Improve the country in a year...

[Since1982]

Abolish 'Buy to Let' mortgages

I agree with the sentiment, if something is not done, property ownerships will decline for the 'many' until we have a new rich super elitist class that own all bricks and mortar. I am very much in favour of taxing buy to let property owners intelligently, this could lead to fair deal for first time buyers. Let's face it, many people got very very wealthy from increased property prices and did absolutely sweet FA work in gaining such an advantage. Tax em I say!

But BTL owners do pay tax. Income tax on rental income and capital gains tax when the property is sold. You might want to suggest they pay more tax but at least start with an appreciation of the current position.

 

[ROKERITE]

Tackle the spiralling overpopulation by cutting all child related benefits for third and subsequent children, with the long term plan to phase them out altogether.
End all state run faith schools. All state schools should be completely secular.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

1. Scrap Trident programme & HS2 - there's £150 Billion savings straight off
2. Introduce some kind of pre-vetting for admission to A&E departments
3. Pay child benefits in a format that can't be used to buy beer'n'fags

 

[somerset]

1. Scrap Trident programme & HS2 - there's £150 Billion savings straight off
2. Introduce some kind of pre-vetting for admission to A&E departments
3. Pay child benefits in a format that can't be used to buy beer'n'fags

Dreaming again:

1) Its a ten year wind down period if it ever happens, and 2000 people out of work.
2) Never be allowed, already resisted by Labour and the left, and even medical staff say they can't turn people away who turn up wanting treatment.
3) They tried it with food vouchers for asylum seekers etc, the left resisted it saying it stygmatised those using them, and infringed their rights and civil liberties.

 

[Butch Willykins]

And so the non risk takers remain poor but still jealous?

it's nothing to do with risk. BTL is basically intergenerational theft.

I've absolutely no gripe with landlords, if you own a property then it's totally within your rights to let that property. My problem is that people are borrowing money (BTL Landlords) and getting others (Tenants) to pay it back for them. It's making life impossible for youngsters trying to buy their own properties, especially in places like Brighton and London.

At least bring in a rule that means that BTL mortgages can only be offered on the Landlords ability to repay the loan, not projected rental income. That might level the playing field a little.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Dreaming again

Not in the least: I have complete power, nobody can stop me doing anything, I can literally do whatever it takes...

Oh, and at the end of the year if the country isn't any better I am prepared to be bummed by former Palace manager Ian Holloway live on TV.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Re-balance the economy with manufacturing and an emphasise on small to medium sized privately owned companies.

 

[somerset]

... I am prepared to be bummed by former Palace manager Ian Holloway live on TV.

That's a whole new ball game.......I thought it worth quoting again though, just for effect.

 

[somerset]

Ban all brewery/pub groups,...Punch Taverns and Enterprise Taverns in particular. Return our cultural heritage 'locals' back to free houses......now I am dreaming.

 

[withdeanwombat]

Ban everything, and tax what's left at 95%.

I quite like Ian Holloway.

 

[Pavilionaire]

Restrict the ability of high street commercial premises to remain empty for more than a year.

More than half of the empties in my local high street have changed hands but the new owner is either pissing about or waiting for the economy to change. We're talking 4 or 5 years here. The licencing law should be geared around the premise "shit or get off the pot".

 

[Deleted member 22389]

Re-balance the economy with manufacturing and an emphasise on small to medium sized privately owned companies.

Agree 100%. We need manufacturing and we need young people to become the next engineers because these essential practical skills are slowly disapearing. We can no longer rely on the service industry.

How would I find the money? For a start I would stop all foreign aid and make this money available to small and medium sized business, so it does the good for our country.

The billions we pay out where we don't seem to get anything back, would create millions of jobs and millions of new start up companies in the UK. And the money would only goto companies that are actually manufacturing something.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

'Sorting out' the country implies, to me, putting it into a position where the subsequent trajectory is 'better' than the one right now. In other words, making real lasting change.To change the trajectory requires subtlety and consent. Human beings move slowly forward by interaction. There is a creative tension that operates, especially over issues that divide, and it is this that drives us towards solutions. Sometimes people/society makes mistakes, so we have to recalibrate (consider Germany before and after its dance macabre with fascism). I like to see this process operating through democracy. The idea of imposing a solution with an individual (member of NSC) having absolute power to do anything is a fundamentally absurd proposition. Having read some of the ideas, I'm amazed at how tiny minded and self-obsessed some people are. Most of the suggestions are either incredibly parochial and would change nothing, or would be unworkable.

OK, so let's play. My suggestion for creating a lasting improvement, with limitless possibilities and power, why not magically have everyone living happy lives, contributing to society to the best of their abilities, and being able to live quiet and separate lives if they find difference threatening?

If you simply mean making things momentarily better for the majority, and without this having any lasting benefit, then magically putting fifty grand into everyone's account would suffice. If you mean remove social tension (again, momentarily) then 'delete' all ethnic minorities, gay people, gingers, uglies, skin heads, hippies, social workers, fascists, neo-fascists, communists, crypto-communists, vegetarians, and anyone else who you may find threatening or strange. Mind you, the extra fifty grand would create a large amount of drunken violence, so within a few days there would be vigilantes and chaos. And when all the people you regards as threatening or strange have been deleted, you may find that someone else, who finds you threatening or strange has had you deleted . . . . there are certainly a few on here I'd happily delete ;-)

 

[PILTDOWN MAN]

1. Scrap Trident and redirect into:
2. Infrastructure such as new roads (A21 for instance) reopening rail routes.
3. Build affordable home especially in the rich's playground the countryside.....every local parish in the countryside should have at least 15 new houses built primarily for low rental to local people.
4. Long term empty houses (those not identified) automatically become the ownership of the local council to be used for low cost housing.
5. Huge tax breaks for singular businesses in rural areas such as shops/pubs/garages.
6. Long term tax free status to new small businesses employing long term unemployed.
7. Scrap National Insurance and have one simple tax at two rates 25p and 40p in the £.
8. Set up Government Bank specifically for lending to first/second time buyers and small businesses.
9. Scrap car tax and put it on fuel.
10. Lower Vat but allow a County tax.
11. Scrap stamp duty under £600,000

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Organise a nationwide competition to empirically discover which of Cameron, Osborne and Gove's faces is the most punchable.

 

[jgmcdee]

Well obviously first order of business would be the castration of Ian Holloway. Forward planning and all that.

I'd have to dig in a bit to work out the basic numbers but:

- Everyone obtains a citizen's basic income: a certain amount of money from the state regardless of age, wealth, employment status, whatever, which constitutes a minimal living wage
- Set up a flat rate of income tax for individuals, with no exemptions or exceptions
- Something similar for businesses, based on profits but including monies paid to wholly owned subsidiaries (or by wholly owned subsidiaries) to count as profit
- Ensure that this happens: http://xkcd.com/843/
- And probably lots of other stuff, but I'm so distractible...

 

[topbanana36]

Stop freeloaders pouring into the country and kick out all these hate preachers and clerics

careful frutos might deport you for having those views.

 

[red star portslade]

Ban everything, and tax what's left at 95%.

I quite like Ian Holloway.

" Alright my lover, i'm going to leave your arrrrrrrrse looking like this"

 

[stripeyshark]

Deport all Islamic fundamentalists.

This.

 

[beorhthelm]

Re-balance the economy with manufacturing and an emphasise on small to medium sized privately owned companies.

you only have a year and complete power, not a decade and a magic wand. what are you going to manufacture and how/why are these SME going to do it, or be better than large companies?

- Set up a flat rate of income tax for individuals, with no exemptions or exceptions
- Something similar for businesses, based on profits but including monies paid to wholly owned subsidiaries (or by wholly owned subsidiaries) to count as profit

second most sensible policies put forward so far.