Economy, Property, Finance and Work
Private Property and Broad Ownership
Property is a source of independence and responsibility. The answer to concentration is wider ownership, not the abolition of property.
Policy catalogueEconomy, Property, Finance and Work
Family Business and Small Enterprise
Smaller and family-owned firms should have fair access to finance, procurement and premises, and a viable business should be able to pass to the next generation.
Position
Family-owned and smaller enterprises should receive fair access to financing, public procurement, commercial premises and administrative services. Business formation and ordinary compliance requirements should be simplified wherever that is possible without weakening worker protection, consumer safety or fiscal enforcement.
Succession policy should allow a viable family enterprise to continue operating rather than be broken up to meet a tax bill. Where a business does fail, the law should offer a predictable route through insolvency and restructuring, including a reasonable opportunity to begin again.
Policy
5 commitments
- Give family-owned and smaller firms fair access to financing, public procurement and commercial premises.
- Simplify business formation and routine compliance without weakening protection for workers or consumers.
- Allow relief on business succession where the enterprise continues in genuine productive activity.
- Guard that relief against artificial fragmentation arranged in order to qualify for it.
- Provide predictable insolvency and restructuring law, with a reasonable opportunity for a second start.
Limits and unresolved details
- Simplification stops where it would weaken worker protection, consumer safety or fiscal enforcement.
- Relief follows genuine productive activity, never a business form adopted in order to obtain it.
Manifesto basis
- IIIThe FamilyThe first institution of civilization, which precedes the state and must be made materially possible.
- VIIThe Economic OrderNeither unrestricted capitalism nor centralized socialism: many proprietors rather than few.
- XVIIIWorkWork possesses dignity, but work is not the purpose of human existence.
Related positions
Economy, Property, Finance and Work
Worker Ownership and Cooperatives
Cooperatives, employee ownership and profit-sharing are legitimate ways of spreading productive property, and taking part in them must remain voluntary.
Economy, Property, Finance and Work
Finance, Lending and Access to Capital
A diversified financial system serving productive activity. Legitimate lending and a reasonable return are accepted; exploitative interest and debt traps are not.
Economy, Property, Finance and Work
Taxation
Taxation is legitimate for the common good but should be fair, family-sensitive, non-confiscatory and compatible with broad ownership, productive work and subsidiarity.