Lets get Britain back on track!

This last week there have been a plethora of news stories on a number of subjects including giving more powers to local councils, changes to devolution, forcing faith-based schools to admit other religions and freedom of religious expression. My belief is that the very fact that these four issues have come up like this just go to show that it's time that what is currently known as "the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" starts to change... and change to the benefit of the people who live here.

In other news this week it seems that our monarch, Queen Elizabeth 2nd, has cancelled several public appearances due to ill health. Why is this important to this blog? Well, notice that in her absence the country didn't fall apart. The places that she was due to visit didn't suddenly cease to exist, if anything things probably ticked along quite nicely, and that brings me back to the original purpose of this particular piece.

Our great country. Since before the time of the Romans these islands have been ruled by one king or another (apart from a brief spell in the 17th century that is). We learn in school that many of these were great rulers who did a lot for this country. Others were not so good; some were mad, others war-mongerers, some were just lazy. Unfortunatly if you operate a system whereby the job of running the country is passed down from father/mother-to-son/daughter you're going to get this occasionally. But is this something we can accept in the modern world? We live in a world where people want to have freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom of movement. Increasingly, and thanks partly to the current war on terror, we're losing many of our freedoms. What most Brits don't seem to realise anyway is that technically speaking we don't have any of those rights anyway. If you were born in Britain you are not a Citizen, you are a Subject. Wether you like it or not, all of the important things here are "owned" by the ruling monarch. Her Majesty's Government, The Royal Mail, HM Customs and Excise, Royal Air Force, the list goes on. The democracy we see is an illusion, one that can be pulled out from under us at any time, and even though Elizabeth hasn't done so, who is to say that Charles will be so ready to let the government do what they want given his past record?

Unfortunatly, even if we removed the monarchy from the equation our current system of government is badly flawed too. Although we supposedly live in a "United Kingdom" things differ depending on where you live. If you live in Scotland you live in a region where laws can be made locally, your regional assembly has tax-raising powers, your money is printed by local banks, public rights of way don't exist. If you live in Wales you have a local assembly that has a few minor powers... but nothing of what the Scottish have and you don't even get to print your own money. Northern Ireland doesn't know where it stands most of the time. So you folks print your own money, but your regional assembly is so screwed up because one side refuses to speak to the other one most of the time. Those of us who live in England probably have the worst deal these days though... we're still run by a parliament which contains members from those other 3 regions of the UK who already have their own regional assemblies!

Add to this that the second chamber of our "national" parliament isn't even elected. It's members are chosen by the goverment of the day... not exactly what you'd call democratic.

At a more local level we all have some form of "regional government" in the form of our local councils. This isn't much better though. Many people don't bother voting in local elections and as a concequence we wind up with council chambers made up mostly of members of one of the 3 main national political parties; these groups will generally just be extensions of the national party and the mayor is usually appointed by those in power. There is no method of keeping executive powers in check and as a concequence local councils can run roughshod over all and sundry and do what they like - look at the 80's when we had "loony left" councils banning sports days in schools and now where we have the "loony greens" who want to tax us for not eating the packaging on our cornflakes packages and for parking our cars outside our own homes!

So, what do we need to do? In my opinion we need a complete top-down shake up of the whole system.

1. Scrap the monarchy. Our head of state should be elected. Some people think that this should be a "ceremonial" position, others believe that a President should be able to exercise some form of control over the elected assemblies. I personally prefer the latter, but in either case there should be no hereditary power and we should be able to vote for whoever is in this position... and their term of office should be a fixed period with the next election date known well in advance.

2. Reform the Commons and Lords. The former should remain largely as-is but the system of "whips" whereby a party can force it's members to vote in a particular manner should go, as should the "Parliament Act" which allows them to over-rule the Lords. As for those Lords, they need to go too. The whole assembly should be elected using a system where it is unlikely that the result would mirror that of the commons. Clearly the names must go, but something else we should have, like with the head of state is a fixed term for each assembly - overlapping so that one remains in power when the other changes. Snap elections shouldn't be allowed (other than perhaps for no-confidence motions) and we shouldn't be left guessing how long our government will be in office.

3. Reform regional government. If Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland want their own regional assemblies then fine, they should have them. But so should England - without being split into "regions", and all 4 assemblies should have the same powers. There should be a level playing field. In the same way local government should be reformed. County councils should remain as should town councils, but the latter should have an elected mayor who has powers of veto over decisions made by the council and should have a fixed term of office. Neither the council of the mayor should be able to act alone in the manner that Ken Livingstone seems to have done in London.

Doing this will create a "Federal Republic" and so many other things will have to change. The name will have to go, our national anthem will have to change and we won't need to argue any more about who's head gets printed on the money.

More than this though, we need to take some other steps to ensure our government doesn't get taken over by certain interest groups. Religion in public life needs to be banned! It should be illegal to preach religion in schools paid for by tax payers money (although I'd be open to faith-based schools getting grants, but by no means full funding!). People running for public office should not be allowed to stand on religious grounds and people working full-time for these bodies should be bound by the same rules - no preaching from the office. What church you go to and what you do in your own time is your business, but I should not have to ask for my children to not be taught religion in school, I should not have to fight to send my children to a good school because I don't believe in the school's particular brand of "God", and I should not be told I cannot work or shop on a Sunday because somebody else thinks I should be in church!

Finally, and most importantly, what we really need is a written constitution and bill of rights. It's ironic that, although a vocal portion of my countrymen are anti-Europe, that we actually have more rights as EU Citizens than we do as British Subjects. I'm actually quite annoyed that my first chance to have a written constitution has been scuppered by all those Sun- and Mail-reading zealots who seem to think we've got the best system of government in the world. But basically we have no rights; we get what we see because the monarch of the day chooses not to argue... but that could change at any time and we have no way out if it all goes wrong!

I for one look forward to the day I live in England, part of the Federal Republic of Britain. I live in hope that we can also be a fully functioning part of Europe, driving our cars in km/h, buying our litres of petrol in Euros. Of course I want us to still be speaking English and having our own elected government.

What I want most of all though is to live in a properly democratic country without having to sell up and move abroad. Is that too much to ask? Clearly it is!