, music, books, and video games.

  
  

  As mentioned before, all students regardless of background will have the opportunity to learn skills which nowadays are reserved for those which have money. This includes music and drama lessons.

  
  

  • End benefit sanctions. Reverse welfare cap including the bedroom tax and benefit cap. Abolish Universal Credit and re establish specific benefits for different things. Increase minimum wage to £10 an hour and make living wage and minimum wage the same thing.

  
  

  • Local government will have more rules from the central government in addition to more funding. Of these will include free bus services, public libraries, and free swimming pools and gyms. Outsourcing of these projects are banned, and the facilities must be directly from the council. Also, an ambitious school project will see schools in poorer areas of Britain given special attention from the central government so that they match the school quality of London. Add in elements of direct democracy into local councils and create a PR council system to replace the current ward FPTP.

  
  

  • Follow a Norway style rehabilitation prison system, try utmost hardest to avoid reoffending by teaching people how to behave in society.

  
  

  • Have heavy press regulations. Prosecute and exile Rupert Murdoch for corruption and propaganda. You can only own shares and benefit of one newspaper, and if you will lean more heavily to one political viewpoint you must include that on the front page, ‘for example, Socialist Worker.’ To be able to remain political neutrality in the eyes of the law, newspapers are required to offer multiple different viewpoints. The limit for individual donations is reduced from 500 pounds to 50 pounds. Also foreign citizens are banned from owning any newspapers or shares in newspapers. Only British citizens can start newspapers or own shares in them.

  
  

  • Create a federation of Britain, with the states of Wessex, Sussex, Mercia, Northumbria, Scotland, and Wales. I wish for Britain to have a population of around 95 million people, so that it can remain a loud voice and dish out a bigger punch on the international scale.
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