The Nomocrats – nature and purpose

In a free society, the guiding philosophy should be that ‘everything is allowed except that which is expressly forbidden’. Today it feels like that has been turned on its head, and instead we are banned from doing anything except that which the Government considers acceptable.

Yes, we need laws that protect individuals, society and the country so that people can go about their day-to-day lives in peace and safety. But we don’t need legislation on the minutiae of life. Of course, governments like power, and passing laws enables more power to be taken by the State.

We do not live in a Police State. We are governed and policed by consent, so perhaps its time to withdraw some of that consent. We don’t want MPs enriching themselves at our expense (whether they act within the rules they made for themselves or not); we don’t want police ‘kettling’ and assaulting innocent people during demonstrations; we don’t want a country where there is a ‘political class’ and ‘the rest’.

We don’t want to live in communities that are terrorised by criminals; we don’t want to live in environments strewn with rubbish and graffiti; we don’t want a society in which ‘looking after number one’ is the only priority nor one in which that is the only way to be safe and to succeed; we don’t want homeless people forced to sleep in doorways.

We want a fair society, with law that is focussed on what is just rather than how cleverly an expert lawyer can argue about the complex small print; in which those who need support can find it but everyone understands that they need to play their part.

We want politicians – whether Westminster or local authority – and civil servants to remember that there are two words in ‘public servant’, and both deserve equal emphasis.

Of course, none of this is radical or original thinking, and nor is it easy to achieve. But perhaps a start could be made if government was inclusive rather than exclusive; if it was truly: government of the people, for the people, by the people.

And that would be the essence of my fantasy political party – The Nomocrats (NO MOre CRAp ThankS).

Key principles would be: inclusive government; small government – not just metaphorically but literally, with the number of MPs cut from the nearly 650 at present to probably nearer to 300, and with all of those MPs involved in government, not just an elite Cabinet.