We have heard a great deal about David Cameron’s ‘Big Society’ and the Con-Dem coalition’s localism bill. However the truth is, with the ‘Big Society’, we are only two steps away from actually having to store tarmac at home and repairing the potholes in the roads ourselves. Believe it or not this could actually happen! The truth is Cameron’s ‘Big Society’ has nothing to do with real localism and transferring power and decision making to communities. This is because localism will never work in the present centralised British state.

Currently when income tax is paid, it is basically handed over to central government. This is what funds our contribution to the European Union, finances our armed forces in foreign military ventures that do not concern us, gives money to foreign despots and countries that can afford to fund a space programme, and last but not least funds those expensive luxuries our M.P’s desire most. What’s left, after several other bureaucratic baskets have been filled is then handed to local authorities. The whole system is top managed, which is why those at the top use money on the items mentioned and the local care home closes down. The big bad Sheriff of Nottingham lives, but has moved to Westminster! Therefore, whichever way you look at it real localism in such a top managed system is doomed.  It is less Big Society and more Big Con!

As English Radicals we have a very different approach to this top managed system which rips off the people of England. We believe in a system which transfers the funding and decision making process of government from the top to local communities. Our system would be based on the highly successful federal Lander system, as operated in Germany. Here the main roles of government are decentralised to a number of regional and city states.

Proof of the beneficial aspects of introducing a federal system for governing England can be found by comparing the English city of Liverpool with the German city of Hamburg. Liverpool City Region has roughly the same population as the Hamburg City State. Yet the comparison ends there. Hamburg is wealthy and attracts industry, media etc. Liverpool, despite the gallant efforts of its communities and its proud history, sadly lags behind. This is the fault of the centralised British governmental system and not the people of Liverpool. Similar comparisons could be drawn with Bremen and Cornwall.

Here in England ERA believes in federal decentralisation to a level that is acceptable to local people. This would mean the people deciding whether to be governed by a County or City State/Province or possibly one based on a historic region, such as Mercia or Wessex. Each state/province would have its own directly-elected Governor, aided by a cabinet and a council of local representatives to supervise and amend legislation. The local representatives would be elected by neighbourhoods with community councils which are either elected periodically or are a Directorate of local voluntary groups. These neighbourhoods would be given a budget according to population and needs.

Ideally, party politics would be removed from local neighbourhoods with representatives elected as the best individual to represent the specific area, and not towing any party line. This would give power to the communities and less to political parties with one eye on their national fortunes and aspirations. For those that believe Government is not possible without political parties, look to Guernsey, an island where no political parties sit in Government. By promoting this system we would witness a bonfire of bureaucrats across the country, thus releasing further funding for local communities. This is what real localism is all about and it has nothing to do with any ‘Big Con Society’.

Finally let’s return to the subject of funding and how the new City, County or Regional Sates/Provinces would be financed.  As English Radicals, we believe in reversing the present system of handing tax to central government and then begging them for money to fund local services and projects. Instead we would allow the new states/provinces to retain sufficient money for services and projects, and then make a donation to central government for national concerns, foreign representation and defence. A re-organisation of lottery funding could assist this process. Perhaps this way, Westminster would be far more careful with our taxes and not allow them to be thrown away fighting pointless wars, funding the EU gravy train or giving it to foreign regimes whose leaders live in luxury and whose people remain starving.
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Our ancestors were able to make money in trading, because of one secret – everyone is different. Different peoples and regions, had their own food, drink, clothes, art and raw materials. Some were liked and became world famous, some fell out of favour and exist in history books. The whole system worked because of those differences.

In today's corporate homogenised world, the very things that made areas famous has been diluted and prostituted for profit. We now get Cheddar cheese made in Italy, Scotch whisky made in Japan and China. Goods designed here, but made in China because our highly inventive engineers cost too much. For the corporation, cost and profit are all that matters, humanity and difference means nothing without a bottom line. Difference today decides on whether to go skiing or scuba diving, it's geographical not human.

Yet looking at this kind of world, don't you feel like something is missing? People cheapened because they're different, be it colour, religion, sex or disability. Nobody is above anyone else, nobody should have special laws to protect them, why can't we rely on a basic humanity instead?

People are ground down and used up in the name of profit, highly experienced and skilled people worth less than cheap foreign labour. People disabled fighting for their country are worth less than someone who inherits money and has no personal merits, where clique is worth more than custom, and where basic decency is of no value.

That is the England we have today, it's being made worse by a corrupt party politics. Most parties can't be told apart in the House of Commons, politicians are being given money by foreign powers or corporations to buy favour, yet the democratic votes of the English people are cheapened by such corruption. We are told we're all the same, but we'll give other partly autonomous parts of the UK more than you get, based on some spurious claims made over 30 years ago.

Why can't people buy Cheddar cheese from Cheddar? Why can't we buy local produce that hasn't travelled thousands of miles? Why can't skilled people be paid what they're worth? The answer right now is because our politicians have sold out to the corporation lifestyle, they have formed a class of their own based on how you were born, what school tie you wear and how much you inherited. If I didn't know better I'd think I was in 1020 AD not 2010 AD.
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We hear a lot of talk of political reform and localism from the Con-Dem government. However do they mean this, or is it yet again all talk and promises, the usual status quo of major party politics.

As English Radicals we seriously doubt whether the ‘ConDemned’ government will have the courage to give local government real power to serve its communities and end the current centralised method of gathering income tax in favour of a local system. By organising the decentralisation of Revenue and Customs and giving control over THEIR citizens taxes to the localities we would see real local democracy in action. Perhaps then, instead of going cap in hand to central government for money to build tramways or schools, local councils would have the revenue base to support borrowing to fund such projects themselves (if their electors so decide). This is the English Radical vision and this is REAL political reform and localism.

The English Radical Alliance challenges Mr Osborne and the Con-Dem government to be truly radical in their cuts to public services, and abolish all government ministries (except Defence and Foreign Office) and hand the power AND the money to local government.  
 

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