XR – Beyond Politics Political Party
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A new political party was launched in London marked by shoplifting a haul of supermarket goods, walking out of Sainsbury’s in Camden with shopping trolleys filled with food but without paying to highlight the instability of global food distribution.
<p class=”css-ca4fse”>The founders of Beyond Politics say the current political system is corrupt and failing. They want to hand power to ordinary people through citizens’ assemblies, and plan to field candidates across the country for future local, regional and national elections, starting with a north London activist, Valerie Brown, who is to stand for mayor of London at next year’s election.</p>
Brown said: “This action is symbolic of what we all need to do … It’s OK if politicians get things wrong a bit, but not for decades. They have been sitting back and watching the world fall apart. People are going hungry and homeless whilst others chuck tonnes of food in the bin because they’ve got too much money. Supermarkets continue to pollute and destroy with plastic waste and food importation.”“We want to establish a participatory democracy. We want to engage everyone and for people to be able to have their say. The current political system is incapable of making the structural changes necessary. We need a complete transformation of politics.”
They still do not comprehend what free access actually means. i can’t find its website but if someone does, perhaps we can actually point out how conservative their demands are.
“Extinction Rebellion’s co-founder Roger Hallam is a driving force behind the party.”
Oh no, not that raving lunatic ! He doesn’t stand for free access but, besides predicting 7 billion deaths before the end of the century, is on record as advocating the rationing of basic foodstuffs as a way to try and avoid this.
It will be interesting to see if this new party will be amongst our opponents on the ballot paper when we contest the Barnet and Camden constituency in next May’s elections for the Greater London Assembly.
‘We want to establish a participatory democracy. ‘
Yet i still cannot track down a website that is devoted to their political views. Are others having better luck?
“Beyond Politics” is one of XR’s three demands. See here where it is explained in more detail. It probably won’t be much different except that they might now be demanding citizens’ assemblies for more things that climate change.
They are not yet registered as a political party with the Electoral Commission but will have to if they want to be able to contest under that name.
Their strategy doesn’t seem to be very coherent. XR initially envisaged their demands being met by minority civil disobedience. Now they want to contest elections to local councils while at the same time transferring some of councils’ decision-making powers to Citizens assemblies.
And then they say: “The current political system is incapable of making the structural changes necessary” but then they want take part in it to the extent of standing in elections.
True, it can’t be used to successfully reform capitalism to work in the interest of the majority (not could citizens assemblies either), but why can’t a parliament elected by universal suffrage be used to abolish capitalism and usher in socialism when a majority want it and are organised outside Parliament to participate in this revolutionary change?
Or maybe the whole thing is just a stunt. Not a bad one actually, if only the purpose had been to publicise free access.
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