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Roger Douglas at National Conference

Sir Roger Douglas, the origin of Rogernomics and New Zealand's champion of free markets, was the keynote speaker at the LDP National Conference on 24 January 2010, at the Balmain Leagues Club in Sydney.

Roger Douglas was appointed NZ's Finance Minister when Labour was elected in 1984. In that role he implemented the most radical changes in half a century, including monetarist measures to control inflation, the slashing of subsidies and trade tariffs, and the privatisation of public assets.

Traditionalists regarded all of these policies as a betrayal of Labour's left-wing stance, and Rogernomics became deeply unpopular with those who supported the political left in New Zealand. Douglas's supporters defended the reforms as necessary to revive the economy, which National's Muldoon had kept under tight regulation.

He was planning to implement a new flat tax system and a guaranteed minimum income scheme when  forced to resign his Ministry in late 1988.

After retiring from Parliament in 1990, Sir Roger founded the Association of Consumers and Taxpayers in 1993 which went on to become ACT New Zealand after the MMP referendum in 1995.

In 2008, Sir Roger was asked by ACT Leader Rodney Hide to run as a candidate for ACT. At number three on ACT's list, Sir Roger was returned to Parliament at the 2008 election for the first time in 18 years.

Sir Roger's presentation: 

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0v7vawyf77I

Part 2:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCjm1IxMU64

Your Choice, Not the Government's

The Government is comprised of politicians and public servants with no special insight or wisdom. Despite that, it constantly tells us what is best for us and how to run our lives.

It ties up enterprising businesses in regulations and red tape that prevent them from investing, expanding and employing more people.

It also insists we should eat healthy foods, not smoke, wear a helmet when we ride a bicycle and not use marijuana. It tells us how to discipline our children, whether we can renovate our houses and who we can marry. It prevents us from owning a weapon to protect our families in our own home and stops us from obtaining help to end our own lives even we are in terminal pain. It forces us to vote even when we don't want to.

The Liberal Democratic Party believes people should make their own choices and accept responsibility for the consequences. It believes governments have neither the expertise nor the right to tell people how to run their lives and should stick to things like protecting Australia from attack and safeguarding property rights.

The LDP believes in legalising assisted suicide, the right of self defence and voluntary voting. It considers property owners, not the government, should decide whether smoking is allowed on their property and whether to remove trees.

It believes the government has no business regulating victimless crimes such as adult consensual prostitution, adult pornography or risky behaviour that harms nobody else. It believes speed limits should be determined by what most motorists regard as safe, not what public servants deem to be acceptable.

Even when the choices that individuals make are unwise and could harm them, so long as nobody else is harmed involuntarily, the LDP says, "It's your choice, not the government's."