Liberal Party of Wizlandia
Liberal Party | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Abbreviation | LP |
| Leader | Ashley Lavelle (Chief Executive) |
| Deputy Leader | Samuel Mitchell (Secretary of the Senate) |
| Founded | 2012 |
| Newspaper | The Lorenvia Times |
| Think tank | Liberal Policy Institute |
| Youth wing | Young Liberals |
| Ideology | Liberalism Constitutional Liberalism Economic Liberalism Civil Libertarianism |
| Political position | Centre to Centre-Right |
| European affiliation | ALDE (Observing Member) |
| International affiliation | Liberal International |
| Colors | Navy Blue |
| Slogan | "Ensuring liberty, opportunity, and prosperity for all." |
| House of Commons | 256 / 800
|
| Senate | 43 / 120
|
| State Legislatures | 1,496 / 4,826
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The Liberal Party, abbreviated LP, is one of the three major contemporary political parties of Wizlandia, along with its main political rivals the Social Democratic Party and the National Party. The party has dominated federal politics since the passage of the 1960 Constitution, it has consistently held the most seats in parliament and has been in government for 37 of the last 41 years. The party is currently in a coalition government with the National Party.
The Liberal Party's ideology is Liberalism, which incorporates economic liberal, cultural liberal, and civil libertarian positions. The party sits on the centre to centre-right of the political spectrum, with the National Party positioned to its right and the Social Democratic Party positioned to its left, though other scholars argue such left-right dichotomy is misleading as the Liberal Party tends to be more pro-market than the Nationals.
The Liberals platform espouses market liberal policies, they support a liberal market economy with policies such as free trade, liberal investment laws, a floating exchange rate, a flexible labour market, reducing occupational licensing requirements, phasing out income and capital gains tax to be replaced with a low but moderately progressive VAT, and maintaining the current Universal Catastrophic Coverage healthcare system. The party describes itself as an eco-capitalist party, and supports carbon pricing schemes to tackle climate change. On socio-cultural issues, the Liberal Party is strongly civil libertarian and culturally liberal, supporting open immigration, drug legalisation, legalisation of prostitution, gay marriage, polygamy, internet freedom, freedom of speech, and freedom of association.
The Liberals foreign policy has tend to be hawkish and focused on strengthening regional alliances, preserving shipping through its waters, and promoting liberal values. The party supports continued membership in the World Assembly, the Liberal Democratic Union, the South-Asian Union, the Trans-Asian Free Trade Agreement, and the International Defence League. The party maintains that resolutions passed by the World Assembly are not legally binding in Wizlandia, and opposes giving up fiscal or other domestic policymaking powers to supranational institutions.
History
Political Positions
Constitution
The Constitution of Wizlandia was enacted in 1960 by a Liberal majority government, and the current Liberal Party are in favour of maintaining the current structure of government and civil liberties guaranteed by the Constitution. In particular, Liberals staunchly oppose amendments that would lower the threshold of passing a bill from a three-fifths supermajority of both houses to a simple majority, and they oppose amendments that would weaken the Constitutional provisions restraining federal power.
Economics
The Liberal Party support free-market economics, including free trade, investment freedom, and oppose legislation that would increase zoning regulations, occupational licensing regulations, create a minimum wage, or promote collective bargaining, which they describe as rent-seeking behaviour. Instead, the party advocate maintaining Wizlandia's flexible labour market. The Liberal Party support a small to medium sized welfare state in the form of cash transfers, funded by a combination of Progressive VAT, a Carbon Tax, and a Land-Value Tax, which they believe is a more efficient way to help the poor than interfering with markets or raising revenue via labour and capital income taxation. Liberals oppose instituting a corporate or wealth tax, and they tend to opposed high-levels of government borrowing, believing that it crowds out more productive private investment, but they support counter-cyclical deficit spending during economic recessions. The party supports the independence of the Federal Bank, and oppose any attempts to link the Wizcoin to a fix quantity of gold or to other currencies such as the U.S. Dollar or the Euro.
Environment
The Liberal Party support the current Carbon Tax, believing that forcing consumers to internalise pollution externalities to be the most cost-effective method of fighting global climate change. In addition, the party supports nuclear and hydroelectric power, and tend to downplay environmental concerns regarding the construction of dams.
Healthcare
Historically, the Liberal Party has opposed significant government intervention in the healthcare market, although the modern iteration of the party is more supportive of government regulation and healthcare spending. In 2000, the Liberal-SDP Coalition passed the Universal Catastrophic Healthcare Act, modelled after the Singaporean healthcare system, which created a Health Savings Account and ensured affordable catastrophic care for all Wizlandians, in addition to increasing funding for preventative care and healthcare research. The Liberal Party support the regulation of pharmaceutical drug prices, allowing drug patents to expire faster, forcing healthcare providers to be transparent about prices, and support the use of cost-sharing methods. Liberals oppose making public healthcare free at the point of use.
Education
The Liberal Party considers education to be the greatest provider of opportunity, and they oppose any significant cut to education spending. The Liberal Party support increased devolution of education to the states, in addition to supporting the federal school voucher system, though they stress that for private and charter schools to qualify for the voucher program, they must meet certain federal standards and must not discriminate in the students they accept. The Liberal Party oppose any attempts to establish a federal teacher's union, and advocate for policies that would reduce the power of teacher's unions at the local level. Liberals support continuing the prohibition of affirmative action in public university admissions.
Immigration
The Liberal Party support the current open-borders status quo, and some of the most outspoken radical wings have criticised worldwide border controls as a system of global apartheid. Liberals oppose immigration quotas and cultural or language requirements to Wizlandian residency, though they still support a degree of background checks that would prevent known felons, terrorists, and those carrying communicable diseases from entering the country.
Social Positions
The Liberal Party are very civil libertarian, and they support maintaining the status quo of internet freedom, legal gay marriage, legal polygamy, legal incest, legal soft drugs such as marijuana, and not making hard drug use a criminal offence. Critics on the right have accused Liberals soft-on-crime policy for resulting in one of the highest crime rates in the developed world. Liberals oppose amending the constitution to make hate speech a crime or to increase restrictions on the right to protest, oppose federal restrictions on guns and abortion, and at the state-level they oppose restrictions on first-trimester abortions and excessive gun regulations. The Liberal Party advocate legalising prostitution, believing that making prostitution legal would make the industry safer and increase women's freedom.
Foreign Policy
The Liberal Party is primarily made up of liberal internationalists and liberal hawks. The party is supportive of Wizlandia's membership in NATO, supportive of sanctions against foreign officials that engage in human-rights abuses, and support international tax competition and free trade agreements. The Liberal Party oppose WA condemnations of Israel, supported the American intervention into Syria and opposed its troop withdrawal under the Trump administration, have argued for harsher diplomatic sanctions against Russia, China and Myanmar, and recognise Juan Guaidó as the President of Venenzuela. The Liberal Party support maintaining Wizlandia's status as a nuclear power, and have accused the Social Democratic Party and other pro-disarmament parties of endangering Wizlandian national security.