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"I feel frustrated. I feel the whole mode of modern British Government, Whitehall and Westminster, is in a profound way counterproductive."

So says Andrew Phillips, as he would want to be known, and we should listen. Personally, I would add anti-democratic, dysfunctional, depressing and, more than anything else, increasingly unnecessary. He goes on to say:

"We have politicians and civil servants who have done nothing outside parliament. All they are fit for is passing new sky blue laws."

In a century we have swapped one ruling class for another, plutocracy for psephocracy if you will, where careerist spinmeisters will do anything to attract a vote at the expense of ideological debate. But more ominously this puts personality ahead of principle. The winners in this battle delude themselves that they have a mandate for almost anything that pops into their little heads as if they and only they are capable of governing.

Modern British government (perhaps western government as a whole) is like a mediaeval papacy (complete with a corrupt curia and all that papal bull crap!) and we need to rekindle the political equivalent of the reformation's "priesthood of all believers" or the enlightenment's rejection of a higher power altogether for whose favours we need some intercessor to mediate. We need to foster a belief in all citizens' right to self-governance before anything else, the sovereignty of the individual over the state.

The beast that is the state is increasingly only able to sustain itself against its own people by ever more coercion. Globalization threatens to empower the individual to the detriment of the state. Individuals and voluntary associations are more than ever before able to form communities not restricted by geography, to operate in markets once only accessible through intermediaries, to choose where to live, work, play, shop and pay taxes or not, none of which need be in the same jurisdiction.

We need to deconstruct the state, slay that beast. To reconstitute government as something to which we voluntarily cede only those functions that we cannot arrange for ourselves or in our communities, geographical or otherwise. To communicate, learn from and learn respect for those other basically decent individuals and associations of individuals oppressed by a world of states that seek to aggregate power to a ruling few. An age of co-operative individualism. Individuals seem, largely, to be able to make more friends than enemies, states more enemies than friends. We no longer need those states to network on our behalf when we can do it for ourselves.

My one regret about Andrew Phillips is that, having recognized some of the problems, he finds himself too tired to stay and try to change them. But we all run out of puff some time. Those who agree with him need to carry on that fight with ever more urgency.

Spotted this on Guardian Unlimited today: Mac adverts on behalf of exploited Chinese workers

You know those artsy Mac adverts where a couple of people explain why they have a Mac against a white background - well a group has done one highlighting the plight of workers in the electronics manufacturing industry in the far east mostly. As you watch it, of course, bear in mind that since Macs basically use the same bits inside as any other PC they're not particularly worse than anyone else - just that the slightly "holier than thou" (I'm a Mac user - I can say that) advert style is easy to spoof.

But it puts me in mind of another one of my unrealised "inventions" - the "Fair Trade PC". We get Fair Trade clothes, footwear, foods. We can try to buy locally produced goods. But with computers and most other consumer electronics we're more or less stuck with what we're given. Why not a "Fair Trade" PC? People pay a premium for Jonathan Ive's beautiful designs, why not for better conditions for the workers?

Cllr. Gavin Ayling from Adur publishes what one presumes is the Tory "line" on Lib Dem tax plans. Whilst I'm not clear from his comment:

Just a direct quote from CCHQ today, it’s all pretty obviously wrong… And yet the LibDems steal votes from the Tories in the country and from Labour in the cities… They’re lies, people, let’s hear that before wasting our votes!

...whether he's saying that the message put out by CCHQ is "all pretty obviously wrong" and "lies" but that aside, let's have a look at some of their criticisms:

Among the Liberal Democrats’ plans for over 40 new taxes are:
• VAT on new homes. Liberal Democrats would make homes less affordable by slapping VAT on new housing – inflicting a stealth tax on homeowners, especially first time buyers. New homes currently do not pay VAT. They advocate ‘new homes paying VAT at our new harmonised lower VAT rate’ (Liberal Democrats, Affordable Homes in Safer, Greener Communities, Policy Paper 69, November 2004, p.20). VAT at 7 per cent would add £12,000 to the cost of an average new home in the UK.

The purpose of this change is made explicit in the document cited (I was on that policy working group). The fact that VAT is not charged on new homes but is on renovation and repair of existing homes is a disincentive to better use of our existing housing stock. We cannot unilaterally abolish VAT on such renovations and improvements so the only way to negate this disincentive is to rate both at the same, lowest possible, level. Currently most renovation VAT is at the higher rate I believe - so this would reduce that by as much as we are able to whilst levelling the playing field.

For a party that tends to fight against new build, I would have thought that the Tories ought to support something that encourages better use of current housing stock in preference to giving in to pressures for new build sprawl.

• Tax to park at work or to shop. They would ‘establish private non-residential parking levies (including out-of-town retail and workplace parking)’ (Liberal Democrats, Policies for Transport, Policy Briefing 24, March 2003).

Yet it's okay in Tory controlled Oxfordshire to charge us to park at home? Or on-street parking up by 170% explicitly to discourage driving into town at certain times?

• Pensions tax. Liberal Democrats stated yesterday that they would raise £3 billion by scrapping tax relief on private pensions for higher rate tax-payers (The Daily Telegraph, 9 June 2006). This would further weaken pension saving.

If they were worried about the effect on investment I would agree. However to imply that this is going to jeopardise the savings of those who already don't save enough or at all for their pensions is just naive. Salting excess income away in the form of additional pensions contribution, whilst good for investment, is also one of the biggest and most exploited income tax avoidance measures in use in this country by the already very wealthy usually with very good pensions provision already. Together with the proposed removal of the plan for a 50% tax rate on incomes this is likely to be neutral at least on everyone but the very wealthiest. Most people who have only average pensions savings or none at all would be a million miles away from being affected by this change.

But the point is taken - the Tories do now have to fight for their core constituency haven't they...:)

• Second homes tax. Liberal Democrats have already called for 200 per cent council tax on second homes (Policy motion passed at Liberal Democrat Party Conference, September 2003). Under local income tax, this would be replaced by punishing business rates on second homes (Liberal Democrats, Scrap Council Tax: Liberal Democrat plans to replace council tax with a local income tax, January 2004).

Actually since policy is also to change Uniform Business Rate into a locally set and collected Land Value Tax (called Site Value Rating) second homes would fall under this regime and not UBR. And rightly so. The monopoly of holding land out of its best permitted use ought to be taxed as it has a social cost in the form of availability of affordable housing for the resident population of any area. If they want to publicise our policies, they could at least get them right!

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