I have written previously about the necessity for a measure of Basic Income in the UK, about how some limited examples of it have in fact existed for decades (eg Child Benefit) and in one case since before the First World War (basic State Pension). I make no apology for returning to the subject. It is important.

When someone inherits a vast fortune or lives off a trust fund, few say “he will now do nothing and be idle and useless”. In fact, few of such heirs and/or trustafarians are idle. Whatever may be said about David Cameron-Levita, one charge hard to make stick is that he is or was idle. His careerism may have been taken at cruising speed only, but he did not sit back and treat life as a holiday. He worked hard for 25 years or more on his career, however badly that turned out for the British people. The trust monies he lived off, the rumoured £40M he inherited, did not make him notably lazy, bearing in mind that he had no need to work at all.

Then take the example of Zac Goldsmith. Again, there is much to disparage in him, but it cannot be denied that someone who inherits a rumoured £400M or more has no need to engage in politics, work as an MP or do anything. Yet he does do these things.

Lottery jackpot winners rarely do nothing. Some (arguably absurdly, bearing in mind the wealth they have won), start businesses, others even carry on in the same jobs they had when they needed the money paid as remuneration.

As Adolf Hitler said, the essence of European man is creative work. It is immanent or inherent. Basic Income (whether at a level that truly covers all living costs or only part) is simply a recognition that the individual needs money and that not all persons are able to earn it, that not all people are fortunate enough to inherit it. More than that, the Basic Income idea understands that society pays in other ways in the absence of Basic Income: social security bureaucracy, with its attendant costs (salaries, equipment, buildings etc); court and prison costs; the huge costs of paying out “assessed” and carefully-doled-out benefits and so on.

The individual in receipt of Basic Income has a measure of personal security which is at present known only to those who have trust income, inherited capital etc.

Some studies indicate that even a very limited measure of Basic Income (as little as £50 per week) has a very positive effect on the recipients and society. It is a step-change, from neo-Victorian pennypinching to a modern approach that looks at things in the round.

Already, many who work full-time in the UK cannot live or live decently on the pay they receive. It is topped-up via working tax credits, by child benefit etc. Robotics advances may take away 30% of UK jobs in coming decades. It is time to implement some element of Basic Income.

The lesson of history is that the lessons of history have to be repeated time and again. The collapse of huge and powerful states and associated political power-elite structures often shocks with its suddenness, despite there always having been warning signs. Likewise, the “sudden” rise of a political movement either from a recent start or, more usually, only after years of obscurity, takes the world by surprise. The latter is akin to the actor who experiences “overnight” celebrity (after years of unsung effort).

The DAP, which Adolf Hitler joined in 1919, consisted of only 6 people. Hitler became member no.7. There may have been a larger group which followed those seven, but the only real members were in that little beer-cellar. Nine years later, in 1928, the renamed NSDAP could still only manage 2.6% of the national vote. Then the times became more favourable. Cometh the hour, cometh the man: in 1932, the NSDAP received a vote of 33%. The following year, the vote increased to 44% and the rest is history.

Lenin and his Central Committee had spent decades in internal or external exile; some had been imprisoned; their influence on affairs in Russia was negligible. The 1905 Revolution happened and was crushed with the Bolsheviks playing only a minor part even in St. Petersburg, the then capital. In 1905, the Bolsheviks numbered only about 8,400. That number increased substantially in the years immediately after 1905, but fell back to about 5,000 by 1910 (the Mensheviks had similar numbers in those years).

The first (February) 1917 Revolution was not caused by the Bolsheviks. In fact, it took them by surprise. Most of their leaders were in exile outside Russia and had been for many years. The Bolsheviks were able to seize power in October 1917 (old calendar-style) because their small but disciplined forces had the ability to command larger but less organized elements. In essence, the “Bolshevik Revolution” was a coup d’etat in one city of a vast empire, in much of which the Bolsheviks had virtually no members at all.

The two examples above illustrate how a small group of political believers, if that group has ideological and structural discipline, can do what seems at first to be the impossible. Likewise, an apparently titanic political structure, such as the Russian Empire of the Romanovs, or later such as the Soviet Union (with its satellites) can come crashing down in a short space of time, after a period of stagnation or decadence.

Since 1945, the world has had an “international settlement” imposed upon it. Once the Soviet Union and its system collapsed after 1989, the remaining part of the post-1945 settlement has seemed increasingly unstable. The stagnation of the past decade presages the collapse of the “accepted” politics across the world and particularly in the “West”.

The populist discontent which has brought Trump the U.S. Presidency, which was manifested in the UK by the rise of the BNP, then UKIP and then by the Brexit vote, is the same discontent which is energizing the American “Alt-Right”, Marine le Pen and Front National in France, the Freedom Party in Austria etc. It has still not run its course. The EU is collapsing, but its adherents and beneficiaries are in psychological denial about it. In the USA, for the first time, questions are being raised about the core authority-documents of the State, i.e. the provisions of the ludicrously-outdated U.S. Constitution.

The time is almost here when there will be “sudden” collapses of state power and equally-sudden rises to power of people and groups previously regarded with distaste or even laughter. Our time is coming.

Start with the premise that a “safe zone” for social nationalism is created, perhaps in the South West of the UK. The zone might centre on a suitable country house or other large building, on a farm, or on a hamlet or other cluster of houses. In that central area, almost everyone would be a social nationalist. Further around that centre there would be villages and small towns where many would support the project. Further out yet, another circle where the influence of social nationalism would be less concentrated, less powerful, though still stronger than in the country as a whole.

News about the germinal ethnostate would spread. No doubt most of the reportage from mainstream media would be hostile, but no matter. People living far and wide would hear about the project and would come to visit the safe zone and then, in many cases, to relocate there, to live in the villages or small towns of the region. Even if only 1 in 1,000 in the general UK population did that, the safe zone might eventually attract thousands and even tens of thousands of suitable people.

The political effect of the resettlement would be felt in elections for local councils as well as for the Westminster seat or seats for the area. The effect of even 5,000 dedicated social nationalists voting en bloc cannot be underestimated. 1 in 1,000 of the UK adult population would in fact number about 50,000. This is not a mere pipe-dream: it is feasible; it could work.

Another important factor in the proposed resettlement is that, unlike the usual situation at present in the UK, in the posited safe zone, social nationalists would not be a small fringe or marginalized group, but a significant minority which might become an unstoppable majority in time. The consequential effects on the rest of the UK would be huge.

Social inequality is inevitable in any human society. All that one can hope for and, more pertinently, legislate for, is a decent and reasonable measure, so that inequality does not become excessive or grotesque.

Social inequality arises out of and is maintained by inequalities in both capital and income. Today I address only income. My contention is that the maximum post income tax income must be capped at (2016 values) £200,000 per annum. Needless to say, only a relative handful of UK citizens actually receive anything like that after tax; the average is closer to £20,000. Still, it is important that the huge incomes which a few have, be lopped off at that level or, arguably, at one even lower, for the preservation of some sense of social contract in society. That is a more worthwhile reason for this policy, rather than just the (often criticized) aim of raising more tax revenues, which might not even happen, taking things in the round.

The work of all citizens should be valued, by society, by the citizens themselves (valuing the work of others and having a modest pride in their own contribution, too). When a few award themselves or are awarded incomes in the many hundreds of thousands or even millions of pounds per annum, the whole fabric of society is gradually ripped to shreds.

There is another and oft-discussed policy to complement the above maximum-income cap. That second aspect is the concept that the pay of the highest employee or office-holder in an enterprise or a public service should not exceed that of the lowest-paid employee of the same body by more than a certain decided multiple. To my mind, that multiple should be 10x, that referring to post-income-tax income.

The above two policies will go far to knitting society together. There will be anomalies, special cases etc, but the important point is that the general idea will  be accepted by all or almost all…and will work practically.