Congratulations to the Tea Party! Roll on its influence in Britain!

How very encouraging to see the Tea Party movement having such a successful night at the mid-term elections in America. It really is a remarkable achievement: from something that only sprang up a few years ago, to become such a highly influential force in American politics. It will be fascinating to see whether the successful Tea Party candidates can keep their promises now they are in Washington.

Watching their success made me hope that we might have a similar movement over here. I’m not referring to the wacko right-wing of American politics, which has tried to associate with the Tea Party, but rather the Tea Party in its purest form- that of a movement for truly small government and a significant reinterpretation of the relationship between the state and the individual. This clarification is explained well by James Delingpole here.

From a British point of view, there is something you have to admire about the Tea Party movement’s brashness. In Britain, despite our tax and spend binge of our previous government, to come up with a name that is short for Taxed Enough Already, would be seen as highly politically incorrect. Here, to announce in public that you are taxed too much is to invite derision. The lefty media have influenced the public psyche so that to complain about tax is somehow equated with immorality. It means you do not want to help the poor and must be extremely selfish. It means you must be anti-nurses and teachers. It means you don’t care about schools or hospitals. It probably means you also eat babies for breakfast…

The debate about small government and less tax is only now beginning to tentatively shift in Britain. But we need to get past the overly simplistic view that to ask for less tax is selfish. Given the public deficit, this is a wonderful opportunity to start persuading people of the benefits of small government, but like I have previously argued here, even now the Conservative party are desperate to avoid arguing ideologically about the reduction of the state. God forbid, we might try to argue that asking for less tax and small government, far from being selfish, would actually improve our society as a whole; would give us greater freedom, happiness and prosperity.

The other day, I became particularly agitated as I tried to read my paper in a coffee shop. At the table beside me there was, perhaps, the quintessential caricature of an American; one who talks so loudly that the whole street can hear them! While we polite British might wince when we hear an American with a volume control problem, we should also admire their candidness. The Tea Party’s openness about small government would be a welcome addition to the political debate e over here.