It would be a brave thing for an existing party to set out to change voters' perceptions of what political parties are for. Most would not even contemplate it. However idealistic members of political parties might be, ther e seems to be a strong psychological barrier to change. It needs a new organisation to achieve this. People need to be convinced that the constant failures of government do affect their lives, and that a new approach is necessary. Such an organisation ne ed not itself be a political party, but its launch as a registered political party with no platform other than to hold government to account, could at the very least provide welcome publicity. It would be regarded as a nuisance by other parties, who migh t be persuaded to compete on the same ground - and then find they do not have to fight, but could co-operate.

I suggest the name, 'Citizens Against Incompetence and Corruption' (CAIC).

CAIC would have to stick to its guns. Compromise would be fatal. Care must be taken that the organisation is not infiltrated by those antagonistic to its aims and knocked off course. This arguably happened to the Electoral Reform Society following the pu blishing of the Jenkins report. The Society had been campaigning for the Single Transferable Vote for over 100 years, but after Jenkins membership was massively boosted by members of the Labour Party. It is almost certainly not coincidental that a vote t o change its aims and support the Jenkins system was won. There is no evidence that there was a conspiracy by the Labour Party to compromise the Society, but the new members are unlikely to have understood the issues as well as the old guard. Whether the change was beneficial or not is a matter of opinion, but it was a very radical change and was achieved by a simple majority. The constitution of the new organisation must have greater safeguards in its constitution.