Ukip's other policies, from bike tax discs to aircraft carriersIts well-known positions on the EU and immigration aside, Ukip has a curiously mixed bag of messages
Much as the Good Friday peace agreement saw Northern Ireland's once single-focus sectarian parties scramble to pull together policies on the likes of bus services and waste disposal, so is Ukip's second place in the Eastleigh byelection likely to bring increased scrutiny of its views beyond the two key messages on Europe and immigration.
Delve into the policy documents on Ukip's website and two things emerge most clearly. Firstly, while it is perhaps unfair to label them 1950s revivalists, there is a distinctly nostalgic tone to many ideas: grammar schools, respect for the police, a strong Royal Navy, regular references to ending "political correctness" and multiculturalism. Also, Ukip has the minor party's luxury of promising to lavish money on projects while being somewhat vague on where this cash will be found.
For an officially free-market party, Ukip made a perhaps surprising number of significant state spending commitments in its last full policy document, the 2010 election manifesto:
• Defence spending would rise by 40%, with the navy getting more than 70 new ships, including three aircraft carriers.
• The number of prison places would be doubled, with £30bn committed to flood defences and an unquantified further amount going to transport investment, including high-speed rail lines, more roads and improved ports and airports.
• Almost £90bn would be committed to a mass programme of building nuclear power stations.
The spending seemingly relies upon presumed savings from leaving the EU, which – the manifesto estimates, without giving a source – could total £120bn a year. There are similarly woolly promises about economies from cutting red tape and "non-jobs". Tax plans are more predictably new right, with a proposed flat combined income tax and national insurance rate of 31% for any annual income above £11,500.
One of the party's more controversial views is its position on energy and climate change. Ukip is avowedly sceptical about human-caused climate change, claiming that "more and more scientists are challenging the conventional wisdom on global warming". Ukip's solution would be a radical rollback of renewable energy projects, such as wind farms, in favour of nuclear power and the likes of shale gas.
While much of this combines into a relatively coherent message, some policy details can look contradictory or even a bit crankish, perhaps the result of one or a few activists imposing their personal opinions on a still relatively tiny party.
Education is a case in point. While schools policy is a fairly straightforward mix of free market and nostalgia – parents would get vouchers to spend in the private or state sector, with the latter seeing the launch of new grammar schools and a focus on the three Rs – the position on universities seems a bit more anomalous. Ukip is scathing about the "nonsensical target" of having 50% of people attending university, arguing for example that nurses need vocational training rather than degrees. Yet the party also wants a return to state grants for students rather than loans. As some education websites note, how do you reduce university access while simultaneously making it a more attractive option? By a very non-free market cap on places, perhaps?
Other details look fraught with unforeseen difficulties, or somewhat niche. The foreign affairs commitment to formally back independence for Taiwan has its arguments but would risk losing the UK very significant amounts of trade from an irate China. The separate policy document on animal welfare is perhaps laudable, but the public is maybe not at the stage where it needs a long list of specific Ukip promises about breeding pedigree dogs.
Cyclists who voted Ukip in Eastleigh meanwhile, might be alarmed to learn the party believes bicycles should have tax discs, while riders should pay for parking and walk their bikes across busy roundabouts to prevent "unacceptable delays to traffic".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013 ... bike-taxes
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