"We used to have a balanced economy in which the manufacturing base contributed massively, providing jobs, a tax base etc. The City boys decided that it would be more profitable to move those jobs to low-wage, high-profit countries, ie in Asia.

We had no choice, nobody called a referendum or made it part of their election manifesto. The City decided. And the parties all nodded their assent.

All our economic and financial woes follow from that decision, as does the widening wealth gap, the pension deficit, the triumph of the hedge fund managers and on and on." ( Memessime 3 May 2010)

Comment by INIREF

We could not call a referendum because we, as a people and electorate, have no right to do so. A recent example of a citizens' initiative in the realm of "big finance" is the Abzocker Initiative in Switzerland. Abzocker means roughly "Fat Cat". Bankers and managers who pay themselves excessively fall under this category. The Abzocker Initiative proposes that a national referendum be held to bring this sort of greed under control.

With the right to citizen initiated referendum in Britain then at least some warning shots could have been fired across the bows of speculators and lax regulators.

We need to introduce elements of direct democracy.

Electoral reform seems a worthy idea but we should not forget that only INdirect democracy would be improved. We are left with the "representative rule" allowing us a voice, choosing others to govern for us, once every five or so years.

It would be better for our democracy to introduce elements of citizen-led, direct democracy, which enable the electorate to introduce proposals and veto unwanted policy during the life of a parliament.

See more:
Arguments, free materials  http://www.iniref.org/index.enter.html
Election strategy for more democracy  http://www.iniref.org/

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