Have you thought of anything radical, out of the box, that you think would be good for our society?

[waltzingparrot]

I have two:

1. Britain should be 'No Smoking'. I don't just mean no smoking in public areas, I mean we don't sell them . A chance to eradicate smoking. Good for individual health, good for NHS. Govt will have to tax something else.

2. on the announcement of a general election, we should have a media blackout on the subject apart from

Each party can :
drop their manifesto/ leaflet through your door
Make an election broadcast ( can be repeated)
Compulsory weekly attendance on national TV to be interviewed by Andrew Neil, Question Time etc.
And a daily round up of facts on the nine o'clock news only. No speculation.
Keep it limited and contained.

I am not sure if they still do but in Bulgaria the unemployed but fit looked after parks , beaches , and other public areas. Kept them clean/ cut grass etc.
They got paid for this but slightly lower than the nat min wage. They can stay on this for up to ( I think ) two years.

Velveteenfruitbowl
I agree with you that wealthy people should pay to access a GP or hospital. Where I live prescriptions are free, I take 3 different tablets every day so does my husband. We pay through tax but we can afford to and should pay on receipt. I've been taken to hospital twice in the past year, both times emergency admissions. The care I received was fantastic and I'm extremely grateful to the NHS for that care.
Where and how could I have been charged? If wealthy people are charged how would that work? Ask to see a bank statement then give me a bill after my brain scan or after my colonoscopy. Means testing would enable a two tier health care. That would be appalling for those that can't afford to pay. I really don't know the answer. In an emergency situation private health care is not the answer.
We'd gladly pay for prescriptions and I feel it's wrong that we don't.

You can only do 3 days per week in a desk job. You have to have a second, active job to balance any desk days out. Having two jobs is considered both normal and healthy.

I think schools should be smaller. Smaller classes but just smaller in general.

I know it would be so expensive

I always think rationing should be brought back. People were at their healthiest and so much less was wasted.

People were at their healthiest

No, they weren't. Many were malnourished and many children got rickets , so that women suffering childbirth complications due to 'contracted pelvis' was common even in the 1960s.

Make giving a voluntary donation to whichever NHS service you’ve used a common, accepted practice. I don’t mean a one off fundraising for Marie Curie if you’ve had a relative use a hospice recently. I mean something similar to when you go to a museum and you’re asked to give whatever voluntary contribution you can afford as you enter or leave.

Money comes from the government for museums and galleries so I don’t see why we can’t do this.

Well considering we know so much more about nutrition now we could do "better" rationing - and the majority of people had better diets then than now.

Ha! Better rationing, corruption then was rife and would be now, it wasn't a better diet, it was barely enough to keep a person alive, hence, corruption and theft were rife.

Radical and out of the box, like a politician that tells the truth and doesn't just spend their time verbally bashing the other lot? Imagine how refreshing that would be...Sorry to bring that in here but that would be beyond good for our society!!

Back in the real world though, supermarkets should be charged a fee for every piece of fruit / vegetable that goes out of the door in plastic wrapping, that they're then banned from passing on to customers. Money raised goes to environmental causes.

Get rid of the long summer holiday for schools. They should be open year round with each pupil having an annual leave allowance just like an employee that could be taken anytime.

Every girl fitted with a copper coil at puberty, and replaced compulsorily until marriage.

You don’t have no teachers left to teach them, Josephine. It’s a shitty job these days. Teachers are on their knees by the time the half term breaks come round

Every girl fitted with a copper coil at puberty, and replaced compulsorily until marriage.

Why not boys injected with chemical castration?

Yuck, yip. Like the Handmaid’ s Tale in reverse. Just no, no, no. That’s almost like an assault.

And you’re also making marriage compulsory if you want kids?

Make prisons, prisons.
They’re their to pay for a crime, not to love in the luxury so many do.

Also national service.

Also everyone gives there dogs to me.

Make it harder to go to uni at 18 and much, much easier to go later in life. Set up a time bank so that for every 5 years you work you get 3 months off to study / retrain.

@Chattybum I do indeed know that and did teach my own children all sorts of things but I was thinking of the many children who don't have that background or opportunities really and also of the wasted few weeks of term.

I would find the grimmest most deprived town in the country and move parliament to there. This isn't some kind of punishment for MPs, it's practical. Land prices would be cheap there to build a parliament fit for the 21st century, accommodation for MPs would also be cheaper there. Hundreds (thousands?) of jobs would follow redistributing wealth to the area and our MPs would all come face to face with the poorest parts of the country. The Palace of Westminster could become a museum.

It would be chaos in schools if children could take leave at any point in the year and I doubt you would have any teachers left.

@RaininSummer ok I take your point and I get that not all kids have parents like that. My point comes from the fact that I'm broadly against farming out ever more parental responsibility to the education system. Nothing personal.

If you commit a serious crime no benefit safety net for you forever. You are on your own.

Stop with the wrist slapping for serious crime. Put them on an island to suffer.

I would make the amount of tax everyone pays a matter of public record, try to encourage a sense of pride in paying a lot of tax.

Make companies publish the amount of UK tax paid in the last tax year on the front page of there website or in their front window. Again try to make paying tax a something to be proud of.

no benefit safety net for you forever

thereby practically guaranteeing a return to crime...