Ben Harnwell

That's what I wanted to come here and share with you today.

I would like to try to contribute to a change in attitudes and a change in the conversation that we can have publicly where we can say, roof tiles are fine, trees are fine, but let's put a little bit of energy into preserving what's going on underneath the roof tiles, right?

Because that's more important.

Now, I sort of think, I've been involved in, I first worked in Parliament, in the UK Parliament, in 95, so that's like over 30 years ago, and I know you're going to say, come on, Hanwell, you're lying, you can't possibly be that old.

I heard, I felt the brainwaves, you're thinking, but it's...

I was, I was working there for 30 years.

And I sort of developed this, you know, when people say, what's the core of your political philosophy?

Well, it splits into two really.

I'm quite libertarian in the sense that I hate paying tax.

And that's really the starting point of my political philosophy, is that I hate paying tax, because as Ronald Reagan said, I know how government wastes my money.

The second thing is, I think there is an onus of those who are involved in politics to work towards a society

which is slightly better than the one that they were born into.

You can serve what's important.

You have policy experiments.

Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't work.

You have the capitalist free market, which is great at moving things forward.

So there's no reason why a society, if anyone involved in politics after 20 years

of contribution, 30 years of contribution to the public good, you're not leaving a society which is slightly better than the one that you inherited.

And that's not the case anymore, right?

Because we are now dealing with the first generation in the West where parents have come to the conclusion that their kids are going to have a worse standard of life than the one that they themselves had.