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Power to the people: restoring and reimagining local government democracy

With turnout plummeting and faith in Parliament collapsing, BERT SCHOUWENBURG explains how radical local government reform — including devolved taxation and removal of party politics from town halls — could restore power to communities currently ignored by profit-obsessed MPs

POLL AFTER POLL has demonstrated that British voters are largely opposed to the privatisation and outsourcing of essential services and want them returned to public control.

With energy prices soaring, train fares the most expensive in Europe, schools falling apart and our rivers and coasts becoming open sewers, this is hardly surprising, yet the politicians who have the power to effect the change that people want do little or nothing about it.

Worse still, in the face of huge protests, the 411 Labour MPs effectively condone and encourage genocide in occupied Palestine as Israel’s armed forces have killed and maimed tens of thousands of children with materiel and logistical support from their government.

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