10 Reasons to Vote Lib Dem
1. You Want a Stronger Economy
The Liberal Democrats will ensure a stronger economy. We will shy away from making the cheap, short-term solutions that we have seen from Gordon Brown and the Labour party in the past 10 years. The economy is a long term commitment, responsibility, and if mis-managed, problem. The consequences of a poorly managed economy can affect the country for decades, and for many future Governments.
With this in mind, we will keep the independent Bank of England, and help it make the best decisions for the country's future economic strength, by having it take into account more economic criteria, such as house prices, not just controlling inflation, when setting the interest rate.
2. You Want a Low Tax Party
The Liberal Democrats will reduce the overall tax burden of the country, and especially that of those on low and middle incomes. Our policies, of fairer, and more direct, taxation, will lower taxes for as many people as possible. We will strip down and make huge savings from the massive centralized Government we have now in order to achieve this. We will increase the lower threshold of Income Tax to £10,000, to both give the low paid a break, and to vastly reduce the amount of paperwork involved in processing tax returns, making a double saving.
3. You Want the NHS to Work for You
The Liberal Democrats will give power back to the Local Councils to make better decisions about the running of local hospitals, and will give control back to Doctors and Nurses, rather than making huge centralized decisions.
We believe that the Health Service is a basic right for citizens, and as such will reimburse you for going private, should the NHS not be able to treat you in time.
4. You Care about the Environment
The Liberal Democrats want to make decisions to both help the environment and people who want to do something about it. We will invest in proper public transport, more high speed rail networks to major cities, to allow people to take trains rather than cars.
Once the train networks are in place, we will vastly reduce taxes on petrol, and charge people more for using busy roads, which will have the dual effect of persuading some to use the trains, and not hurt those in rural areas who genuinely need their cars.
5. You Want our Schools to be World Class
As with so many areas of our lives today, our schools are controlled by the Government directly. We will reduce the amount of red tape the teachers have to suffer through, allowing them to spend more time concentrating on teaching, and remove masses of targets. We will cut the majority of the centralized tests, it's nonsense that 7 year olds are sitting a centralized exam.
Nowadays, some of our schools have another problem of students who cannot speak English, mainly due to it not being their first language. This can cause alienation, and hurts the education of both the foreign student, and holds back others in their class. The Liberal Democrats will address this issue head on, giving those children extra support and lessons.
6. You Care about Your Civil Liberties
The Liberal Democrats will have no ID Cards, no innocent people's DNA being kept on file, no children being fingerprinted at school. We care about our Civil Liberties and our basic human rights, which are absolutely non-negotiable.
7. You Believe in De-Centralization
The Liberal Democrats believe centralization is one of the most fundamental problems facing this country. Everything, from our health services to our schools to the tax system, is a massive centralized mess. This costs countless billions of pounds, raises our taxes, and takes decisions away from local communities. We will give power back to local councils and communities.
8. You want Less Crime
The Liberal Democrats recognise that prison, as it stands at the moment, doesn't work. Unlike the Conservatives, who seek to appeal to the "lock 'em up" crowd by advocating tougher sentencing, we are realistic. Firstly, we don't have any free prison spaces, so to imprison someone, we'd have to free someone else. Secondly, the re-offending rates in the UK are incredibly high. Prisoners have overwhelmingly high rates of drug use and illiteracy. They get out of prison, with no skills, and can't find work at all, so commit more crimes.
The solution is not to lock them up again, the solution is to assist them in getting work and skills. The Lib Dems will introduce a massive education program for prisons, along with anti-drug initiatives and programs to help those who come out of prison to stay out.
9. You want Politicians to be Accountable
The Liberal Democrats beieive in openness and clarity, and as such, we will implement rules so that MPs expenses are independently audited, and receipts are required for every penny spent. MPs are representatives of your constituency, and as such, we will implement rules where MPs can be "fired" from their jobs by the public if they show frank disregard for expenses rules.
We'll put our money where our mouths are. Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrat front bench team have already released their accounts. The remaining Lib Dem MPs will be doing so as well shortly.
10. You want a Fair Deal for Pensioners
The Liberal Democrats will increase the state pension in line with inflation to give pensioners a fair deal. We will drastically simplify the process in line with our policy of cutting centralization and red tape. We will establish an independent review of Public Sector pensions, with any savings invested towards the normal State Pension.
We will also scrap the unfair council tax, based on the value of your house, which unfairly hits the most vulnerable in our society.