A Republican Manifesto

I haven't been reading the Standard a great deal lately due to religious holidays, but I guess it is full to overflowing with the inquest on Princess Diana. This has prompted me to publish my Republican Manifesto.

In so doing, I do not hold any grudge or feeling of ill-will against any of the Royal Family. I'm not against anyone. Nor have I any views on the personality or character of any of them. I have never met anybody Royal, but if I had done so it would make no difference. If you are a member of a Royal Family, you are schooled from your earliest years in the art of making a good impression to the public. None of us knows what the Queen or any of her relatives are really like, because we do not see them at home. Nor do I intend to join in any kind of a debate as to whether the Royal Family do their job properly. The facts are that in today's world, there is no job for a Royal Family to do. They are figureheads of ceremonial importance only, producing nothing, except for lots of column inches in newspapers together with an image of the United Kingdom (U.K.) as some kind of a medieval theme park rather than that of a modern country. It was to counteract this image, I believe, that New Labour in their early days in office started their ill-judged talk about "Cool Britannia".

It isn't enough for the U.K. simply not to have a monarchy. I see the conversion of the U.K. into a republic as a small but integral part of the process of the modernisation of all our governmental institutions, and of the production of a proper constitution for the country. It is beyond absurdity that a one-person limited company turning over a few thousand pounds per annum has got to have a constitution (called in the case of a company the Memorandum and Articles of Association), but the nation as a whole has not.

To begin with, I envisage the peaceful transformation of the U.K. into the United Republic of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, henceforth abbreviated as the U.R. As part of this process, all hereditary titles will also be peacefully abolished, so there will be no more Dukes, Earls, Viscounts and so on. The House of Lords will be abolished, and replaced by an upper chamber of Parliament consisting of representatives from the regional assemblies of the U.R.

It will be a fundamental principle of the U.R. that all political offices must be filled by a process of election. By way of contrast, not many of us know that at the time of writing this piece the most powerful woman in the country at present is Baroness Amos, the New Labour leader of the House of Lords, who also has a seat in the Cabinet. I am not saying there is anything wrong with her. I am saying that we have had no opportunity to vote on her competence for office. She has never fought any kind of election. She is what she is because Tony Blair took a shine to her. Under the constitution of the U.R., that would be impossible.

I would also propose that the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man will come under the ambit of the constitution of the U.R., and that they should lose their favoured tax status. We would want to co-operate fully with the United Nations on the matter of abolition of tax havens all round the world, so that every nation has a fair and transparent tax and finance system.

As a national Head of State, I would propose an elected President. The President would have to resign from all political affiliations as a condition of standing for election. He/she would be entitled to attend, speak, and vote, at all meetings of the Cabinet. The primary role of the President would be to assess the impact of legislation on the spiritual well-being of the nation. Civil service staff will be given to him for that purpose of a comparable number and rank to those working with a member of the Cabinet.

I would envisage that there should be no state religion, and that the advancement of religion should not be a charitable purpose under the legislation.

I would also wish to write into the constitution certain core values, which all civilised societies have agreed upon. Included in these are the right to free speech, the right to freedom of association, the right to freedom of religion, the equality of all citizens before the law, and the equality of the sexes. Included also would be the obligation to respect the lives, dignity, and property of others, and not to incite religious or racial hatred.

Most importantly, I would intend the constitution to make it clear that the objectives of Government should be to make the lives of the people more simple and straightforward. At the present we have a government that makes life more and more complicated every day. The policies of whoever is in government should be directed towards empowering the people to take charge of their own affairs so that we live fully functional and satisfying lives without the requirement for layers of regulation. That has to be the prime objective.

My opinions on anything are subject to change. My love for you will not change.