AI, Taxation & the Future Economy: Steve Endacott on Workforce Disruption and Economic Growth

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Steve Endacott: Sponsored Jobs this is the biggest societal change we've seen ever. And it's not coming over 20 to 30 years. It's coming in the next five years. And if we don't wake up, it will overwhelm government. We'll have too many people on the dole. We won't be able to fool them. The richer get richer, the poor get poorer, and our society Will go backwards.

Host: Foreign. Ladies and gentlemen, you once again welcome to the Kingdoms podcast and Diary of a. Ah, cfo. And today we've got a very, very important guest returning for the second time on the podcast. Mick Walker, Mass Stephen and the Court. How are you today, Steve?

Steve Endacott: Hey, fitting, antsy, feeling ready to discuss politics, feeling like I've got something to say.

Host: Wow, interesting. AI Steve and the human Steve are, uh, the one and the same entity, is that correct?

Steve Endacott: Absolutely. AI Steve is just a AI avatar, uh, that can talk to people 247 when I'm asleep, or more likely down the pub.

Host: Wow, interesting. So, uh, today, uh, our conversation is actually going to be centered around AI democracy and Britain's future. So please sit back while I read out the introduction that I curated for you today. So, ladies and gentlemen, once again welcome to another thought provoking episode of the Kingdom's podcast and Darius and cfo. Today we are joined by entrepreneur, political reform advocate and founder of Smarter uk, Steve Anacord. Steve has built, has killed successful businesses, created thousands of jobs, and is now applying entrepreneurial thinking to some of Britain's biggest challenges. His proposals span AI driven governance, digital democracy, tax reform, housing, energy policy and education. His central argument is simple yet ambitious. Britain needs new systems for a new era. At a time when artificial intelligence is reshaping economies, institutions and societies, Steve is challenging conventional thinking about how government should operate, how citizens should participate in decision making, and how technology can be used to create a, um, more responsive democracy. Today we will explore his visions for Britain's future, the opportunities and risks of AI driven governance, and what lessons entrepreneurs, leaders and policymakers can learn from building systems that actually work. Steve, you once again welcome to the podcast.

Steve Endacott: Thank you very much.

Host: Uh, you're always welcome. You know that you are always welcome. Before politics and policy, there was entrepreneurship. So tell us about your journey and the experiences it shaped how you view leadership, innovation and problem solving.

Steve Endacott: Okay. I originally came from a corporate background. I, uh, was taught how to build teams. I was taught how to balance me and I was told that the leader needs to be controlled by people around it. You can't have a leader who just goes off willy nilly and doesn't have balance. So I'm used to building balanced teams. I know what I'm good at. Uh, I know what I'm bad at. That's what corporate life told me. I then went into entrepreneurial life where I built and, um, grew businesses from scratch. I've had major successes, but I've also had major failures due to a vat dispute. One of my businesses went bust and that's extremely painful. So I think business people who've got a rounded experience should be getting involved in politics. I'm really worried about our politics and anybody in the UK isn't is a bit of an empty look at what's going on. We're run by a bunch of politicians who've never had jobs and all they want to do is fight each other rather than create policies and work together to sort out the issues of our country. That is a big issue. So I've decided to start Smarter uk, populate it with business people, populate it with intelligent brains, look at all the big issues of the day, create policies for discussion and hopefully force the parties to actually have an open discussion about the major issues and what they're going to do. Labour got elected by keeping their heads down, having no policies and just waiting for the backlash against Conservatives. Look what's happened. It's been a bit of a disaster. I quite like Nigel, I, uh, quite like reform, but I'm worried if not careful. They do exactly the same. Keep their heads down, have no policies, get elected and then we start the whole cycle again. It's rubbish. We need our parties to work together. We need long term strategies, long term politics and open debates of about the issues of the day and policies that can solve them. And that is what I'm trying to achieve with Smarter uk. I don't care if I ever get elected to go to Parliament. All I care is I have some influence and start driving the future of our country because I've got the time, I've got the brain power, I've got the friends, I've got the money. Yeah. And I'm going to make an impact in our country somehow.

Host: Well, uh, I love the fact that you're impact treated but what lessons do you think you can take from building businesses and what, what lessons do you think the government could learn from entrepreneurs and you know, business people generally?

Steve Endacott: How to get shit done. Yep. Stop worry about how it looks, make the harsh decisions, collaborate with other people and get shit done. Yep. That's what business people do. They don't go around criticizing all their competitors all the time. They focus on their business and what their business is trying to achieve because that drives their P and L, that drives their profit, that drives how many people they employ. Focus on the right things which the issues of the day. Stop the political inviting, Stop going on TV being asked questions and never giving a straight answer. God, are, uh, you fed up of that? I'm fed up of that. If you ask the question, give an honest answer. It may not be the one your party likes, but at least it's going to be honest. And um, people understand where you're coming from.

Host: Wow. So was there like a defining moment when you decided it was not enough to comment on Britain's problems and that you want to propose solutions by yourself?

Steve Endacott: No, by the smarty UK team. Not just by myself. All of these policies have been heavily debated because by debating with other intelligent people you come up and you tackle all the issues and you create a policy. Yeah, I write them up. Yeah. I try to communicate them. But as a whole team that discuss this and come up with the policies and then we're not saying we're just going to implement these policies, we're putting them forward for debate by politicians and ideally debate by, by our country via referendums on each of the policies to say what do we actually think as the people of this country? Stop electing people every four years. Send them off to Parliament. Yeah. And hope they actually deliver uh, on their promises because we know they don't. That manifesto goes out the window the first month of office, let's be honest. So don't allow him to be elected for that period with no safety checks. Every major policy has to go to a quick electronic referendum in our view. So we constantly control our government and uh, stop the bullshit infighting.

Host: Many people actually complain a lot about politics, but very few people take that proactive step of writing detailed policy frameworks. And by the way, I have seen your policy documents and I personally think they're very brilliant. What actually motivated you to take that action?

Steve Endacott: Because nobody else is. Yeah. You can't just sit back and watch our country crumble because nobody's dealing with youth unemployment, nobody's dealing with nuclear power and the fact we haven't got enough electricity. Nobody's dealing with our nhs. You can't just chuck money at it, you got to fix it and modernize it. Yet nobody's dealing with the fact that our education is too expensive and people, our ah, students are leaving with major debt. These are the topics that need to be discussed. These are the topics that policies need to be formed. This is where we need collaboration and long term thinking. It's not a four year cycle. Our politicians are too hell bent on m what sounds good in the newspapers, what gets them polling information, what gets them re elected. Don't worry about being re elected. Worry about governing the country, please. Okay, let's give you a couple of things about how we elect people, we don't elect individuals, we elect tribes. After the last election, two weeks after the election, 86% of the population couldn't remember the name of the person they elected as their local mp. They only elected a. Myself included, which was Labour, Conservative, yourself included. So let's scrap, myself included, first past the post. So let's scrap this bullshit first past the post in a narrow sliver of the country. Yeah, let's go proportional elections, where you vote for the party and then they elect the good, best people they've got for each seat. Because that's really what happens already. Yeah, you don't vote for the individual, you vote for the party. So vote for the best people that party has. That's a much simpler way of running politics and it's a fundamental shift. And, um, that only doesn't only apply to MPs, it also applies to local councils, because, again, changing the entire local council, getting rid of the Labour locale council, bringing in an entire new reform, uh, council, you don't do that in a business. You don't suddenly say, let's sack the entire management team, bring a new management team, and it's going to have a smooth handover and the business will keep running, be profitable. Do you? Of course you don't. So our fundamentals about how we elect people and what we do are broken. And we have too many politicians that all they want to do is be political animals and infight and play games. That is not what we need.

Host: Uh, it's quite interesting what you're talking about, because, uh, yeah, we need to be honest about these themes. Right. Myself included. I did vote for a particular party. The only reason why I can remember, anyways, my.

Steve Endacott: The.

Host: The MP I voted for got elected. The only reason why I could get back to remember their name was because I took a picture while I was at the poll. So I think I very much appreciate what you're talking about. Right. But, uh, if the UK continues on its current path, what concerns you the most over the next decade?

Steve Endacott: We don't have enough power for the AI and electric car future. It's not clean enough power. We don't have clear strategies on how to get youth unemployment down, we don't have clear ways of fixing the nhs. Our, uh, whole taxation structure needs to change from being earning based to being spending based. And then we need a major refit because there's a tidal wave of unemployment coming due to AI, and we need to prepare for that. We need to retrain our workforce and we need to do enormous Amounts to make sure we don't get. The rich don't get richer, the poor get poorer and our society falls to pieces. Yeah, it's a doomsday scenario that's coming, but we can easily deal with it if we start thinking and planning about it now. Uh, they've never done it, they've never worked in business. Most of them, most of them came from Oxford, Cambridge University, did political science, went into Westminster as a understudy, became an MP and now governed the country. So they don't understand how to run businesses, they don't understand how to implement products and projects. They actually don't know much about AI. They're not really waking up to the threats of AI and they're not really fit to govern us in a world it's shifting so fast, is my humble opinion. Yeah, I'm not saying it's me that should govern. I'm just saying that there should be more business people involved in government that understand the issues. There should be more committees of real people that understand AI to start setting the policies for our future. Because if we don't wake up, we'll get overwhelmed by a tidal wave of unemployment that's coming, we won't be prepared for it, the rich will get richer, the poor will get poorer and our society can fall to pieces. Now that's the worst case doomsday scenario. Yeah, and there's lots of easy ways of stopping that. But if we don't start planning for that now and we don't start working cross party, who cares if it's a Labour policy, a Conservative policy, a reform policy, I don't care. I just want the right policies and I want all parties to agree them so they don't change every four or five years in a business. Would you sack your entire management team, bring in a new management team and assume the economy will carry on running smoothly with no disruption? Of course you wouldn't. So why do we do that in politics? It's a crazy system. We've got to look at it and question whether we've got the right system.

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Host: agile in this rapidly changing global economy?

Steve Endacott: So first of all we should be focusing on becoming an AI first country. The biggest opportunity of AI is it's exportable internationally. AI speaks 42 different languages. So the whole of Europe, you know the thing we left because of Brexit, not a smart move by the way. Yeah, could become one large market just like the US because we can sit in the UK and we can actually talk to any other country in their language smoothly and easily and export our uh, products. So we've got become a powerhouse of AI, the intellectual center of Europe that drives innovation, drives development and exports it to all the other countries so that we maintain employment with a human beings doing the smart stuff. Yeah. Rather than lose all our jobs. So let the jobs be lost in France. I don't care about the French, I care about the British and looking after our country. So a UK first approach where we actually use AI, we develop our efficiencies, we become a more efficient country, we export our products and we make more Money in the other countries around us. Not a bad idea.

Host: So, uh, what lessons would you say the UK can learn from countries that have successfully embraced innovation?

Steve Endacott: Name me when it has. So it's not countries that embrace innovation at the moment, it's corporate entities. Look at OpenAI, look at Google, look at Microsoft, look at Meta. They're the, the people and the businesses we should be following, not looking at countries for an example. Because most countries like ours are run by a bunch of muppet politicians that don't know what they're doing. Why do we allow it? Yeah, let's change it. Let's go for Porsche representation. So you elect an overall party and they put the best people they've got in the right places, rather than individual MPs that you can't even remember their name two weeks after the election. So let's have referendums on all the major topics. So instead of sending people off to government every five years and hope they deliver something, let's keep an eye on them, let's manage them. What do you think you do in business? Yeah. Do you think the MD just walks away for five years and says, oh, I hope you have a good time, Tell me what results you've achieved. Of course they don't. They govern and they manage. Yeah. On a interview. That was a missus. You can cop that out.

Host: Okay, Absolutely.

Steve Endacott: So get onto the policies. Yeah.

Host: Speaking of countries that are embracing innovation, speaking of, you know, the countries that are embracing innovation, uh, I'll talk about the rise of China, Japan, for example. It seems like we are experiencing, in the words of David Morin, right, uh, the rise of China and the fall of the West. Are you able to speak to that?

Steve Endacott: Yeah, I can speak to that. Basically, democracy is a great thing and I love living in a democratic country. The downside is it's harder to get things done if you're a dictator. You can just tell the entire population, right, we're all moving to AI, we're all moving to electric cars, we're all doing this and you can move faster. That's China. Yeah. That gives them advantage. Sorry, I don't want to live there. So, yeah, they've got an advantage. And we've got to look at how we take those sort of advantages and apply to our democracy while keeping the best bits of it.

Host: So you have actually proposed AI to improve governance. What does an AI enabled government actually look like in practice?

Steve Endacott: It's not an AI enabled government, it's the AI I've proposed. As with AI, Steve is a way of Connecting to voters. So AI Steve has all my policies uploaded into its database and it can talk about those policies with voters 247 from the convenience of their couch, on a mobile, on a laptop, on an iPad or wherever they want. And then they can feed back what they like and don't like. So that if we haven't got policies on something, we can create other policies. That then goes to a panel of a thousand commuters to say is the policy to come out sensible? You know, common man, common lady review. So we get sensible policies and those policies are then put into government. And when we get to okay, this is what we think as a government, this is what our views are as a government. We go back to the population and say this is what we recommend. Yeah, do you want to vote yes for this or do you want to vote no? Because somebody's saying this is a better policy over here. Yeah. And you have electro electronic referendums so you trust your banking, your entire wealth to your phone and security of your phone, but you can't vote on your phone. That's madness. You've got to vote on a white piece of paper, walk into a ball booth in a little secrecy, put it into a thing and have a human being count it because that's how we've done it for the rest of our lives. That's democracy, that's old fish fashioned crap. Let's chuck it out, let's modernize and let's connect voters back to the politicians. So the politicians are told what to do, told what the pick country wants and then then work together to achieve that.

Host: Interesting take. So it is pretty clear that you strongly believe that AI would enable governments to make better decisions. But what government functions can realistically be enhanced by AI within the next five years?

Steve Endacott: We're not going to enhance government functions, we're going to slash the hell out of them. 20,000 civil servants, mostly in London on high salaries. Yep, that's gone up 20% since before COVID That's an admin overhead we do not need. We need our own form of dodge with a great big chainsaw going through it, cutting out all the efficient stuff and making our government more efficient so we can have lower taxes and a lower central overhead that delivers nothing apart from administrative burden to those businesses. Yeah, let's tackle the civil service. That just as much of the problem is all the blue politicians. In fact it's probably more a politic problem because I'm paying them more.

Host: So uh, a lot of people are actually afraid of AI. But what are the Opportunities that you think the public is overlooking when it comes to AI.

Steve Endacott: Okay, let me just give you a small glimpse of the future. We will all have co pilots that make us more efficient, make it easier to do our job, write the emails, do the admin, do the filing, do the accounting, do some of the legal advice so that actually we focus on human beings selling to other human beings, human beings negotiating other human beings and driving the businesses because they got the strategy and the vision of where they want the business to go. But it will be powered by every single one of us having a copilot, which probably means you need less employees. And I'm expecting within the next five years, 25% of people will lose their job, 55% within five years. So the upside is we have more leisure time, we have more time to go on holiday, we have more time to go to the park, we have more time to play sport, we have more time to go and drink coffee with friends. So we need to reskill our uh, people losing their jobs into those jobs and make them feel like that, credible jobs that they want to do. Yeah. If you're a lawyer, you're buggered. Your job is going. If you're an accountant, you've got a problem. So we're going to turn our society on its head. One of my sons is a farrier. He's not going anywhere. He shoes, horses, you can't do anything without that. Plumbers, builders, they will earn more money. Yep. The middle classes could be wiped out if not careful turned on their head. So we have to rethink our education system. We have to rethink what we're training people for. You can't end your education anymore at the age of 18 or 21 because you need to be re educated throughout your life because the world is changing so fast that all needs to be planned by government and delivered by government. So yes, people should be scared of uh, AI. Yes, it is a major threat to a lot of people's employment. But it could also make our society a lot better. Uh, when we only work three days a week max and we share our jobs around, we have more wealth, we have more leisure time because that's what's happened after most revolutions, the industrial revolution. We ended up better off. Yeah. So there's many lessons from history. It just needs planning. The problem is this is happening so fast it's likely to overwhelm governments if we don't plan for it urgently.

Host: Well, I love the fact that you place emphasis, you place premium on learning from history. Because I always say that if you don't know where you're coming from, how do you know where you're going to? And, uh, looking at AI, you know, the concerns of people are very valid. And uh, one concern that catches my attention particularly is the, is the guardrails, is the safeguards, right? What safeguards would need to exist to prevent the misuse of AI, especially in government?

Steve Endacott: Safeguards are hard. Let's actually look at the problem here. You remember when nuclear weapons came along and we nearly went into a winter of nuclear meltdown and then we got detente between the Russians and the U.S. uh, because they sat back and thought, God, this is dangerous, we've got to do something, we've got to make an agreement. We're not going to use this stuff. The problem in AI is it's not governed by countries, it's governed by commercial businesses. OpenAI Meta, uh, et cetera.

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Steve Endacott: Yeah, and all they're focused on is making a profit, so they don't care about governance. And Donald, the little idiot in America is making it worse because he's encouraging them not to worry about it. But for example, there was some code, um, sent out by Claude recently that could be used to hack into virtually any business. So they went, whoa, whoa, whoa, we can't put this out there. We've got to actually put this to the people that prevent hacking and give them six months to look at it, use it and actually strengthen their systems to make sure that nobody can hack them. Now that's good AI, governments, but it won't always occur from the commercial business. So we need to look at the risks of AI and use government policy to stop the worst implications of that AI. One implication, for example, is it will reduce a lot of jobs, yet we can't stop that. The gene is out the box. But government can say to businesses, okay, all Those people working five days a week for, you know, say 50,000 pound, now they're going to work for four days, but you're going to maintain the same salary and you're going to have more staff to do those jobs and you're going to spread the work around more. Only a government can impose that on businesses to deal with the issues created by AI. So it's not just AI governance, it's actually thinking about the impact of AI on our society and, and counterbalancing it. So for example, taxation. We're getting an older population. Yeah. We're getting less people working due to AI and our taxation is based on people working well. There's few people to tax, there's more people to pay out. So how's that going to work? So therefore you've got to change the taxation from being on income to expenditure. So you increase VAT on online purchases from 20 to 25% and um, the extra 5% goes into the government coffee. You maintain the same 20% VAT on the high street because at the moment they're unfairly biased against because they have to pay business rates, they employ five times and more staff. Yeah. So they're paying more tax and that's why our high streets are declining. And if people are working less, we need places to meet, we need stable and uh, safe central spaces. So taxation and structuring taxation, given a 5% advantage over online purchases can help. The other reason for that 5% on online purchases is look where all the money's going. It's not going into our taxation system. When you buy online from Google or from Meta, from Amazon, they hide that money offshore, don't declare the profits in the UK and we don't get the tax revenue. If you moved it to a VAT they can't avoid. We suddenly dramatically increase the taxes we're taking from expenditure. Yeah. So we've got to think about how AI is going to change things, how unemployment's going to change things, how unemployment. An older population is going to change things and we've got a move from taxing income to taxing expenditure. And um, by the way, the rich spend more so they pay higher taxes. This is not rocket science. Yeah. It's a wake up smell. The roses realize we've got to change things and have a government willing to implement unpopular decisions. It will not be popular increasing VAT by 5% online positions. I do know that and um, that may mean I never get elected. You know what, I don't care. It's the right thing for the country. Let's at least debate it and make it a policy that all parties might support so therefore all of them won't suddenly worry about, oh, it's Unpopular.

Host: This is a serious, serious wake up call. But how do you think policymakers should balance innovation, privacy and security?

Steve Endacott: It's not policymakers that will balance privacy, security, innovation. It's the AI world and individuals. I'll give you a perfect example. In the AI world, you will have a digital twin that will monitor everything you do by your phone, everything you buy. It will know all your preferences, it will know your age, it will know how many beers you like. Yeah. And it will go out search the Internet using MCP connectors to businesses to say, my, my would like to buy a holiday to Mallorca, uh, seven nights, all inclusive. But he wants the best one suitable for 61 year old who likes to drink beer. And we'll get those sponsors back. It will collate them, it will make three recommendations. I click a button and then it books it for me. So your phone is going to know enormous amount of data. You're not wanting to share that with the rest of the world. That's too dangerous. I am not giving that to OpenAI. It's staying on my phone. And, uh, my phone will reach out. So that needs to be legislated. Yep. The security of your personal data stays, uh, on your phone. It's ring fence only. You control it, you can delete it, you can access it. Yeah, look at fake, deep fakes. At the moment, I could take any of my employees, I can say, right, read this speech into this camera for two minutes. I've captured their image, I can clone their image. I can then make them say anything that I want them to say. That's fundamentally wrong. You have to own your image, you have to own your rights, you have to be able to take legal action if somebody steals your image and says, uh, things that you don't want to say. That needs a legislative policy by government. So that's the sort of implications that we need to think about, we need to discuss. We need to pass regulation, we need to control AI. But you can't completely control AI. It's a genius out the bottle. Those fraudsters will still be using those clones to defraud your grandma because you've suddenly told her that you've lost your phone and you need a bit of money so you can buy a new phone so you can talk to her. That is going to happen and we can't stop it. Yep. But we need to make sure that it's a serious, uh, prison sentence for those people who do it. Yeah. So again, we've got to look at what actually constitutes illegal activity. What actually do you want to send people to jail for. And by the way, why do we always send them to jail, give them a nice TV and lock them up. It's a waste of resource. Make the buggers work. I know we used to have chain gangs and it's probably wrong, but we've got to make people work. If you're locked up, you have to work. You have to give back to society. If you're on the dole, you stop getting anything for free. You have to work and do social work like picking up litter or looking after old people or doing their shopping. Nobody gets anything for free in my world. Yeah. If you want some subsidies, you want some, uh, dole, you still have to do some social work because at the moment it's too much of a black market where people take the dole, get. Yeah. Use the tax money if people are working and then go off and do black label jobs where they get paid cash. We've got to stop it. Yeah. And the only way to do that is actually making people work as rom the dole. Yeah. And I don't care if you've got a mental illness and I don't care if you've got a physical illness. You can still contribute to society and you should still actually deliver something for the subsidies and the money you're getting. Yeah. It's an equal world where everybody has to deliver something back to society.

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Host: I think I do agree with you on that. But do you believe that AI will strengthen democracy or, uh, weaken democracy?

Steve Endacott: I think it could destroy democracy because I think the rich will get rich, the poor will get poorer, and if we don't change our taxation system, the whole thing's going to fall to pieces. Yep. So I think we've got to seriously think about how we implement AI and how it's going to change our society and how we have to change our governance to reflect that.

Host: But you know, speaking of digital democracy, which is one of your most talked about proposals, what inspired that idea?

Steve Endacott: The fact that you elected a person five years later on a mandate. They don't deliver that mandate. They're still in power. You can't get rid of them even though you think they're rubbish. Sakir Starmer M. For example. Yeah, and if you do get rid of them, look at the other Rubbish politicians bidding to replace them. Yeah, and it's a joke and I've had enough of the joke at thar politics. And I want to reconnect politics back to the individual. I want them to elect a party, not individuals. I want that party to have the best possible people to include business people that work part time in politics, not necessarily full time. Yeah. And I want them to listen to the voters with electronic referendums on all major items that you just click a button on your phone. It isn't hard work but you have to contribute to the governments of the country. You have to actually say what policies you like and what you don't like. So you can't then turn around m and say oh, it's always the politicians that get it wrong when actually you decided the policies. Mr. Voter. That is my view of future democracy.

Host: So how does your uh, proposed a digital referendum system work in practice?

Steve Endacott: Very simple. You get a high tech business, same ones that build the electronic security for the banks. You then create an AI avatar of the head politicians, Nigel Farage for example, who would explain those policies to individuals. Those individuals can then listen to the counter arguments from the other parties. You then say, right, these are your three options. Which one do you want? Press the button and the majority wins. Government of the day has to follow that policy whether it was their policy originally or not. It's not exactly complicated, is it?

Host: It is not complicated but uh, how can technology actually increase the citizenry participation without creating chaos?

Steve Endacott: Why would it create chaos? I thought the whole point of democracy is that uh, we as a country voted on what we want to do on each policy. How does that create chaos? You put the policies forward, you debate the policies, you have a period of introspection and maybe a TV debate on them, et cetera. And then somebody just presses a button on their phone and says okay, that's the policy I want to go for. That's democracy. How does that create chaos?

Host: So uh, one thing with democracy is, you know, it is powered by the people. But we understand that not everybody is, would I say intellectually capable to make well informed decisions. Right. So how, how do we manage the possibilities?

Steve Endacott: That is what you think offensive? I find that statement offensive. Yeah. So basically every single person in this country in a democracy has a view. Yeah. It doesn't matter on their educational status. Yeah. What should happen is government should shape the policies, shape the arguments, put that to the country. But sorry, then the country and every individual gets a vote on it. Otherwise just go to move to China like you fancy and work in part of uh, a dictatorship. That's your choice. If you don't like it, bugger off.

Host: Shots fired ah, at China. So I'll put you on the spot right now I think I uh, don't know whether it was last year or the year before. There was some debate about reducing the age of voting to I think 16. What are your thoughts, like what do you think should be the right age, the minimum age for voting?

Steve Endacott: I think she's remain 18. I think at 16 you're not emotionally stable, bodily wise, experienced enough to be electing our government. And I think 18 is the right age. That's a personal opinion. I think it's mainly the move to 16 was because 16 year olds and younger people tend to be more left, uh, and that's what the Labour uh, government at the time wanted. They want more left voters to be enabled to keep them in power. It's all bullshit politics rather than what's the right thing for the country. So no, I would stick at 18. But here's another thing. If you don't vote, you lose it. Hang on, let's listen to me. If you don't vote, you lose it. Democracy requires participation. Democracy requires some effort of reviewing the topics, understanding the topics and making a considered judgment on those topics. And if you can't be bothered to vote, I don't actually think you matter. Yeah, it's your choice, everybody should vote. But if you don't vote, you lose it.

Host: Use it or lose it. But uh, now, now coming back to that point of persons below the age of 18 not being, you know, socially and emotionally mature, uh, we understand that there are variants, there are variations, you know, in terms of maturity when it comes to human beings, we don't all, you know, grow and develop at the same rate. And of course, you know, it speaks back to the point that I made about, you know, not everybody having the intellectual capacity to be able to make certain decisions. And of course, you know, also there are decisions that are uh, better made by people who are well informed on the subject matter. So for example, I, as a, an accountant, you know, uh, a tech expert, I don't really know if I am the best person to be voting on things relating to say healthcare or defense. Right. So what, what kind of uh, regulation would you put in place to ensure that in terms of technical decision making, right, uh, that people who are well informed make decisions in the best interest of the public?

Steve Endacott: I'm not sure you're listening to me.

Narrator: Yep.

Steve Endacott: What I'm suggesting is our uh, well informed politicians with experts around them debate the topics, come up with the policies, put forward the choices, and then it's up to the them to convince the UK population about which is the right choice. That's how politics work. But at the end of the day, the UK population should be making the vote. So it forces them to actually consult with us, the real people of the world, about what they want. This debate about age, I think you've got to draw a line somewhere. But debate about intellectual capability, uh, giving you voting rights, I think is offensive. We all live in this country. My dad was a docker, he didn't have much formal education. He can still debate a political policy with me to the nth degree. So how do you measure whether people have the right qualifications or intellect to make a vote? Absolute rubbish. Shut that out the window. That's not happening. One vote, one person, and the only ways you lose it is if you don't participate. If you don't read the policies, you don't actually discuss it, you just say, oh, I vote Labour because I've always voted Labour. Then I think you should lose your vote because that's not what we need. We need democracy where people make a little bit of effort, read out the policies. Yeah, and participate. You can't blame politicians and say they're all rubbish when you sat on your fat ass and you're not willing to participate. So we need a change of culture, uh, a change of mentality and society that policies for the people, by the people. But if the people don't participate, I'm wasting my time. And it may be wasting my time, but I've got a vision about what I'd like to see happen.

Host: So the thing is, there are many critics who argue that complex national decisions cannot be reduced to app based voting. How do you respond to that bullshit?

Steve Endacott: Why not? The politicians are meant to shape the arguments. Brexit, yeah. Is, uh, a case where it went wrong because the politicians lied. Lied, I'll say that a third time. Lied to the public about the benefits of leaving the European Union. The real benefits and the real reason we did it is we want to control our, uh, shores. We want to stop people coming in. There's other ways to do that. Yeah. We didn't want to be told by the European Court of Justice on, um, what to do all the time. We could have left it. We didn't have to leave the Economic Union, but now we have. Don't think they're going to let us back in without taking our trousers down and giving US a good spank. So the opportunity has gone now we've left Europe. We have to use our independence, we have to do deals with America, we have to do deals with China. And you know what, we have to do deals with Russia and we have to take a UK first policy that looks after us, makes us a little ship off the side of Europe where people can export their goods through because that will maximise the profits. And I want to be Switzerland and not uh, irrelevant new island off the coast of Europe anymore.

Host: So what role would you say citizenship play in shaping policies in between elections?

Steve Endacott: I think anybody should be allowed to work with a think tank like mine. Rtuk. I think we should be forcing those policies to be discussed by the major parties. Yeah. And then I uh, want the major parties ideally to come up with something they all agree on to implement. Why has it always got to be Labour this way, that way and somebody comes along the central. Why can't we have politicians that debate the policies, agree common policies and um, put in long term strategies for the benefit of our country? Why is that such a ridiculous request? And the only reason is because they're all in it for themselves. All they want is the 5 million protection fund, uh, Gucci glasses and the suits, uh, and the backhanders when they leave from business to reward them for the deals they did when they were in business. Tony Blair. Yeah. So let's reshape our uh, politics and have more realistic politics, more real people involved, more business people involved. And that takes a radical reform of how we govern our country. And I'd like to move on to some of my clear policies if I can because I think I've got some simple and clear and practical policies.

Host: I'm coming to that in a beat because, you know, I have questions for you. Orne. Housing, energy and um, economy talking about the clash between the government and the public. Right. So how can digital democracy rebuild trust between the government and the public?

Steve Endacott: It can't. Yeah, that's not going to change anything. The trust issues between the government and the public are due to the nature of the people. We've got government in our country, they can't be trusted. Yeah, they're in it for political power. They need to get their own way. Look at west street in, for example, trying to torpedo Andy Burnham, get elected by bringing up the Brexit topic and saying Labour will rejoin Europe. And he put that out there because he knew that was the opposite of what we formed were going for. And it was a way of scupping Andy Burnham's election. That's sickening. That's just personal politics to stop somebody getting elected who may be bettering you as an ex MP or PM of this country. Please, Wes treated, resign, hang your head in shame and, um, bugger off.

Host: Now, talking about your policies. Right, uh, I'm going to touch on education, AI and the future of the workforce. So you have actually proposed reducing tuition fees. What is broken in the current higher education model?

Steve Endacott: Don't think it's broken, I just think it can be tweaked. So currently, students leaving university, 30, 40 grand of debt. Yes, it's flexible, yes, it's low interest, but it's putting a lot of people off. And I think education is the bedrock of our society, it's a bedrock of our future growth and it's a bedrock of us becoming an AI enabled country. So therefore, I would like to reduce that cost, so I'm told by many other countries, because I go around the world to America, to China and other places, that we've got the best education in the world and how they love it. Well, let's sell it to them. Let's expand all of our major universities up to cambridge, etc by 33%.

Host: Yeah.

Steve Endacott: And sell those extra places to foreign students at, uh, double the price. So instead of 9,250, they pay 18,500. That, uh, extra 9,250 gets split across two UK students cutting their tuition fees in half. Yep. So sell our best asset to foreigners, allowing the country, educate them, and cut the cost to our students by half. But don't you've got to expand the places because you don't want to replace our UK students with foreigners and push them out of the system. Yeah. That's a simple policy, isn't it? What's wrong with that?

Host: It is simple on paper, but, uh, how about, in terms of, you know, you actually this spoke to this, right, Expanding the capacity. Right. So there's that bureaucratic process of getting the budget reallocation to expand, uh, the capacity. So how, what sees an innovative way for the government to raise this fund to ensure that there's a smooth, uh, process in terms of expanding the capacity.

Steve Endacott: I think you're forgetting the ability of our government to raise money and borrow money is huge. And if they've got an income to offset it and pay for the interest of that money, it's not difficult. So you literally just borrow the money, you expand the capacity, the income coming in from new students, et cetera, both UK students and international students, pays the interest of, uh, that investment, that's not hard. That's what you do in a business. Why can't a government do it?

Host: I think that sounds good, but, uh, when you look at the educational system in the uk, how do you think it should evolve, especially in a world that is heavily influenced by AI?

Steve Endacott: I'll give you one simple example. When I was a kid, calculators came along for the first time. Yeah. And in real life, I would use a calculator all the time, but I wasn't allowed to take into an exam because theoretically that would reduce my ability to do maths. Absolute rubbish. Yeah. It's the same with English. Now that AI actually does all the writing for you and spelling for you, does it really matter if you're a perfect speller anymore? No, it doesn't. So math and English being the fundamentals of what we teach people, that gets wrong. Now, we've got to teach them to be innovative. We've got to teach them how to use all the AI tools to research topics. We've got to teach them how to think out the box, how to negotiate with other humans, because that's the skill sets of the future. And we're still educating people for the past. For example, saying to students, you can't use AI to help write your thesis, your dissertations, your replies to your homework. Absolute rubbish. Of course they're going to do it. You can't stop them. But what you can do is put their thesis into an AI and say, right now, have a viber, uh, where the AI asks some questions on the theses they've written. And if they don't understand and can't answer the questions, they get a rubbish mark. Again, it's not difficult to rethink how education can be reshaped, but don't ban AI from it. Just look at how you use AI in a different way to reshape how you measure intelligence. Yeah. And drive innovation and encourage innovative thought and encourage being creators. They will be the skills and most valued in the future. Not administration, not the stuff that's going to be done by AI.

Host: It's interesting your take. And of course, uh, there's something that is very, very obvious right now. There is a clear mismatch between the skills that, uh, the educational system is teaching students and, you know, the graduates that are being turned out and the skills that are required by employers. So what skills do you think would be valuable going into the next decade? And what's your advice for, you know, young people preparing for careers that may not even exist yet?

Steve Endacott: Uh, and that's a difficult thing because careers are going to be reshaped and we don't actually know yet. Is it really? Honest answer. Because it's a revolution, it's only just starting, it's taking off. But we should involve businesses a lot more into saying what skill sets are we short of what skill sets we need more of. How do we actually write training programs to give them those skill sets so that when they turn up into the work employment place. Yep. They're actually effective from day one. But let's start back from the very fundamental. Education goes from, you know, early years to 18, if you do A levels or to a degree, 21. And then you stop. Well, that ain't going to work in the future because the world is changing that fast that we've got to continuously reinvest and re entrain our workforce, whether they're 30, 40, 50 or even 60. Like me, old dogs can learn, uh, new tricks. I'm a case in point. I'm using AI every day of the week because I've got young people showing me how to do it. So we need young people to show older people and retrain and re educate and work out how to do that. And again, that's a fundamental shift in our educational process. So involve businesses in education.

Host: Yep.

Steve Endacott: Make it a bit more adaptable to AI and accept AI is coming. And get the educators to start thinking about not what they've always done, but what actually we need moving forward. That's a big task in itself. Yeah.

Host: Uh, interesting. So do you think that universities should become more aggressive when it comes to teaching entrepreneurship and AI literacy?

Steve Endacott: Yeah. Every single degree should be 50% AI based. Yeah. Before you even get out, uh, of bed, I don't care if you're doing politics, I don't care if you're doing business, I don't care if you're doing sociology. 50% of your training should be how to use AI tools to best utilization in that degree. Yeah. And then you teach the rest of it.

Host: So let's talk about housing, energy and economic growth. Beginning road housing, your housing proposals. Can we do one at a time, traditional thinking? Yeah. Uh, we're starting with housing. Right. So your housing proposals, they challenge traditional thinking. What is the core problem with the UK's housing market today? And I know housing is very, very dear to your heart.

Steve Endacott: Yeah. So the problem is that we all know that Labour, government, other governments promise to build hundreds of thousands of new homes and it never happens. Yep. And we have a lot of housing stock tied up with older people, we're an aging population. I'll give you a perfect example. My father is sitting down in Kent, lonely, on his own m because my mother died in a three bedroom house that's far too big to him. But there's no way on hell he's going into an old people's home because they cost 15. They're uh, rubbish in his opinion. Yeah. And he just won't m do it. So therefore I look at a local housing project near us called Imbertal where they've got 51 and two bedroom apartments around a central space with a beautiful bowling green, a nice restaurant, a nice bar that people socialize and have coffees at, uh, every single day. Show films, have cinema things. Yeah, but those houses, they can't buy, they can only rent them because they want the flexibility. Obviously when that person gets older and they have to go in to have more care, they may not be allowed in assisted living anymore. And that's the sort of future I see. So I want to spend 5 billion, I'll say it again, 5 billion. But that's capital that the country can raise on 50 like minded projects where we have 60, 70 apartments around a central location and people at uh, older age go in there, assisted living. And it's really nice accommodation that people want to move into. So when you get to 65 you can consider saying, right, okay, do I want to move out of this big house into a smaller house? It's always your choice. Nobody's ever made to do this. But that moment, say you get to 75. Yeah. And you say, right, uh, I've had enough. This family home, I don't need it anymore. The government then buys it off you. Yeah. And you get half that money's capital release so you can do what you like with it. Funds your traveling, funds your lifestyle, you can give it to the kids inheritance free. And half the monies is capped to pay for your future bills in this rented accommodation, say 1,500 pound a month or your medical bills or your assistance. And when you die, if there's anything left, yeah, the kids get it inherited tax free. So the benefit of that is all of these new complexes. Yeah, you're getting income from. They're paying for the interest of the investment to build them. The benefit of taking the family home is that can be recycled without a single brick being built into younger people so they can rent because there's not enough rental properties for younger people. And again, yeah, they pay rent and that covers the interest. So the whole thing becomes Recycling older properties, it becomes self funding. Yeah, and it's just logic. Give people accommodation that when they get to an older age is suitable to them, that they want to live in. It improves their lifestyle because it's more sociable and there's older people to talk with. Free up the old stock, give it to the younger families and uh, make it rentable so they can afford it. That is not complicated. It's simple practical politics. We can raise the money because we've got an income stream for that money, which is a rental income. A simple practical policy that most parties should be looking at and they're not even debating. And at the moment we've got lonely old people stuck in their houses or in shitty little, uh, old people's homes that aren't fit for purpose. Let's stop it. Let's respect our elders and uh, create a society that actually means they've got a long happy life after they've reached the age of 65. Because at the moment, most of them feel like it's all downhill.

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Steve Endacott: Now it's an absolute scandal. One million. I say it again. One million people under the age of 24 employed. And one of the reasons is our lovely Labour government have increased minimum wage for younger people. Employees are very simple. Young people take more training, more handholding, make more mistakes. So if they become more expensive, you're inclined to take the older person, the 30, the 40 year old, and give the job to. So we've got to readdress that and we've got to give them the massive incentive to take younger people because governments don't really employ young people, businesses do. So my proposal here is businesses pay 15% national insurance on all payroll going through their business. So for older people, fine, keep that. But for anybody under 24, give that business a 15% credit yet credit against that person. So the more they pay them, the more credit they get. And that creates a 30% differential between somebody in the 18 to 24 bracket and somebody older. And that encourages really actively in businesses to employ young people. Once they've been in a business for two years, yeah, they get all the employment rights and it's a pathway to their future careers. So rather than having on the dole and paying them assistance that way, I much rather pay 15% to an employer as a credit that's offset against their national insurance from the other employees to actually force them to be encouraged to have younger people on their payroll. The more the younger people work, the more credit they get. If they have a Saturday job, great, they get credit, they have an apprenticeship, they get even more credit. If they have full time employment and overtime, they get even more credit. So it said just understanding businesses and uh, what motivate businesses. And businesses are motivated by cheap labor. Sorry, you may not like that word, cheap labor, but that's the facts of life. Yeah. If you want younger people to get in, make them cheaper than older people and then they start the career that is an investment worth making for the government and our society.

Host: That may be a contrarian view, but uh, it sounds sort of effective. Now let's talk about energy. Right. Energy is another thing that you know is very, very dear to your heart as well. It comes up in a lot of your newsletters. Right. So your energy proposals focus heavily on affordability. Why is cheap energy so important to national competitiveness?

Steve Endacott: It's a bedrock of everything. Yeah. So if you think about things, if we want to be a AI superpower. Yeah. We need huge number of server farms to run that, those computers. Those computers and server farms need huge amount of electricity. So electricity is like oil, it's the power base of AI. And if AI is the future of the world, you've got to have a strong power base. And also just look at our economic uncertainty due to the war in Iran, um, the war in Russia, oil prices spike and our energy costs of heating our houses and powering our cars and everything else just goes through the roof and we can't control it. So let's look at a couple of basic facts. We are moving away from petrol cars to electric cars. So while we've got petrol cars, drill baby, drill. It is stupid not exploiting the oil we've got in the North Sea and importing it from somewhere else on gas from somewhere else to burn in our power stations to create electricity. That's just stupidity. So drill baby, drill. Yeah, let's get as much stuff gas and oil out the North Sea as we can. Why we migrate to electric cars but if we've got electric cars we need clean electric power. And yes, solar's great but it's only sunny during the day. Yes, wind's great but it's erratic and you can't actually build an infrastructure based on it. The only clean and I use it in caution energy is nuclear energy. But we've gone backwards yet. We were the leaders in dealing with nuclear waste in the 1950s and now we've gone backwards and we can't even deal with our own nuclear waste. We were the leaders in building nuclear power stations in the 60s but we've gone from 25% of our electricity being generated by Lukya down to 17. That's just madness. We are the leaders in developing small nuclear reactors led by Rolls Royce that can be located around the national grid at strategic places to power our future. Where's the investment? It's just not there. And um, that's because politicians don't make long term policies yet. Installing nuclear and building a nuclear power will take a 10 to 20 year time frame. They're out of power by then so they don't care and they don't have its policy. That's got to change. We've got to have long term politics agreed by the major parties where we look at our power and we go right, the only sustainable, dependable and cheapest solution is nuclear. Let's go and become a nuclear powered country. Nuclear powered electricity, electricity that drives our AI future electricity that powers our homes, powers our cars and is clean. That's good for the planet, it's good for commerciality, it's good for our country. And it's a simple policy, but it's a long term policy that the politicians aren't getting around to. That's one of the things I want debated by all parties.

Host: So speaking of investments, how can the UK attract investment while simultaneously improving the standard of lesion?

Steve Endacott: First of all, we need to learn to cheat better.

Narrator: Yeah.

Steve Endacott: So we need to reduce taxes and uh, make it cheaper for oligarchs or anybody else with lots of money to come and leave our country so that money gets sucked into our country. Did you know a thousand millionaires left our country because the Labour government stupidly decided to tax on the non dom status? Stop this bullshit political taxation, look what's best for the country. Having money flowing into the country with billionaires moving to us is logical. Cutting the taxes to have people to invest into data centers in the UK is logical. Having businesses and giving taxation breaks to startup AI businesses so they innovate and um, create new technology is sensible. Yet we just got to look at what drives our economic future and I think that is AI. We need to build a power structure that can support it, uh, an investment structure that's going to support it and an innovation process that supports it. And then we can have an AI employed population where we all have AI co pilots, we all become more efficient and we export AI tools and AI goods around the world. That's the future I'm banking for to making sure we have a prosperous uk.

Host: Interesting take. So speaking of economic opportunities, what economic opportunities do you think or do you believe that the UK is currently missing out on?

Steve Endacott: Um, Europe, Europe, Europe and Europe. Yeah. Brexit was a stupid decision, fine, we've made it. Yeah, we can't go back because I take our trousers down to spankers. But we do have to have closer economic ties to them and we do have to understand that AI speaks 42 different languages, so that will break down the traditional barriers across Europe where. And make it one single market. So that means just like in America, uh, if you have a good idea, you've got a huge market to go after. Now with AI, you can have a good idea in the UK and we can export it into 42 different languages across the whole of Europe, across Russia, across China, across the Far East. So start thinking international, start thinking global, start thinking what tools and products and innovation can we build that we can export around the world? Because the barriers to commerce are dropping fast. With the barriers of language disappearing, barriers to commerce.

Host: Ah, are dropping fast. Wow, that is, that is deep but. Yeah, deep but true. Speaking of fiscal policies, right, you are an advocate for taxing spending rather than work. So why do you believe the current tax system is outdated?

Steve Endacott: It was invented 50 years ago where the majority of the population worked. But look what's happened over the last 50 years. We have an aging population that don't work. So therefore how do we get enough income to pay their pensions? The triple lot, for example. Who's paying for that? Well, the people are working are. We've got an in growing amount of people unemployed or um, have mental illnesses, et cetera. Not working. Yeah, who pays for that? So the problem is with AI coming along and 25% of people likely to lose their jobs and people like these less work less in the next five years, we've got to reshape how we actually get central income to pay for society that's balanced. So we don't have the rich being really rich and the poor being so desperate they stab you on the streets. That could happen. And that scares the hell out of me. So therefore I'm proposing a move to taxation based on what you spend. So for example, VAT, an online purchasing, will go up from 20 to 25%, but it remained 20% on the high street because the high street at the moment pays an unfair tax burden. They pay business tax rates on top, they have four more times, five times more employees, so they pay 15%. National Insurance and online purge companies. And also the major online companies aren't even paying tax in the uk. Look at Amazon, they hide all their profits offshore, so they don't pay tax in the uk. Look at Google, they do the same. Even ebay does the same. So therefore the only way to actually bring tax on those companies into the UK is have a flat 25% tax extra 5% on everything you spend that comes into the coffers of the UK taxman. And that actually helps fund a reduction in income tax. Because you know what? Rich, uh, people spend more than poor people. It's not rocket science. Yep. So if you really want to hit the rich, tax them on their expenditure, not their income. So still encouraged to work hard, still encouraged to create wealth, still encouraged to create jobs. But they tax get taxed harder on what they spend. So they can have their Gucci sunglasses, they can have their nice Chanel suits, et cetera, and their perfumes, but they pay more in tax. Not rocket science. Very simple shift can be delivered by current infrastructure, our current technology. But it's going to be unpopular, um, and therefore politicians won't put it forward because nobody wants to pay more tax. The moment I say I'm increasing VAT from 20, 25%, I'm unpopular. You know what, I don't care. It makes sense. It's what we should be doing. If it means I don't get elected, tough luck.

Host: Uh, interesting. But how do you think AI is accelerating the need for tax reform?

Steve Endacott: Because 25% of people will lose their jobs in the next five years. Are you listening? Are you taking notice country? Every person will have an AI co pilot will make more efficient. So therefore I'll give you an example. In travel, we have broadly 2000 home workers who sell travel from home to customers. Yeah. And the capacity of each one is limited because they've got to do lots of administration as well as talking to the customers. If they have an AI copilot, that will double the capacity that the best homeworkers can do. And, um, they will get all the bookings. That means half the other homeworkers clearly don't have a booking because they've been stolen by the best people. So you need half as many people. That's not numerical science. That's this statement of fact that the best people become more efficient, they will take the work. The least efficient people will lose their jobs. And 25% of you are going to lose your jobs. If you're working in the call center, uh, get a new job, it's gone. If you're working in customer services, think about a new job. Because it's mostly gone. If you're a lawyer, funny enough, you're also buggered. If you're an accountant, you've got a problem. Yeah. If you work at a manual worker with your hands or your plumber or your builder or your horse farrier, you're probably protected. This is the biggest societal change we've seen ever. And it's not coming over 20 to 30 years, it's coming in the next five years. And if we don't wake up, it will overwhelm government. We have too many people on the dole, we won't be able to afford them. The richer get richer, the poor get poorer and our society will go backwards. We need long term thinking, long term strategy and proper politicians now.

Host: So I said with AI comes automation. Right? And you spoke about efficiency. Definitely. Automation significantly increases efficiency, but also it significantly reduces traditional employment opportunities. So how do you think governments should rethink economic productivity in an AI driven world?

Steve Endacott: Okay, so I've talked about 25% of jobs going in the next five years due to efficiency of human beings being more productive. The wave after that, and it probably is 10 years off. Robots doing housework, robots on the production line, robots serving you drinks and food and beer and Driving trains, driverless cars. So you don't need taxis anymore, they just driveless taxis that come around and pick you up. That's another wave of automation, another wave of human beings having less work to do. So that's great because that means we have less, more leisure time. But governments have got to think about how you spread the remaining work around to give people the income to live. Because you can't have like 10% of the population working, funding 90% of the population to sit on the mask and do nothing. It's not going to work. Yep. So we probably have to go to a four day work working week, down to a three day working week, maybe even uh, a two day working week in the future. So that basically work is passed around between more people and then we need to recycle those people haven't got jobs into supported more leisure activity, people will pay. More sport, people drink, more coffee, people go, more holidays, people have more leisure activities. So let's invest in our leisure infrastructure. Let's retrain people to support human beings where human beings want human support. It may be massages, it may be sports training, it may be golf. Yeah, we've got to reinvent society to have more time and work out what we value and work out how we pay for that. And that's why I think taxation shouldn't be on income, it should be on expenditure. So the more you spend, the more you have to fund the central tax bill to support all the people that don't have as much money. Not complicated.

Host: Interesting take. You know, something that stands out to me from you is your use of the term UK first. And you know, it's UK versus the world. What policies would you implement immediately to help the UK achieve that global competitive advantage?

Steve Endacott: Okay, so first of all, stop fighting other people's wars. Yeah. I don't like the invasion of the Ukraine, but it's not my war. I don't like America's action in Iran. It's not my war. We are no longer a superpower. We're a little island off the coast of Europe. It was stupid enough to leave the biggest economic union it ever had access to. Yep. So we've got to take the most of that and we've got to say, okay, how do we do deals with the big guys? What value do we offer America? What value do we offer China? What value do we offer Russia? Well, actually we're a very convenient point next to Europe that they can invest AI infrastructure such as data centers. And we've already got the cables to export that data across the North Sea and as any other sea, to Europe. Yeah. So let's become the world's data center for exploiting the wider market of Europe. Let's car taxes. Let's do all the things that you can't do if you're in European Union. Let's cheat. Just like the Swiss did all through their lives. And that's why they're most one of the most profitable and wealthy countries in the world. Just take, uh, a leaf out of their book and become the Switzerland of Europe at just off the coast with deals with Russia, with deals with America, with deals with everybody. Stop letting other people's politics get in the way of our society and our, uh, life. I don't like China's dictatorship. You know what? I don't give stuff because I don't live there. Yeah. So let's just work with them. Let's take their cash, take their investment and worry about the UK first.

Host: Interesting. Interesting tape. You know, building a, uh, political movement requires visibility. How have you approached your personal branding and the credibility building in order to take this political movement to the next level?

Steve Endacott: Happen. I'm trying. So let's look at my political efforts so far. Uh, quite, quite pathetic, to be honest. So I recognized Tribe and I joined the Conservative Party. And it was shocking. Yeah, it was an old boys club. Yeah. And for example, I wanted to be an mp and they said, no, no, no, you can't just be an MP straight away. You have to apply. They do talk in this voice, by the way. You have to apply and be a councillor first. I don't want to be a councillor. It's not a role I want to do. Well, we know that. And you don't actually have to win. So we'll put you in a seat you can't win just so you get some experience knocking on doors. What a load of rubbish. And then when I came round nine months later and said, right, now can I stand to be an mp? He went, oh, no, no, we've given that to one of our mates. You're not getting that job. And I thought, what is the point of being a Conservative then? And then they melted down and had crazy policies anyway. So I then said, okay, I'll, uh, be an independent. And I didn't understand what that meant. No independents that haven't been the head of major parties or around for 20 to 30 years have ever been elected. Yep. So we launched AI Steve. We got 110 million TV views. Yeah. Because people loved the concept, the democracy we're putting forward. Yeah, but the local Brighton Argos wouldn't cover me because I'm independent and they can't show bias against the major parties and have to give them priority. So we couldn't get our message out in Brighton. And on UM poll a week before polling day, we had a thousand people that said, yes, they would vote for us. But we did a survey of another thousand people and only 8% had even heard of us. And another 8% said, yeah, it's a 60% chance they'd vote for us. You do the maths. That means we're going to get less than 4%, 2% of the vote. Yep. And then we listened to the bullshit of the local press again. They said it's gonna be a closing, uh, rum fight between.

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Steve Endacott: Well, that's cool. No, you don't understand.

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Narrator: That is the problem. Nothing in my life goes as smoothly.

Steve Endacott: I'm waiting for the catch.

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Narrator: Catch. That's exactly what a catch would want me to think.

Narrator: Wow.

Narrator: You need to relax.

Steve Endacott: I need to knock on wood.

Narrator: Do we have wood? Is this table wood?

Narrator: I think it's laminate.

Narrator: Okay. Yeah, that's good. That's close enough.

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Steve Endacott: Wayfair. Every style, every home in Labour and the Greens. And we quite like the Greens policies. So we told all of our thousand voters to vote for Greens. Yep. So how we got any votes in the end, I don't know, because we told not to vote for us, but we still got, I think something like 185 bits are fairly pathetic. Even a thousand is a bit of a fairly pathetic effort because you can't work as an independent. So therefore I've got to look at my choices, this type, uh, and my chosen preferred choice is to create a think tank called Smarty uk, work with other people, create policies and force all major parties to debate those policies. And that's a big effort. That's a big ask. And to do that I've got to build my personal credibility. I've got to go onto TikTok. I've, uh, secured, for example, a 5.6 million channel of followers. I couldn't recruit them, um, so I just brought them 12 grand. You can buy 5.6 million followers. I can't even do a leaflet drop for that. So that's a smarter way of getting my political party out there. That's a smarter way of engaging with people. That's a smarter way of getting policies discussed. Whether I actually join a party and then whether I actually stand for election depends on what those parties come up with in policies. Because I can't stand for reform, for example, even though I like Nigel because I don't know what the policies are. And that worries me. Yeah. So until any party has some clear policies, I'm not joining any of them because I'd rather be independent and talk to all of them and try to influence all party politics. Because I think collaboration is what our country needs and not just some idiot like me trying to get elected. Because actually, it doesn't matter if I get elected, it just matters if we have sensible, practical policies adopted by the major parties. That's the ambition.

Host: Wow. So what would you say are, uh, the important lessons that you've learned so far? Because, you know, many people have ideas, but very few people communicate them successfully. So what lessons have you learned from influencing public opinion?

Steve Endacott: So here's an interesting one.

Host: Yeah.

Steve Endacott: Knocking on doorsteps. Absolute disaster. Yeah. Nobody wants to talk to a politician they hate politicians, don't knock on their door, their doors, because they don't want to talk to you. Don't walk down the high street adding up leaflets because they run a mile, because they don't want to talk to politicians. So that leaves some big challenges then. So the obvious place to talk to the population and the voters is where they're watching and they're watching TikTok and they're watching Instagram and the older ones of us are uh, looking at Facebook. So I've got to get my policies on video in written format published into those spaces so they're easily digestible. I've got to back that up with a site where AI Steve can be trained with all those policies and engage with them 247 so they can have a debate and they can say what other policies they want us to create. So because I've got to be omni easy to deal with none of these surgeries that you've got no idea where they are. Never staffed by the MP anyway. Yeah. So just be, use modern technology, use video, use social, use AI avatars. Yeah. And be accessible to the world. That's an ambition.

Host: Again, well said, well said. So let's imagine a hypothetical world wherein your key policies are implemented. What would the UK be like in 2035?

Steve Endacott: Okay. If my key policies got implemented? We have a fairer taxation system. We would have half price tuition fees for younger people. We'd have older people's assisted living accommodation that they want to live in. We would have a nuclear power as a basis for our national grid. And we'd have an AI first attitude where we've upskilled our population to export all our products around the world. So we have the highest economic wealth and the highest economic growth out of any major society and country. We work closely with Europe without rejoining Europe because they would spank our pants, take our pants down to spankers if we did. And we become the aircraft carrier off the coast of Europe where Russia, America and China base all their um, data centers to export their AI across Europe. And we can do that in 42 different languages without ever having to change from English. We have more leisure time because we only work three day weeks and we invest in that leisure time and we have humans dealing with humans. So everybody's got a job of some sort of. That's my vision for the future.

Host: Amazing stuff. So from me to you, it's a very, very big thank you for joining us today. But, uh, before you leave, I'm going to put you through the quick fire round. Are you ready to rumble? Answers five questions. Let's go. Number one question is, what is one technology that will transform the UK the most?

Steve Endacott: AI and voice. AI and the ability to speak 42 different languages to take down barriers of trade across Europe so we can export our products all across Europe and then across the rest of the world in time.

Host: Okay, interesting take. So if you were to implement one policy tomorrow morning, what policy would that be?

Steve Endacott: Change taxation away from income to expenditure because it would solve most of our problems instantly. Because the richer you, uh, are, the more you spend, the poorer, uh, you spend less. It balances society. And doing it 25% online and 20% offline supports our high streets and means we don't have to claim mining city centers.

Host: Interesting take. So, next question is, what is one leadership quality every politician should possess?

Steve Endacott: Surround themselves with good people, listen to those good people, understand they've got weaknesses, account balance those weaknesses because teams drive success, not individuals.

Host: Okay. Amazing stuff. So next question is, what is one book? Every future leader should read mine and

Steve Endacott: I publish it next week, so look out for it.

Host: Complete this sentence. Britain's future is strongest when we do that.

Steve Endacott: We have a UK first philosophy and we focus on our own country and other people's wars, other people's battles. Yeah. And we've put our population and our communities first.

Host: Okay, uh, interesting. So, uh, finally, how can people reach you? And for the listeners across the UK and around the world who are concerned about leadership, technology, democracy and economic opportunity, what would your final message be to them?

Steve Endacott: To reach me? I'm easy to find. You just put Steve Endicott into Google. You find me. Put Steve Endicott into LinkedIn. You find me. M. If you look harder, you can find my email and my telephone address. It's all out there. Contact me if you've got opinions. I'd love to have more people join me in smarty uk. We've got a good team, but we could always do with more intelligent and more talent and more people who care. So get in contact. Come and join me. Let's take this forward. Let's deliver, uh, a smarter UK and a better future for our country.

Host: Amazing. And of course, uh, from me to you, it's a massive love and respect. And of course, uh, like I always love to say, anytime a person shares their time with you, they're sharing their life with you. Because the SI unit for merger and life is time. So thank you very much for sharing your life and your time with us today on the podcast and to the audience. You know what to do. And of course if you enjoyed today's session, there is actually more where that came from. So go explore, um, other videos and of course do like comment and of course share this with your network. And uh, till I come your way again, always remember to go for something in your life. Conceive, believe, strive to thrive and achieve. For me, it's goodbye. And of course from the man, the myth and the legend Steve Endocrine it is.

Steve Endacott: It's mushrooms with me, Matty Matheson. You know what's better than thinking about dinner?

Narrator: Too hard not stop that and just choose mushrooms. Five minutes. Done.

Steve Endacott: Dinner's that easy and you feel like a genius. It's not magic, it's mushrooms. Stop stressing@uh, mushroomcouncil.com Starting a business can

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