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Dear John,

General election campaigning has definitely started! Today, Keir Starmer unveiled his "six steps for change ([link removed]) ,” the first six things Labour will do if/when they form the next government.

Starmer listed: stabilising the economy, lowering NHS waiting times, securing our borders, setting up a new British energy investment company, “taking back our streets,” and recruiting 6500 more teachers.

All well and good as far as it goes. But how will any of these “steps” mend our broken politics? Starmer doesn’t seem to realise how much danger our democracy is in.

We’re not surprised to see no mention of Proportional Representation, but what happened to Starmer’s 2020 pledges ([link removed]) around protecting human rights, strengthening devolution, or democratising the House of Lords? Those original ten “pledges” turned into five “missions” which are now six “steps”. With each iteration, Labour seems to be slowly moving away from strong commitments to democracy.

There’s no mention either of repealing undemocratic voter ID laws, re-establishing the independence of our crucial elections watchdog, restoring our full protest rights, or tackling the dodgy think-tanks and dark money donors eroding the public’s trust in democracy. As a democracy organisation, this is obviously a huge concern to us.

It’s easy to say that fixing democracy isn’t as important as some of the things on that list. But, if anything, it is EVEN MORE important. Because, unless Starmer priortises fixing our democracy, everything his government achieves can be almost instantly reversed by any hard-right government that follows.

Starmer needs to recognise just how rotten our democracy has become. And he needs to understand just how much we all stand to lose if Labour fails to act quickly. A democracy weakened by the corruption and vandalism of recent Conservative administrations is as dangerous for him as it is for us.

If today’s announcement has shown us anything it is that we really have our work cut out for us. We KNOW what needs to be done ([link removed]) to revitalise British democracy. Now we also know we need to redouble our efforts to get Labour to listen to us.

All the best,

Mark Kieran

CEO, Open Britain
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