AS A NEW candidate, I am standing under the constitution of a brand new grassroots political movement called People Parties. Our slogan is 'Never vote for politicians again, vote for people'.

Voting for career politicians on the basis of manifesto promises is inherently flawed. Once that party has control, the politician’s allegiance to you is compromised. Not only do they have no accountability on fulfilling their promises but there is no chance for people to practically influence policies as they unfold over years. This is why right now, the only thing I can honestly promise is try to truly represent the best interests of the men, women and local businesses of Edinburgh East and Musselburgh, and to involve you in designing those priorities and solutions. I believe men and women are sovereign and should be empowered to be the ones who have the main say in their own governance.

A core principle behind Edinburgh People is to tackle the root causes of systemic corruption to our way of life by unelected, powerful and corporate control. We don’t agree that these entities should have such unprecedented levels of influence over our public services, institutions and policies. Powerful, largely unseen interests are now behind shaping most policies and ideologies, proving so disastrous for most local UK people, and so we aim to attack this via a democratic, people-led movement.

Instead of having career politicians whose allegiance is to their party, People Parties will have men and women with real, practical life experience representing the views and best interests of local people. We can create individual local People Parties throughout the UK, with local manifestos reflecting specific interests of a local areas. There will be no party 'whips' to tell MPs what to do, we will have transparency and no corporate influence to corrupt the process. In addition, all people in an area will be enabled to join their local People Party and actually have an ongoing democratic say in all aspects of policies and practices.

Edinburgh People has been a concept in the making for some time, but because of the snap General Election, we literally mobilised five independent candidates within weeks.

We believe it is possible to achieve our aims using both technology and in-person representation, and by ensuring transparency and freedom of speech. Our initial policies, which you can find on edinburghpeople.org, will be expanded and shaped by our members, you, the Edinburgh People.

My belief is that in coming together in numbers to examine and prioritise the issues we face, we can really understand and come up with better solutions from the grassroots up. The incompetence and corruption in the existing system has reached intolerable levels and so a vote for me is a vote for taking back power from the hands of large global bodies and governments, who have their own agendas.

I hope that if people see me and other ordinary people getting involved, perhaps they will be inspired to get involved too.

Jane Gould biography - I was born in Edinburgh and have enjoyed living and working in this amazing city all my life. After graduating with a science degree from Edinburgh University, I worked for medium and large companies, and I have also been a partner in a small local firm. I’d say the most important and challenging job I’ve done is being a mother. I have been happily married for 37 years and I live with my husband, two sons and rescue dog, and I help look after an elderly relative. In my spare time, I love playing the saxophone. I’ve never been involved in politics before but I have been moved to take action now because I wanted to do something to challenge corruption and incompetence. We need to get power away from the politicians and powerful corporations, and give it back to ordinary people in a properly democratic way.