We can rid the country of burdens

As published in the Suffolk Free Press and www.dissexpress.co.uk, Friday, January 4, 2019

Firstly, a very Happy New Year from me to all this paper’s readers. As you may know, I’m a libertarian. That means my default position is that in most circumstances individuals should be allowed to make their own decisions with only a minimal interference from the state or any other authority.  When freed from outside interference, people are liberated to better themselves, their families and their communities – unhindered by a hydra of regulations and unproductive bureaucrats. The free market is the purest way to ensure freedom from such tyrannies and the most effective mechanism for creating wealth for as many people as possible. So, what would a libertarian 2019 look like? Here’s what I’d hope the next 12 months hold for our county and country. Firstly, we should warmly embrace a no-deal exit from the European Union. This would give us a chance to create a truly pro-business culture – one that is based on the mutual recognition of standards, the removal of ALL barriers to trading across national boundaries and which positions the UK as the global leader in free trade. This should be accompanied by a determined effort to relieve British-based businesses of all but the most basic regulations and taxes. In particular, the antiquated, complex and largely derided business rates system needs to be put out of its misery once and for all. Businesses are forced to pay rates, and other input taxes, BEFORE they have even begun to trade or produce something. They are a major disincentive to entrepreneurs up and down the land. A reforming libertarian government would replace rates with an output tax – at a sufficiently low rate that it doesn’t distort the value/price ratio of the product or services being delivered. The state also needs to back off from appropriating an unjust share of people’s income as well. The present Government had made much of increasing the income threshold after which people pay tax from April this year to £12,500. I would go much, much further and raise that to £14,000 immediately and by and extra £1000 each year with the immediate objective of making the threshold/allowance the annual equivalent to ‘The Real Living Wage’ on an ongoing basis.  This would apply not just to PAYE but also that invisible tax, Employees National Insurance. I’d partially balance the loss in revenue to the Treasury by significantly increasing the scope of VAT to unessential food items and other business services currently exempt or zero rated. After all, people have the discretion as to whether to pay something or not. They currently have no such choice with income tax. But I’d also take this as an opportunity to properly reduce the share of GDP that is accounted for by the public sector. I don’t think the so-called cuts that have occurred since 2010 have gone anyway near as deep as they should too. Our councils are full of non-productive roles involving people telling hard-working people what to do. It’s madness. So, more cuts please – and quicker. The role of local councils should be reduced to that of practical enablers: for example, providing the kits and equipment for community groups to take responsibility for clearing up littering and fly-tipping. Local councils also need to let go of the planning system. I would like to scrap planning requirements on any extensions, renovations or home improvements that meet a limited range of criteria on the basis that a qualified Architect has approved/certified plans & building progress.  I’d also hope to see a relaxation of all onerous financial rules on private landlords but provide ‘mutual’ assurance rule to protect both tenants and landlords. Our drugs laws are failing both addicts and wider society, so I’d like to see the piloting of schemes which legalise all such substances and which regulate and treat them as we do tobacco and alcohol.  We must take the criminal out of the supply chain and mainstream the sale of drugs, albeit with public health campaigns as to the dangers of their use.  If we were to follow the reforming policies above, by the end of 2019 we would be well on the way to creating a less burdened, more energised, more mutually confident and more prosperous country than the one we are at the present.