Photo credit: PA
The UK Independence Party today unleashed an election manifesto proposing radical reforms to two Whitehall departments in addition to a host of core demands on delivering the UK’s departure from the European Union.
One proposal is the creation of a “fully integrated” health and social care system through the establishment of a Department for Health and Care – conceivably one of the biggest changes to the National Health Service since its inception in 1948.
According to the party’s manifesto, the new department would preside over a “sustainably funded social care system assimilated into the NHS” in an attempt to reduce delayed transfers of care and legal barriers created by current interfaces between DH and council-provided services.
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UKIP’s manifesto eyes a £35bn war chest to fund its public services priorities, which would be delivered by measures including axing HS2, scrapping the Department for International Development, and reducing the UK’s foreign aid budget to 0.2% of Gross National Income.
The document’s pledge to end “wasteful public spending programmes” appears to focus on defence procurement, which UKIP said would be overhauled to end a system of “inappropriate lobbying and cronyism on a massive scale” in which “botched projects have become the norm”.
Elsewhere, an “urgent review” of public sector procurement would aim to help small and medium-sized businesses get a larger share of government contracts.
UKIP said it would also make tax collection agency HM Revenue and Customs investigate big business or public sector bodies that repeatedly made late payments to smaller customers, with “fines proportionate to the amount of delayed payments” levied and escalated for “repeat offenders”.
Additionally, the party pledged to train and deploy 20,000 additional police officers and hire 7,000 more prison officers, roles for which the recruitment of ex-service personnel would be prioritised.
On Brexit, UKIP said it believed the UK would benefit from extra income of £11bn a year from tariffs imposed following the UK’s departure from the European Union.
It also set “six tests” to determine whether whichever party is in government after June 8 is delivering on Brexit.
Other pledges included banning the EU flag from being flown on public buildings after Brexit and the return of old-style blue UK passports.