Liberal Democrats and some Conservatives will tell you that the economy needs protection from apparently evil corporations bent on world domination. There is a Competition Commission (formerly the Monopolies and Mergers Commission) for that purpose — to protect consumers from a company with no competitive limits on their actions.

The majority of Conservatives, though, remain on the right where we believe that while monopolies should be controlled, most other controls on companies are performed by the market. Regulations, legislation and regulatory bodies are hurdles to truly innovative companies and frighten off foreign investment (and so customer-assisting competition) and new companies.

Education has been the arena for discussion recently, so let’s consider that. In the UK there is a national curriculum. This means, effectively, that the state thinks it knows better what a child should be taught than the child’s own parents. When this applies to state-schools, then I think we can give the government a break.

But in Saudi Arabia there are private schools that educate to a private-school standard for fractions of the cost of private schools in England. The illiberal left have an almost obsessive dislike of the elitist private schools which are the norm here. They are an expression of the class system just as fox hunting is. But private education need not be this way. The lack of for-profit educational institutions must be caused by barriers to innovation and I would suggest that that is OfStEd.

The same can be said of the financial services industry. Two days after Legal & General reports record profits why should there be a complete lack of foreign-owned competitors? The simple reason for this? The FSA.

To sell financial products to adults, you have to treat them as children. The mis-selling scandals are not the fault of companies making false promises, it is the result of successive governments telling people to take no responsibility for the biggest decisions of their life (buying a house or pension) and to trust ‘Independent’ Financial Advisers who are, often, paid on commission. A conflict of interests this grave would be a scandal in any other arena.

The gulf between the major parties is often air-brushed by the ‘impartial’ media. The political compass, which I love so much, has all three major parties in different ideological hemispheres but we are supposed to think they agree on the major issues. A LibDem recently told me that the economic arguments had been won, that the only political battleground was individual freedom. I don’t agree.

Attacks on private car ownership by the environmentalists are ostensibly attacks on selfish people damaging the environment. And yet another look at the situation shows the old combatants assuming new roles: The left-wing is playing planet-saver while the right-wing is playing the freedom-of-choice role. What if the left-wing are not so much attacking car-ownership for its affect on the environment as much as attacking the social inequity produced by non-use of public transport?

There are many, many Conservative recyclers — we care about the environment. But I wonder how many bus-users are also Conservative voters (unless they’re too old to drive)? Have the battle-lines remained while the argument has changed? I have said it before, but I firmly believe the solution to car-use lies in technological solutions — technology is not the enemy of the environment (any more) it is now in a unique position to protect it.

Michael Howard promised to increase the speed limit to 85mph at the last election which makes sense according to my argument — and at the same time, the current government has watched over punitive speed-camera installations, hours of police time wasted on traffic rather than on train-crime and the base misuse of the 1991 Road Traffic Act.

Let us stop pretending that the three parties have reached consensus on these issues and accept that these differentiating lines are healthy for debate and democracy. And please let us hear from the Conservatives and LibDems how important it is that the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill is not passed.

At the next election we shall hear an excellent Conservative agenda which, like in 2005, should win if policies are the distinction between parties. That we did not win in 2005 shows how much more influence being cool and headlines has on the electoral result.

So, with Blair out of the way, let’s ask our public representatives to tell us loudly what the policies are and let us make a decision based on those. Let us let people chose between:

- Low-tax, European free-trade, vigorous and innovative economy with genuine individual freedom;
- Low-tax, no EU interference, vigorous economy with low individual freedom;
- Medium-tax, EU-sadlled economy with genuine individual freedom; and
- High-tax, EU saddled, low-individual freedom.
They are, in order, the Conservatives, UKIP, LibDems and Labour.

I can, it appears, get through an entire general political post without mentioning the undeniable injustices of the lack of an English Parliament (damn — failed)!


Posted In: Political, Science, News and Politics, David Cameron, Conservative, Labour, Environment, Green, Police state, Liberal Democrats, Liberty