A new political system for Britain

Ever since I was young I have listened to my Dad moan about how rubbish the Government in power is. I was born during a Thatcher government as most people in there 20s were, then we had Major, Blair, Brown and now Cameron, therefore I understand why my Dad constantly moaned. However a result of his constant moaning was that I switched off to politics, I felt; if the government is always shit then either I should fight as hard as I can to change it or I should ignore it. Being lazy I choose to ignore politics.  A conclusion I quickly came to was if governments and politicians are always wrong then the system itself must be wrong and until the system itself is changed I shall ignore politics. Unfortunately the system hasn’t changed and yet I am finding politics more and more difficult to ignore.

Changing the political system is not a radical idea and has been proposed by opposition parties, both the Labour manifesto for the 1997 election and the Liberal Democrats manifestos for the 2010 election supported a proportional alternative to the current first past the post system. However the labour party although stating in their 1997 manifesto

“We are committed to a referendum on the voting system for the House of Commons. An independent commission on voting systems will be appointed early to recommend a proportional alternative to the first-past-the-post system.”

never held such a referendum and the commission did not recommend a proportional alternative. The liberal democrats stated in their 2010 manifesto

“The Liberal Democrats will change politics and abolish safe seats by introducing a fair, more proportional voting system for MPs. Our preferred Single Transferable Vote system gives people the choice between candidates as well as parties.”

and yet the coalition is suggesting we have a referendum on introducing the Alternative Vote system. Although opposing parties recognise that people want more of their votes counted the party once elected into power on the old system neglects the wants of the people. This is partly the problem, our political system is more about a party getting power and then keeping power rather than doing what is right for the people. In our current system MPs all belong to a party and if these MPs want to be in an influential position they have to follow the party line regardless of whether it is of the interest of the MPs constituents. Those in positions of power are no longer speaking for the people but speaking for their parties.

I could go on for ever about why the system can’t work, won’t work but alas my writing and persuasion skills are not up to it. So instead I shall suggest a different system, and this is by no means a system that is bound to work or a system I think will be ideal (I am much more radical in my actual beliefs than I am prepared to write about in the public domain) but it would hopefully be a better system than the one we have now.

Let the system have two houses. A House of Commons and a House of Parties. Members of the House of Commons represent constituencies and are independent of parties and are elected by an AV or FPTP or really any single candidate voting system. This way these MPs represent the people of their constituencies and not parties. Members of the House of Parties are not elected directly but instead people vote for parties by a proportional voting system. Parties win seats in proportion to the number of votes the party receives. These seats are then given to any party member the party wishes to represent them - perhaps with the ruling that one has to be a party member for a certain period before the election to be given a seat. Policies would have to pass through first the House of Parties and then the House of Commons before being written into legislation.

This is just one way in which the political system could change, there are many and some most likely a lot better than my suggestion above. The key thing is to ensure that people get more representation and that politics is not just about political parties or even not just about the politics of two parties.

So how will this change come about? This is the all important question as we cannot rely on current parties to make such a radical change. Does this mean that a new party would have to be formed in order to make this change and how would the people, who do not trust the other parties, trust this party to make that change once in power. I think a party would have to be formed having only one item on its manifesto and that being a radical change of the political system. By only having one objective the party would be completely destroyed if it did not implement it. Also by only having one objective the party would be able to attract all those in favour of the political reform proposed (whatever it may end up being) no matter what their other ideals may be. This party once elected would then constitute this change, allowing perhaps a year for the change to be implemented and new elections to be held. During this year the party would then either disband or write a new manifesto which suit its members and hope for election into the new political system.

So… that is my idea and I would be interested as to what people think of not so much the actual political system I have proposed, as I have said I am sure someone more knowledgeable than me can think of a better idea, but the actual method of making the change come about. Please do respond.

Is Modern Democracy a Religion?

Watching the highlights of Obama’s state of the union address reminded me of something I have been thinking about recently – Is modern democracy a religion?

We spend so much of our time believing in the idea of democracy and promoting democracy and fighting wars for democracy that we fail forget to actually be democratic. Religious people spend so much of there time believing in the idea of religion, promoting religion and fighting wars for religion that they fail to actually be religious. Being religious is about being truthful to oneself, all of God’s other people and God himself; being good to oneself, all of God’s other people and God himself. Do we as a democracy not do the same thing, a true democracy is about the decisions coming from the people. How many democratic countries can truthfully say that that is the case. In the UK the only decision that comes directly from the people is that on election day we vote for a representative to speak and vote on our behalf in Parliament. Can we truthfully say that we, the people, get any say in the decisions of our country. We often vote for a representative who then goes and votes for policies against those he pledged before the election – how is this democratic?

Perhaps we should see democracy for what it actually is, like religions, it is a belief system that believes in an idea which would perhaps be nice if it existed but there is really little evidence that it does.