Your top ten policies.

[srb7677]

• VAT down to 15%
• Flat rate income tax @ 20% on anything above personal allowance.
• Minimum prices allocated to all U.K. produce. This will stop the likes of Tesco squeezing the life out of farmers.
• A cap on benefits payable to any one household. Households with 4 or 5 claimants getting £30K+ in benefits will be a thing of the past. Benefits would be paid in such a way as to limit the amount of non-essential items that can be purchased. Booze, fags, SKY TV etc.
• Road tax scrapped and added to the price of fuel, the more you use the more you pay.
• Local Authorities and Police would have to justify every speed camera. Sticking them up just as cash cows would end.
• INDY2 would be granted with the whole of the U.K. getting a vote.
• NHS would be run like it used to be, with matrons on the wards. NHS contracts would be scrapped and a proper system put in place.

I am not averse to a cut in VAT, but the money needs to be found from somewhere.

A flat tax of 20% would be higly regreesive because that is no cut at all for most basic rate taxpayers who pay that already, but a massive cut for higher rate payers. It is thus a massive tax cut costing billions purely for the benefit of higher earners, which is not a wise choice of priorities.

A better deal for farmers seems fair enough but who sets the minimum price and on what basis? And would this not be both inflationary and add to already rocketing food prices? We have enough people relying on food banks already.

A cap on benefits already exists. Any further tightening would simply impose further hardship. And a major component of high welfare bills is extortionate rents by profiteering landlords. Better to reduce this cost at source by capping rents.

I have long favoured scrapping road tax and adding it to fuel in principle, but right now is not the time for increasing fuel duty any further.

I am against speed cameras being used as cash cows.

Giving the entire UK a say on, for example Scottish independence, would be a travesty. You could get a situation where the Scots vote for independence but the more numerous English deny it to them. Imagine if the entire EU were given a vote on Brexit? Whether or not one of the national components of the UK wants to be independent or not is a decision for them, not the rest of us.

The NHS is a victim of too much privatisation and too many managers. Bringing back matrons and bringing all services back in house sounds like a good idea, but it will not be enough alone.

[Barry]

Indeed but unlike all you even older pensioners I dont bang on about how stupid or immature young people are. Give them a voice.  The ones who know nothing will dienfranchise themselves anyway by not bothering. Let the intelligent ones express an opinion at the ballot box.

MPs were recently trying to stop people marrying at 16, yet it's OK for them to vote?

The law says that a person is a child until they are 18 years old. Now, that's not calling them stupid or immature. Children mature at different rates and it is not practicable to test them individually, so the law sets the age of 18.
Like all age limits it is a one size fits all approach, it isn't broken, so why tamper with it?

[T00ts]

Indeed but unlike all you even older pensioners I dont bang on about how stupid or immature young people are. Give them a voice.  The ones who know nothing will dienfranchise themselves anyway by not bothering. Let the intelligent ones express an opinion at the ballot box.

And you are not ageist?

[srb7677]

You're an oldie. Above middle age.

Indeed but unlike all you even older pensioners I dont bang on about how stupid or immature young people are. Give them a voice.  The ones who know nothing will dienfranchise themselves anyway by not bothering. Let the intelligent ones express an opinion at the ballot box.

[srb7677]

Borkies, is right to say most would not, there are more than enough that don't now why add to it?

But why is the fact that many would not vote being used as a justification for denying it to those that would?

You old people constantly go on about the immaturity of young people as if you are the fonts of all wisdom. Judging my your age groups voting patterns and choice of reading, this is highly questionable. I will take no lectures from your age group about how stupid the young supposedly are.

I know that I knew more at 17 than many of the so-called grown ups.

[Streetwalker]

Why does it always seem to be oldies opposing lowering the voting age?

Good topic 

I dont think it should be based on age at all but on the contributions to the pot . The more % of your income you pay in the more say you have .
That means the unemployed ,kids , non working  pensioners, rich tax dodgers  and freeloaders dont get a vote .You could add some self employed brickies though to be fair it wouldnt make a hell of a lot of difference to them anyway .

abolish vat
abolish tax on beer
all kids go to their local school
no super stores allowed in towns 
private health care option (redution in tax/NI )
Forget green /carbon zero targets , its a load of horse shit
free local transpot 
Abolish the BBC 
reduce corporation tax 
cap on house prices /rents aligned to average incomes 

Palace get first pick in a new draft system , Oh was that ten already

Subject to alteration 

[Good old]

We have such people working at my workplace and paying their taxes. This earns them the moral right to a vote. If they can't vote politicians don't give a damn what they think. And I myself can remember being far more politically aware and knowledgeable at 17 than most so called grown ups. And referring to 16 and 17 year olds as children is rather insulting and typically ageist.

You better have a word with the education authorities who treat our young people as children  until eighteen regardless of labels ,is that thought to be insulting, let alone an ageist issue.?
Young people should be given a period beyond eighteen let alone sixteen to adapt and find their feet in the real world in my opinion . Just entering the world of work is not enough to have a solid understanding of what makes their world tick over. If they are going to vote they will soon enough. Borkies, is right to say most would not, there are more than enough that don't now why add to it?

[Barry]

Why does it always seem to be oldies opposing lowering the voting age?

You're an oldie. Above middle age. I had to wait until I was an adult to vote, when the age was reduced from 21 to 18.

It makes no sense to have juveniles voting. Anyone who needs an appropriate adult for a police interview should not be given the responsibility to make a voting choice.

[T00ts]

16 seems reasonable. We have 16 and 17 year olds doing adult jobs in my workplace, receiving adult pay and paying adult taxes.

Are you sure they are supposed to still be in full time education until 18?

[srb7677]

Do you feel that the average 16 yr old is really interested in politics enough to make a really informed decision or are they only really able to do as they are 'advised'? 

The ones who are not interested will not bother voting. This is not a reason to deny the vote to those who are.

[cromwell]

• VAT down to 15%
• Flat rate income tax @ 20% on anything above personal allowance.
• Minimum prices allocated to all U.K. produce. This will stop the likes of Tesco squeezing the life out of farmers.
• A cap on benefits payable to any one household. Households with 4 or 5 claimants getting £30K+ in benefits will be a thing of the past. Benefits would be paid in such a way as to limit the amount of non-essential items that can be purchased. Booze, fags, SKY TV etc.
• Road tax scrapped and added to the price of fuel, the more you use the more you pay.
• Local Authorities and Police would have to justify every speed camera. Sticking them up just as cash cows would end.
• INDY2 would be granted with the whole of the U.K. getting a vote.
• NHS would be run like it used to be, with matrons on the wards. NHS contracts would be scrapped and a proper system put in place.

There's a lot there I can agree with too except the cap on benefits per household,there are households where they get over that but aren't living the high life.

[srb7677]

Always? Didn't oppose it going to 18 how low do you want to go?

16 seems reasonable. We have 16 and 17 year olds doing adult jobs in my workplace, receiving adult pay and paying adult taxes.

[srb7677]

As an oldie I'm not going to disagree with you. For me it's a matter sheer lack of experience , and in so many maturity ,which is quiet different to intellect . We are calling these people children, because that's what they are.
We protect them from the actions of adults, because they need protection from being amongst other things being led by the nose into being abused in some way. We all have enough trouble not having politicians do that to us as adults. Why have a general principle of protecting them from the world as if they don't know what time of day it is, if we then ask them to make decisions where by knowing a lot more than the time of day would be more than helpful.
I would not object to the rest of the list , though Toots has a point, because it wouldn't amount to much if you don't get the financial areas working happily toward those policies.

We have such people working at my workplace and paying their taxes. This earns them the moral right to a vote. If they can't vote politicians don't give a damn what they think. And I myself can remember being far more politically aware and knowledgeable at 17 than most so called grown ups. And referring to 16 and 17 year olds as children is rather insulting and typically ageist. 

[Good old]

Why does it always seem to be oldies opposing lowering the voting age?

As an oldie I'm not going to disagree with you. For me it's a matter sheer lack of experience , and in so many maturity ,which is quiet different to intellect . We are calling these people children, because that's what they are.
We protect them from the actions of adults, because they need protection from being amongst other things being led by the nose into being abused in some way. We all have enough trouble not having politicians do that to us as adults. Why have a general principle of protecting them from the world as if they don't know what time of day it is, if we then ask them to make decisions where by knowing a lot more than the time of day would be more than helpful.
I would not object to the rest of the list , though Toots has a point, because it wouldn't amount to much if you don't get the financial areas working happily toward those policies.

[cromwell]

Why does it always seem to be oldies opposing lowering the voting age?

Always? Didn't oppose it going to 18 how low do you want to go?