Brandt: "It is time to strengthen our states"

POLITICO | In a keynote address from Corrintrin, Chancellor Brandt has addressed the Imperial Senate on his plans for the states this parliamentary term.
"Dear friends, colleagues and fellow legislators -- I come to speak to you today as representatives of your respective states, but more importantly as fellow citizens wishing to better the lives of every single person we're privileged to represent in parliament. The 576AER Financial Report has shown that although much has been done to address the lack of necessary investment and years of austerity that have drained the states dry -- there is still a large gap to be filled when it comes to individual state finances. Our government is soon to release our proposed Federal Budget, and we have made it our main mission to decrease the deficit, in particular the state budget deficit. For it is you, our devolved administrations, that carry out the tasks and hold the responsabilities of governance which impact most effectively the everyday lives of all our citizens. 
How shall we achieve this, you may ask yourselves? Well, firstly, before anything can be done, an agreement of good will has to be reached between both chambers of parliament to steer our country into the right direction. It is in the best interest of all of us to decrease the economic burden on the states and restore healthy finances. We must agree that politics and partisanship have to be put aside, and that all of us together must pragmatically address the needs and tough choices that must be made to restore financial confidence.
One of the main burdens to our collective budget is wasteful and unnecessary spending. The biggest benefactor of past inefficiencies in our finances has been the military industrial complex. The Great War ended over 20 years ago yet we're still parading around with equipment and hardware that was outdated at the time we commenced the re-conquest of Haalsia during the war. Our military is not only unnecessarily bloated, it has become outdated and inefficient due to stagnant traditionalism and refusal to reform. The armies that shall maintain peace and safety in the modern era are not those with the most boots on the ground, the most vessels at sea or the most vehicles regardless of their outdated nature -- but rather the armed forces which are flexible, adaptable, modern and well funded for the purposes of quality, not quantitative. The era of warfare dominated by quantity is over, a single modern battleship is more efficient than a dozen of it's predecessors 30 years ago and thus more cost-efficient. The first step to restoring state finances is thus restructuring, reforming and thus effectively decreasing military spending. We shall modernise our vast arsenal of equipment by continuing to sell-off outdated equipment and use the revenue to produce or purchase lesser yet better and more tactically efficient vehicles such as tanks, planes, naval vessels, etc. 
In resonance with the tenets of a modern, efficient and adaptable army, we shall seek to decrease costs by decreasing the amount of active soldiers and transfer hundreds-of-thousands into active reserve and to translate their skills to the civilian workforce through cooperation between public and private enterprise. Our soldiers, aside from being extensively trained in combat to protect our nation's security, are also evergrowingly more skillful at a variety of other fields. Soldiers who have years of experience as engineers, electricians, medics, instructors, pilots, drivers, etc. who can serve the nation in different ways such as teachers, doctors, nurses, entrepreneurs, members of our emergency services, technology specialists, security experts, public servants and so much more. These men and women would be a great asset to both the public and private sector and aid in the recovery of our economic stability. No jobs would be lost, no veterans would be left behind, soldiers would only be transferred when they are secured a sound path to carry on working hard for themselves, their family and nation separate from the military.
As our country is still recovering from the economic hardships of the last decades and the period of austerity that has dominated it, it is essential that the sacrifice is felt across all levels of society. That if low-income families are still seeing rough economic situations, that those at the top are not enriching themselves at their expense. This is why this Government shall propose a modest cut of 50 million Fall to Royal Expenses for the upcoming 4 years, to be reviewed then depending on the economic situation, and a modest cut in the wages of federal legislators. This way those who are elected are more able to put themselves in the shoes of their constituents and more truthfully be capable fo representing their best interests and needs. 
The repeal of archaic legislation which drained our collective budget of necessary income such as the Family Support Act can be seen as our efforts to trim wasteful spending and it is our intention that in the best interest of our national plan to restore financial confidence, the 11.5 Billion Fall that would be recovered could be directly used to slash the state budget deficit by a third! 
However, reduction of wasteful spending is not the only way by which we shall effectively tackle the deficit in the long term. Although some of you are skeptic of this notion, sometimes it is necessary for the state to levy taxes to support the things we hold dear, our education, our healthcare, our welfare, our infrastructure, etc. The provisions of the Federal Income Tax Reform Act and Corporate Tax Reform Act are expected to continuously close our deficit gap as more revenue flows into the budget by our new streamlined system of taxation. To restore our state's finances, tough choices must be made and the moral tenets of our democracy dictate that they must not be made at the expense of the many, regular hardworking people who pay enough as it is. As Chancellor I serve the interests of not just my voters and those who support me, but of all those under the jurisdiction of our beloved country and constitution. It is thus imperative that we have a real conversation about fairness, equality and a progressive and solidary country. Our Government is currently in the works of proposing a bill to parliament to introduce a package of Financial Transaction Taxes averaging at a rate of 0.1% across the different categories. It shall be a tax for our financial sector, which have been favoured by very low taxes for an unnecessary amount of time, so that they too contribute fairly to the prosperity of our society. As opposed to a consumption tax, which affects the vast majority of people -- working and middle class consumers -- a transaction tax shall only apply for specific transactions such as currency exchanges. The revenue created by this new tax shall be committed towards the reduction of the state budget deficits.
These are some of the ways our Government shall seek to end decades of state budget deficits, not by senseless cuts and austerity that stagnate growth, but by fair taxation, trimming wasteful spending, investing into our states' economies and stimulating growth and confidence in our markets once more."
 
Category:The Imperial Constitution