Welcome to the Freedom & Justice Party

Our first four years

In our first four years in government we will:

put people first in all our policies to create a happy and harmonious society,
end the shame of 4.3 million of our children living in poverty,
end the need for over 2,800 food banks,
scrap Right To Buy which has taken over 2 million homes away from social housing,
provide the funds for Local Authorities (LAs) to build top quality social housing,
repeal the 1961 Land Compensation ACT and allow LAs to compulsorily purchase building land at a fixed multiple of current use value (2 times).
scrap the unfair Council Tax and Business Rates,
provide 100% of the funds local authorities need to meet their statutory duties,
create a register all residential tenancies to ensure fairness and security for tenants and landlords,
fully fund the NHS,
provide incentives for GPs to join the NHS instead of being private businesses,
end the use of NHS resources by private health care,
provide proper care for people as they get older,
create a Citizens's Bank with 100% security on savings,
provide free nursery care, with meals, for all pre-school children,
bring education back under local control,
end our "one size fits all" education system,
convert trusts into companies with trustees as directors and beneficiaries as shareholders,
scrap the use of tax havens by UK citizens,
reduce tax on earned income to reward work, creativity and initiative,
increase tax on unearned income,
introduce a lifetime gift allowance and scrap inheritance tax,
control our borders and speed up asylum processing,
ensure that our financial system is tightly regulated - no more financial crashes!
invest in our manufacturing industry to make best use of our nation's creativity,
support our farmers to compete in a world market for food,
support our farmers to look after our countryside,
repeal the 1995 Agricultural Tenancies Act and introduce a right to buy for tenant farmers,
complete the Land Register and introduce a Land Value Tax,
rebalance our unfair distribution of wealth and economic development,
return national monopolies (water, energy, etc.) to public control,
support policies to ensure our planet is safe for the future,
end corruption by banning donations and gifts to political parties and politicians,
end the influence of foreign governments and special interest groups on our politics,
maintain a foreign policy independent of the USA and Europe,
create a genuinely free press owned an controlled by UK citizens,
end involvement in other people's wars - we are not the world's policeman,
hold a referendum on NATO membership, foreign bases and nuclear weapons.

Tidying up

Interesting facts:

Number of words in the bible: 783,000.
Number of words in the complete works of Shakespeare: 884,000.
Number of words in law relating to land and property in England and Wales: 5,000,000.
Number of words in the UK tax code: 10,000,000 (20,000 pages).
12 times more than the bible, 11 times more than the complete works of Shakespeare.

When chatGPT was asked to estimate the number of words in law relating to land and property in England and Wales it replied:

"Given the breadth and complexity of this legal area, providing an exact word count is impractical."

Why is this? Two reasons:

Time.
Legislation has built up over hundreds of years. New laws simply modified existing ones instead of repealing old legislation and replacing it with new - thus increasing size and complexity.
Deliberate complexity.
Law relating to land and property was written by those wishing to retain their ownership of land and property. Law relating to tax was written by those wishing to protect the financial interests of their supporters. Lawyers profit from complex law.

After the invasion of 1066 it took William the Bastard from Normandy a few months to enact laws giving himself personal ownership of all the land in the country. We don't know if he could read and write but he had no computers and no spreadsheets - only clerks with quill pens!

After building over 500 motte and bailey castles, and suppressing most rebellions, it took less than a year to carry out a survey of all land and property in the country and to record it in the Doomsday Book of 1086 so that taxes could be extracted.

If this could be done in the 11th century, with none of the technology we have at our disposal today, it will be even easier for us to repeal all legislation relating to land, property and taxes, and replace it with new laws, understood by all and with all the relevant data made freely available online for anyone to see

Land and property

As far as land and property is concerned it involves no more than:

All land belongs to the state (see below).
Land may be held from the state as "freehold" subject to any specified conditions.
Sufficient proof of freehold will be the official entry held by the Land Registry which will record details of freeholders, boundaries, the value of the land, any conditions and any charges against the land.
Ownership of property on land, buildings etc, shall be no different from ownership of any other object.

At the same time we will remove the anomalies of the Duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster and tidy up the relationship between the "crown", the "state", the "crown estate", the "monarchy" and the personal property of members of the current royal family. We do not propose to get rid of the monarchy though we will add the question to the referendum we will hold in the third year of our first parliament which will give people a voice on major issues that affect us all.

Tax law

As far as tax law is concerned we will start with the principle that tax is entirely separate from the way that government decides to invest and spend. Tax law will not be used to provide exceptions or special cases - these can be dealt with as part of government spending.

This will greatly simplify tax law since we have then to deal with taxes on:

Individuals. Earned and unearned income.
Companies. We will take advantage of the opportunity to redefine the different types of companies permitted under UK law. (Trusts will become companies.)
The self employed and partnerships.
"Sin" taxes: alcohol, tobacco, gambling.
Environmental taxes: air travel, fuel, etc.
Land Value.
Purchases (VAT).
Imports.
Gifts.

This won't please lawyers - but it can, and will, be done!

Why no wealth tax?

Because they have been tried and they don't work.

Implementing the list above will achieve the same thing.

Referendum

The 2016 referendum on continuing membership of the European Union set a precedent of asking citizens their views on topics that government felt it was not fair to decide on its own. A similar idea exists in Switzerland and many states of the USA.

In the third year of our first parliament we will hold a referendum on important issues as they are at that time. At the moment the initial set of issues is:

Do you wish to retain the monarchy?
Do you wish to retain our membership of NATO?
Do you wish to retain foreign military bases on UK soil?
Do you wish to retain nuclear weapons?

Why do we need these changes?

People feel alienated and they have lost trust in politics and politicians because no one has made any effort to solve the unfair distribution of wealth in our country This opens the door for divide-and-rule, scapegoats and populists like Trump and Farage.

it is simple: people don't see society as fair, they see people getting rich while they become worse off, they see politicians accepting back-handers, donations and freebies every day - they feel ignored.

The FJP is the exact opposite. We put our people first, our policies are designed to be fair and we will ensure that everyone benefits from a fair and prosperous society.

This is not "an uncosted pipe dream" - it can be done despite the fact that those who benefit from our current corrupt system claim it can't.

Look at the list above. Is it fair? Is it what you have the right to expect in a happy society? Can we afford it? Yes we can!

We believe politics should be about principles and policies - not personalities.

What does "fairness" mean?

Fairness means:

Putting social benefit above personal greed while allowing people to benefit from their personal hard work, initiative and creativity.
A fair distribution of our country's wealth.
Ensuring that the media is controlled by people who are UK citizens who pay tax here - we are fed up with foreigners, tax avoiders and public school boys telling us how to run our country!
Ending corruption in government - check the Register of Members Financial Interests to see who is currently bribing our MPs. No wonder so many Labour MPs are in favour of "increasing the role of the private sector" - look who is paying them!

Is it fair that

someone becomes wealthy simply by being born?
someone can lead a life of leisure having done nothing to justify it?
people can bring the world to its knees by financial gambling?
foreign countries intervene in our politics and elections?
people can escape their social responsibilities by living in a tax haven?
part of our media is controlled by non-UK citizens and those who pay no tax in the UK?

Can we afford a fairer society?

Yes, easily!

It is a political decision to create an unfair society where the rich get richer and the rest go nowhere.

It is a political decision to create a fair society where we all benefit from a prosperous society.

We opt for the second decision, and, as a society, we can afford it - despite what economists tell us - after all, they were the ones who failed to anticipate the crash of 2007/8, they are the ones responsible for the boom/bust of our economy and they are the ones who led to 14 years of austerity after 2010.

To put it simply: most economists consistently get it wrong, they don't know what they are talking about and they are scared to death of looking at the world in a different way - a way that leads to fairness, not exploitation and poverty.

Rethinking things

We have to stop thinking that government works in the same way as household budgets. We will never solve our problems if we think that "tax pays for things".

In the real world the government injects money into the economy, that money flows around to make things work then the government takes enough money back out (via tax) to prevent inflation. After all, you can't pay your taxes until the money comes from somewhere and the government is the only source of money!

It ain't, rocket science - but it is different from what we have been led to believe by economists, the media and politicians. More information here.