Democracy is ultimately about people, not institutions. Without the informed participation of the people, reforms can only ever have a limited effect. We need to provide people with the tools to engage with politics and a culture where everyone sees that they have a place in the political process.
Make Government More Open
Openness in government must become the norm. To achieve this:
- The Freedom of Information Act should be defended, its loopholes closed and the scope of the Act extended.
- Government must fulfil its legal obligation to publish local spending reports (which breakdown how much each government department and agency is spending in each local authority).
- There should be free access to publicly generated data such as the national postcode database and Ordnance Survey maps.
Inclusive Citizenship
We want an inclusive form of citizenship where civic rights are extended to as many UK residents as possible. We reject recent government proposals to narrow it further by removing the voting rights of Commonwealth and Irish citizens who are UK residents. We want to:
- Improve the teaching of citizenship in schools, with a special emphasis on teaching young people about rights.
- Lower the voting age to 16.
- Extend voting rights to all serving members of the armed forces.
- Ensure that all polling stations are accessible for disabled people.
- Grant voting rights to prisoners.
Engage Under-represented Groups
For political parties to be relevant to wider society, they must reflect the mix of the country they seek to represent. We want:
- Each political party to set targets for achieving fair representation, and to publish the results.
- All prospective parliamentary candidates to able to request a small amount of unpaid leave or flexible working to campaign.
- Each party to show how the party handles parental leave.
Broaden Party Participation
Parties must broaden participation beyond their members and improve internal democracy. Experiments in opening up candidate selection to constituents should be encouraged.
Political parties should be encouraged to broaden participation through incentive-based state support to encourage them to engage directly with the public and reduce the importance of rich donors in the political system.
This might take a variety of forms, including:
- A registered supporter system where parties would get a fixed amount for each person they register in exchange for giving them
a say over, for example, the selection of candidates. - Matched funding, where small donations of up to £20 are matched, pound-for-pound.
- Tax relief on donations, in a similar way to how Gift Aid works for charities.
Record of Action
Unlock Democracy organises People and Politics Day, a series of one-day conferences designed to inform young people about politics.
We run Vote Match, an interactive tool for informing voters about the policies of political parties. 80,000 people used this tool during the 2009 European Elections and our General Election edition will be launching imminently.
We have worked with the British Council on a number of projects to promote democratic participation in South East Europe.
See Also
