My Own Policies

Thank the lord, we’re finally through all the election guff. At the time of writing this, I don’t know who’ll have won the election.

I do think, though, that a plainly-put list of policies and ideas would’ve been a far better idea than the wanky ethereal guff spouted in most of the manifestos this year. And I reckon that if a party had put forward the following list, they’d have had a pretty good chance at getting in. I could be wrong, but I figure it’d be a set of policies I’d vote for, anyway.

The policies I’d put in are (in no particular order, but as they occur to me) :

• Banning HGVs and coaches from the outside lane of all multi-carriageway roads. That would mean HGVs and coaches could overtake etc on three-lane motorways by using the inner two lanes, but wouldn’t be able to do so on dual carriageways and two-lane motorways like most of the M11
• Reducing fuel duty
• Reducing our energy imports by increasing our nuclear-power capacity and promoting green energy
• Making Inland Revenue into an efficient organisation
• Local authority management reductions
• NHS improvements – removing managers, increasing “front-line” staff
• Speaking plainly and clearly rather than evasive waffle
• [Added later, because I forgot] – Electoral reform, making it law that everyone eligible has to vote, but there is a “None of the above” option on the ballot.
• [Added later, because I forgot] – Enforcing use of fuel duty/road tax to maintain/upgrade transport and roads
• [Added later, because I forgot] – Looking at re-nationalising train service, along with investment from the above point to upgrade rail network/rolling stock

How would this be paid for? By (to a greater or lesser degree) :

• Increasing tax for earners of >£100,000
• Chasing non-dom non-taxpayers
• Increasing VAT by 2.5% to 20% – when it was dropped from 17.5 to 15% everyone said it was a piss-poor reduction – so will they complain if it increases by the same?
• Improving efficiency – not by cutting costs, but by improving efficiency and reducing red tape and crap

There’s probably other bits I could add to this, but it seems like a pretty good list so far.

Mind you, I fully expect to be ripped apart on some of these by certain readers. 🙂