[Kizzy]

Originally Posted by Toy Soldier

Freedom of Speech

Secular governance

(Vital, above all else. None of the rest of it will ever work properly without this at the top of the agenda)

National Welfare system

Universal Education

(Both Welfare and Education standards come before healthcare, because enlightened people need the healthcare system less or at least they should need it less, and as for welfare, people struggling to survive on nothing are invariably less healthy)

Health care

Economical infrastructure

Agriculture

Military defence

(This is only so far down the list when thinking about the UK, which realistically currently has very few threats besides terrorism, e.g. we are not at real risk of invasion of any kind. Full scale war between developed nations = the end of humanity. Its sort of a fruitless effort to try to have a traditional military defence against this sort of threat, and IMO the "war on terror" needs tearing apart and re-addressed in a completely new way by a completely different kind of military)

Equal rights between sexes/sexuality

(This is a civil issue for we the people to address and demand from one another, if the first two points which I pointed out are vital are upheld - freedom of speech and secular governance - then there shouldn't need to be government intervention here. It's not that this isn't an important issue - just that it's a social one, not a political one, in a truly free society.)

Ethical Animal husbandry and welfare

(As above, in a free society this isn't an issue for governance, it's an important issue but political enforcement isn't necessarily the way to tackle it)

Define 'enlightened' in terms of an education system... Don't healthier people learn better?

I do believe that food standards and welfare of animals ( a primary food source for most) should and must be regulated by the government as the impact of bad practices can be catastrophic, episode such as the BSE crisis could have been prevented, therefore the development of CJD eradicated as one instance.