Mitchell Feierstein is standing for the Brexit Party in Reading East.
He is a British-American investor, banker, writer and columnist.
In 2012, he published his first book, Planet Ponzi, which gives his perspective on the global credit crisis.
Mr Feierstein currently lives in Reading and is originally from Manhattan.
He said he originally came to the UK for a one-year work assignment, and liked it so much, he made it his home.
Below is the Q&A with Mitchell to find out why he is standing for your vote in Reading East.
Hi Mitchell. Why should people vote for you?
Trust in politics is gone. I am not a careerist politician. I have no hollow slogans or soundbites.
I will only make promises that are AAA: Affordable, Achievable, and Actionable.
Our politicians repeatedly promise the world and never deliver. How many times did Theresa May and Boris Johnson fail to deliver on promises? Too many to count.
Just look at Brexit. The people voted for it but the politicians refuse to honour the results of the referendum. Boris Johnson's new Brexit deal is not new.
It's 95 per cent Theresa May's terrible treaty. It is half-baked and does not deliver a clean-break Brexit at all.
Or how about Boris Johnson’s promise to build 40 new hospitals? Johnson has made this promise without calculating the cost, which is estimated to be around 24 billion.
Where is this money coming from? Boris will never fulfil this promise; it’s a lie.
As far as Labour is concerned—what have they improved in the past few years? Nothing.
Instead of blindly believing false promises, ask them all: How are you going to pay for this?
Our country needs real, positive change.
With the funds saved by a true Brexit deal, I will provide that change for the people I work for.
I will use my nearly forty years of work experience in finance and job creation to analyse and solve dysfunctional and inefficient government programs.
I have always been able to find solutions where others have failed.
What is your view on Brexit? How do you think it should be delivered?
We need a clean-break Brexit. The democratic process has spoken.
I am pro-Europe and pro-immigration. Still, I oppose the EU bureaucrats—a wasteful bureaucracy run by five presidents in multi-billion dollar offices in Brussels—none of whom you or I elected.
For years, these career politicians have taken our money and given us no say over how or where it is spent.
Many of the financial institutions in the EU are insolvent, and the UK will have to bail them out, just like we did with Northern Rock, RBS and Lloyds Bank - only it will be 100s if not thousands of times larger.
For example, Italy is broke. Its banks need to be recapitalised, and its government can never repay the nearly £3 trillion debt they owe.
Why should Britain pay for any part of this? That money is better spent on Britain’s future – reducing student loan debt and ensuring the NHS can serve more patients, more efficiently.
We must retain our sovereignty, independence and democratic principles. We need to be able to control our laws, borders, money and defence.
Parliament is guilty of not following the instruction given to them by the people who elected them.
In 2016, 1.4 million voted to leave; this is how democracy works.
David Cameron and all the politicians agreed before the 2016 referendum to leave the EU if that’s what the referendum results showed.
A clean break will provide us with a £200 billion dividend that can be better spent on rebuilding our broken infrastructure.
The fearmongering and propaganda that we will “crash out” is nonsense. All the predictions of Armageddon in 2016 “if you vote to leave” never happened. They were lies.
Just as fearmongering surrounding Y2K was propaganda in 2000, so is the fearmongering around Brexit today.
Brexit will provide the UK with a chance to position itself as a fiscally responsible world leader.
What is your party’s policy on the NHS?
The NHS suffers from institutional bloat. The population has increased and services have decreased.
I have managed and run many successful businesses, and we need to review the business model of the NHS.
There are many potential solutions worth exploring. For example, we could sack unnecessary massively overpaid administrative staff and use the savings to hire more nurses and doctors.
We would create a system of incentives that pays senior nurses and doctors to improve the efficiency of the NHS.
We would also offer state-funded tuition for all nurses and doctors until we resolve this crisis.
In exchange, and upon graduation, the nurses and doctors commit to providing services to the NHS for a minimum fixed period.
We need to be able to provide free care to everyone who needs it when they need it, and we will.
Which of your party’s policies will have the biggest impact on people in Reading East?
Law and order is big. Crime in Reading has surged.
We need a “zero tolerance” policing standard that returns the streets to the people. We have been too lax for too long.
As population increases, services cannot decrease. We need to be able to provide free care to everyone who needs it, when they need it.
Climate change is a big deal. I have twelve years of experience influencing and creating climate change policy.
I will distribute climate change awareness packages that will help everyone become meaningfully involved in reducing carbon emissions.
Legacy parties want to waste billions they do not have on programs that they cannot define or will never work.
For example, people talk about cold fusion, but this will not happen in the next fifty years and we need realistic change now.
Many candidates are offering pie-in-the-sky solutions, but none of the parties has begun with the basics.
We need to provide our community—businesses, homes and individuals—with CO2 calculators that will allow everyone to see and assess their “carbon footprint”.
We can then instruct the community on how they can reduce that footprint. Energy efficiency is an underrated and primary tool for fighting global warming.
What local campaigns would you focus on as MP?
Public parks, swimming facilities and overall recreation facilities. We will look at upgrading these facilities for the community.
If we need to look for corporate sponsors for funding, so be it. We can and will fund these projects without increasing our debt.
What do you think Matt Rodda has done well and what not so well?
I respect Matt Rodda for his refusal to participate in mudslinging. However, like all legacy politicians, he and the labour party have made wildly unaffordable promises that cannot be delivered in a million years.
The promises made by the Labour Party will bankrupt our country.
For example, where is the money coming from for the £58 billion that Matt’s party has promised to compensate the WASPI women?
Nowhere, it is a lie and will never happen.
Matt seeks to undermine democracy by ignoring the 2016 referendum result. While it gets votes, it is shameful.
If he wins the election, should we ignore the results in the same way he has ignored the results of the referendum for the past three and a half years?
Constituents need to vote to change politics for good. That’s why I am leaving my successful career in finance to put our country back on track.
What are you hearing from people of Reading East about what they want? What has their response been to your ideas?
They care about the five primary issues on which the Brexit Party is running: Brexit, NHS, crime, climate change and immigration.
The people on Reading East have said they find my ideas refreshing.
I think out-of-the-box, and they are shocked that the Brexit Party can provide so much more than Brexit and have a team of professionals willing to right this sinking ship.
Are you concerned that if people vote for you it could enable Matt Rodda – a pro-remain candidate – to be elected ahead of Craig Morley – a pro-Brexit candidate?
It is simply propaganda and fearmongering to say a vote for Mitch will split the Conservative vote. It will not. We will take more votes from Labour and the Liberal Democrats than we will from the Tory Party. My party offers an alternative: honesty.
How would you support individuals in Reading as a candidate? (E.g. surgeries or other)
I will always be available and will remain here in Reading to resolve the issues of my constituents.
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