Missing Manifesto - 6 comments
Now you've all read and inwardly-digested the Labour 2005 manifesto, what one pledge or promise would you like to add or change to make it just that little bit better?
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Now you've all read and inwardly-digested the Labour 2005 manifesto, what one pledge or promise would you like to add or change to make it just that little bit better?
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6 comments so far...
I'd add something about taxing land sites which are left abandoned/derelict/empty. London (especially) is supposed to have the most expensive land in the world, yet prices are kept artificially high by derelict sites being kept out of use.
I'd also force the Land Registry to register and find the identity of the owner of every single square foot of land in the country.
Your comment about the Land Registry is an interesting one - but would the burden of responsibility lie with the LR or the landowners themselves?
I suppose in practice this would have to be tax relief on "land use" (construction work, farming of the land) as it's easier to define types of usage than whether something is really left idle. I'm no expert as you can tell.
This got me thinking about that long-lost policy, Nationalisation of the Land. Assuming the government could ever afford to do it legally (though there are some pretty fundamental political issues involved), the elimination of landlord profit and the huge reduction in rents would have an incredible impact on land utilisation.
Peter, I think we could let the Land Registry (or some improved agency) do it as we have detailed satellite maps of Britain and GPS. There is no technological reason why most land in Britain isn't registered. But I agree, it should be the responsibility of landowners to identify their holdings within a reasonable time -say two years.
Any left over land would automatically become Government (not Crown) property. I expect mostly the left over stuff would be motorway verges, disputed wills and so forth.
Fundamentally, I would argue for land value rental taxation. The Labour Land Campaign are pretty sound on this.
How about this:
A third Labour government will undertake to introduce a total ban on private automobiles two years after the election (May 5th, 2007). Certain sectors of the community (a full list to be developed in consultation, but expected to include registered medical staff, firefighters, registered disabled, and those living in extremely isolated locations [a full list of which will be developed in consultation]) will be given a further year's extension, and all current car owners will be provided with advice and assistance on how best to adjust to the new circumstances. Public transportation will be free to the passenger.
Local public transport systems will be run on locally produced biodiesel, while the national rail system will be renationalised in its totality, and expanded dramatically. All freight haulage will be expected to take place by rail by May 2008 which is when commercial vehicles will be banned. All ambulances, police cars, fire-engines and other such vital services will be switched to locally produced biodiesel by this date.
The current national fleet of personal cars will be recycled into wind turbines, a large-scale process which will require an unfortunate, one-off re-exploitation of the remaining national coal assets. All precautions will be taken to ensure that clean-coal technology (as far as that's not oxymoronic) will be employed during this process and a significant increase in the national proportion of electricity being generated via non-fossil means on an ongoing basis is likely to offset this one-off use of coal.
Oh, I could go on... you get the picture ;-)
jim.
During election campaigns, with all the delivering of leaflets and newsletrers, and the knocking on doors I always find myself wishing there were some laws to force every house to have a number and to ban letter boxes at ankle-level!
I haven't actually read our copy of the Labour manifesto as its been signed by Tony & Cherie and we don't want to damage it... but I am certain it does not contain a promise to halt all further 'right-to-buy' council house sales and that is something I would like to see.
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