If I were Prime Minister: I'd shrink the gap between the highest and lowest paid

Our series in the run-up to the General Election – 100 days, 100 contributors, but no politicians – continues with the novelist and historian

(Dan Welldon)

My ambition would be to shrink the differentials between the higher paid and the lower paid so that by the end of my government’s first term, it would be something more like 10 to 1 across the country. I’d look into the charity status of any institution in which the pay differentials exceeded that ratio (I would keep a keen eye on loopholes -giving bonuses, special contracts etc) and end their privileges. In relation to corporations and banks, I’d invite economists who are critics of austerity to advise me on how to reform them, such as Paul Krugman, Joseph Stiglitz, and Naomi Klein.

I would create serious tax incentives to give money away – to the arts and education especially. I’d call for a full-scale nationwide programme to create what used to be called youth clubs – centres for young people to gather safely and actively do things. I’d also invest in turning brownfield sites into more spaces for children to play.

On immigration, I’d move immediately towards a collaboration with Italy, above all, to support policies of resettlement. I’d support the call for an international conference, to stop thinking of the issue in terms of exclusion, but instead consider mutuality and protection (and responsibility). I’d also remove students from the immigration statistics in the UK.

I would treat universities, art schools, music academies, film schools etc as the necessary nurseries of the country’s future earners and not expect such institutions to turn a profit, so I’d restore investment in Higher Education across the board, and not throw everyone into the snake pit together. The crucial contribution of teachers would be fully recognized and rewarded in the pay scales. I would encourage a major institution to take a lead and withdraw from the current time-wasting and clumsy Research Excellence Framework (REF), so that its collapse would soon follow.

I’d redefine faith schools as multi-faith schools. I’d strengthen the governance of academies so that single proprietors can’t impose their will on them.

I’d abolish Westminster modes of address – no more sneering Hon Member this and Hon Member that. PM’s Question Time would not be missed. Instead I’d hold open informal conversations, in a different part of the country each week, with the local representatives, and others who are interested.

I’d return to the problem of press standards - in print, broadcasting, advertising, and on the web – and formulate a new code about images and discussions of sex and violent death in general, but particularly in relation to the watershed.

Trident would not be renewed. The NHS would be liberated from its private contractors.

I’d bump up taxes on Chelsea tractors – and indeed on any four wheel drive car in London or other major cities. I’d discourage packaging in supermarkets also through taxes. I’d look seriously into ways of turning vacant second homes to good temporary use.

I would allow lone parents to work part-time and still receive allowances. I would extend civil partnerships to heterosexual couples.

In order to do all this, I’d make common cause with like-minded allies in the Greens, the SNP, Plaid Cymru, and in the EU. In general I would listen to messages that have been strongly and eloquently voiced during this government and the last, but have fallen on deaf ears. Mine would be open to their ideas, and everything would change for the better. Without imagining how things might be, however crazy and unrealistic they sound, we can’t begin to make a difference.