state control. We believe that only by empowering individuals and their families to take more control of their lives can we promote a spirit of mutual responsibility and respect in society as a whole. The New Party favours small government with a flat-tax regime and measures to increase individual freedom and self-reliance, as well as deregulation of business and industry. The party recommends wholesale reform of the welfare state with measures to reduce welfare dependency, and reduction of state control of public services, including reform of the National Health Service. The New Party proposes various reforms of parliament, including adopting the Alternative Vote system for electing the House of Commons, an appointed and non-political House of Lords, and measures to strengthen the independence of the Civil Service. The party regards itself as internationalist in outlook, which it interprets as support for democratic governments and human rights worldwide. The party is rather more cautious with regard to international organisations such as the European Union and the United Nations. After espousing a robust eurosceptic position, the party has latterly reverted to a more equivocal stance towards the European Union. It has also been critical of the United Nations as an undemocratic body without moral authority. In foreign policy the party has adopted a liberal interventionist or neo-conservative approach and has been strongly supportive of the War on Terror, and British and American military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan. The most recent published policy statement of the New Party is the Manifesto for a World Class Nation, published in 2005. Organisation The party chairman, founder and chief financial backer of the New Party was Scottish millionaire businessman Robert Durward. The Party is governed by a National Policy Committee for the UK as a whole, and by a Scottish Policy Committee in Scotland. The New Party was well-funded thanks to the financial support of its chairman, and the party had a small full-time staff from the outset, with three full-time staff at the offices at Almondvale football ground in Livingston and two at Mark Adams' office in London in 2003. Duward's company Cloburn Quarry funded the Peoples Alliance with £490,000 in 2003, and gave the New Party £284,000 in 2004, £393,000 in 2005, £135,000 in 2006, £209,093 in 2007, and £125,000 in 2008. Friends of the Earth suggested when the party launched in 2003 that the motivation for the party was Duward's opposition to