Tuesday, 22 March 2011

What do independents stand for?

The membership card for Liberal Democrats carries the first sentence of the preamble to the constitution. It reads "The Liberal Democrats exist to build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, in which we seek to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community, and in which noone shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity".That's not a bad sentence but the point I would emphasise is about party funding. If your money comes from unions or from big business then you could not use the same sentence in your preamble. Well you might try to use it but it just wouldn't ring true.

You may guess that I like independence. I want my policies to be written by party members, not by paid officials who serve their master. I would like independent politicians without reservation but I do have a proviso. How do you know what an independent politician is thinking. You may know this person very well and that's fine, but the chances are that you don't.

In Morecambe we have an Independent Party and some independent councillors. A couple of days ago I received a postcard sized leaflet entitled "Independence 4 Morecambe". I think it is another 'independent' party which split off from the other party - why I am not sure. The leaflet mentions words like integrity and decency but I don't know what they stand for. I think all parties and independent candidates use words like this. However they do tell us in the next few weeks that they will tell us what they want to do. That's quite a statement. I look forward to reading their constitution.

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