Daniel Hannan MEP and Douglas Carswell MP go for it:
Hannan and Carswell show how a future government could actually shift powers back, from Brussels to Westminster, from Whitehall to town halls, from the state to the citizens. Their plan aims to restore honour and meaning to the ballot box. It would disperse power among communities, through localism and through referendums.
Skim reading suggests this document is both magnificent and magnificently readable with 30 concrete, detailed proposals to renew Britain:
- Abolish MPs’ perks
- MPs to be bound by the same laws as everyone else
- Elect the House of Commons Speaker by secret ballot
- Confirm Crown appointments of senior Commons Clerks
- Elect select committee chairmen
- Parliamentary committee hearings to appoint the heads of non-departmental public bodies
- Parliamentary committee hearings to appoint Permanent Under Secretaries of State and the heads of Executive Agencies
- Annualised budgets for non-departmental public bodies
- Scrap state subsidised political broadcasts for political parties
- Scrap state-funded electioneering for political parties
- Scrap use of public money for political parties
- Require all donations of over £1,000 to be registered
- A smaller ministerial payroll
- Open primaries
- Sheriff Bill
- Scrap the Human Rights Act 1998
- Withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights
- A Bill to guarantee the supremacy of Parliament against foreign treaties and domestic judicial activism
- Appoint senior judges through parliamentary hearings
- Parents’ Freedom Bill
- Schools’ Freedom Bill
- Localism Bill
- Set councils free
- Healthcare to allow opt outs but guarantee treatment for those who do not
- Local welfare
- The Great Repeal Bill (YES!)
- Parliamentary committee hearings to appoint Heads of Mission, Ambassadors and High Commissioners
- Parliament to control trade policy
- Direct democracy – local
- Direct democracy – national
Please do invest £5 to download a copy.
Tags: Conservatives, Constitution, Democracy, Optimism