To ask what the key issues in the upcoming election are?

[worrieddaughter97]

I'm a 25 year old young professional, in training, on a low wage. It's going to increase in the next 2-3 years. Hopefully by quite a lot. I live at home, but hope to move out by the next election in 2029.

Over the last year or so, I have curated my list of things that will decide who I vote for:

• Housing
• Minimum wage increases
• Immigration
• NHS

But I still feel quite torn. The last 2 elections were ones where I didn't really have "skin in the game" so to speak - I voted how my parents said they wanted me to, as they had convinced me that anything other than a Tory government would be disastrous for us as a family.

Obviously now I'm voting with my head, but I'm still pretty indecisive. So I'm just wondering what other people view as their key issues in the election.

And crime and women’s rights.

Benefits reform
NHS
Local government reform

Firstly have absolutely no respect at for the current ruling party. They seem to think the electorate are a bunch of fools and won’t see through their latest scams. Nepotism and a will to get as much public money to their mates as possible.

it may sound harsh but taxes may need to be increased to pay for the public services that we need - nhs, education, emergency services etc etc. this country requires investment in its infrastructure again.

I would like to see whoever is in power being as transparent as possible. I’ve had my fill of lies and cover ups.

in terms of priorities -
schools
nhs
infrastucture such as roads
deep delve into childcare and what is actually required ( not just the knee jerk Tory fix all )
environmental policies
Defence policies - as much as I don’t want to think they we may now need to spend more there.

considered policies and implications of policies would be amazing too.

The immigrants are the infrastructure in many cases. Without them, we're all fucked!

We have shortages in key sectors like healthcare and education. Without importing foreign workers, these will crumble even more.

Immigrants from the EU paid more in tax than they cost us yet we sent them away with Brexit. There are fields of unpicked food and shortages in zero hours jobs that EU migrants used to do and keep the UK economy ticking.

Even if we somehow achieved that (and I think that means a return to 1 income being enough to support one household - and bigger households than we have now) we would still need to maintain current levels of immigration for a couple of decades to plug the gap.

^^ 20% of NHS staff are foreign

For me, in order....

The NHS - people can't work, they can't get on with their lives if they are waiting for treatment. Salaries, waiting lists,

Secondary education - increase the budget per pupil. Increase staff numbers. Improve the working environment to support teachers in their work.

The environment & food security - If you thought the fuel crisis was bad, a food shortage would be much worse. We need a sensible policy on food production. Food contamination & forever chemicals. Water.

Which leads naturally into Climate change.

I can't vote Tory. Labour's policy on the last two is a disaster. I have no idea who I can vote for. 🙁

I care about

the NHS
defence
people being able to make ends meet
children not being hungry
education
pensioners not being cold
disabled people not being vilified for being being disabled

I don’t care about immigration. It’s not the problem they make it out to be. The reason we can’t get doctors appointments, there’s no dentists, housing is in crisis and the NHS is on its knees is because of the Tories, not immigrants.

Fair enough, I clearly need to do some research around immigration. The housing situation just worries me, a lot. Even in my small town, rent is £750-850, and only going to go up. I'm 25 and can't afford to rent, let alone buy

Make sure you are getting your news from sources other than your parents or the Daily Mail

This. To be honest if it's taken you until the age of 25 to form independent opinions, or at least the intellectual curiosity to explore beyond your parents' self preservational reasons to keep the Tories in power, then I despair.

The last election was when I was 20, and full reliant on my parents for everything - including a wage. I worked at their business, and they convinced me if Corbyn came into power, the business would fold and they would be forced to move abroad. Without me.

Looking back, was it controlling? Yes. But people change a lot between 20 and 25. No need for a sarcastic comment.

This x 1000.

Defence. If we don't start to act climate change won't matter

The Covid policies introduced by Sunak as chancellor and cheered on by Starmer have caused irreparable harm to the NHS. I’m not convinced it’s fixable with money. Or even by importing staff. Labour failed to be Her Majesty’s official opposition and hold the government to account. I can’t vote for either of them.

I'm sorry to hear that you're reliant on people like that.

Well, you do realise a huge chunk of infrastructure gaps is filled with immigrants? NHS, for starters, care home workers, etc.

Anyhow, for me it would be:

1. Immediate revision of early years childcare to avoid allsorts into nurseries before we get another Letby equivalent near babies and small children
2. NHS restructure into something resembling a viable healthcare system
3. Creation of NSS - it would resolve A LOT of both NHS and local council issues - this is where I'd sink the non-dom taxation
4. Driving education system away from rota learning for tests and towards churning out functioning adults ready for workplace
5. Complete rehaul of DWP, with criminal prosecutions for whomever it was that put non-clinical staff in PIP assessments (and I don't even have anything to do with PIP personally)
6. Rehaul of housing system towards more German style social housing and rent protection
7. Creation of nationalised essentials like transport system and utilities: still keep a portion private at a premium, but for the love of everything holy, provide accessible basics to all. Also fixing potholes. And prosecuting water company board members, with proceeds going towards restructure of water systems and environmental recovery
8. Creation of systematic, Swedish style recycling, green energy production, massive upgrade of e-car system, ban on North sea oil&gas exploitation, restoration of riverbeds to less flooding pathways
9. Introduction of sustainable, self-sufficient food production in UK

10. Push away from penitention heavy legal system and towards rehabilitation

Things I don't give a hoot about:

1. Rwanda scheme and immigration in general - utter scapegoating
2. Cannabis
3. What Harry did next
4. VAR
5. Love Island and the likes of that
6. Reform Party, Nigel Fartage and the likes...
7. Pubs closing down
8. Compulsive 101 loggers
9. Ozempic addicts

10. Second home owners complaining about extra taxation

Defence, defence, defence. Without that getting comprehensively sorted, you can forget the NHS, education, small boat crossings, the whole thing! I can’t believe only a handful of posters have mentioned this.

I got a little list too:

• To be able to get an appointment with the GP without sweating blood, or dying in the attempt.
• NHS- improve waiting times and general management. Also, pharmacies, why are we lacking on some medicines at times?
• Schools- address subjects that have been dropped due to lack of teachers/ funding
• Childcare- provision of breakfast clubs in all schools, look into organising after school clubs in the schools, including study/ revision groups, sports, extra curricular activities. Make it a bit easier and affordable for parents.
• Council- address road/ street/ lighting maintenance, go back to general waste to be collected every 2 weeks, address the cuts to training/ funding for people out of work
• Workers- get rid of the zero hours contracts, make it easier for people on temporary work to sign on/ off job seekers allowance/ universal credits (for JSA you only can phone!), address the imbalance of wage/ inflation, where possible
• Transport- look into nationalising transport (end the strikes!), improving transport links, make it more affordable (objective- more people using public transport/ less cars on the road). I am ver interested in a test tgat was done in Germany where they paid a fixed amount per month and use trains/ undeground/ buses; apparently a vast amount of people left the car at home
• Energy crisis/ environmental- evaluate placing solar panels in all UK home roofs. Invest in wind/ wave power. Invest in a new type of self-charging battery, which I find very promising (it charges using the moisture in the air)

I am going to stop here....

Sadly, you are right on defence, in the current climate.
But defence means defence, not shipping our best soldiers to far away lands to further fuck up this world, no thanks.

I didn't go into defence because there's too much we're not told and the whole situation is one huge mikado sticks situation. That being said, although staunchly against capital punishment, can someone please explain to me why is Putin not assassinated yet, so we can all go on with our lives before we have to organise another D day?

And talking about defence, I do worry about illegal immigration on that front. We do not know who this undocumented people are, at all. The numbers are not small and many make it here with the help of gangs that can provide fake passports faster than I can draw a picture.
These gangs do need addressing. I think it should be an international effort, involving police and secret service. I am rather interested in knowing who this people are, how they get their hands into documentation, tickets... and what they do with the money they get.

Possibly the NHS, but as Labour were meeting the Heritage Foundation in the US this week it looks like Streeting, Starmer and co are going to pay back their private healthcare donors with a US/UK trade deal that finishes it that rules out the two main parties.

Education- the single biggest driver of economic success and the area with the surest guarantee of return on investment. A fag paper between them.

Public services in general - same spending commitments from both major parties.

Welfare - same rhetoric from both main parties

Immigration- same rhetoric from both

The problem I have is most things that are important are interdependent. You can't improve equality without; a generous welfare system, a well funded education system, a universal healthcare system or properly funded public services. You can't do that without a commitment to public investment as the driving force for the economy (like we did post WWII.

All of the main parties are committed to following broadly the same economics that have got us to where we are.

Brutal to who?