Last Friday’s Tory budget was the most unfair, the most unjust,
the most unequal and the most divisive budget we’ve seen in our
lifetimes.
I ask you, what kind of a government is it who, when pensioners
shiver in the cold, hands tax breaks to the wealthy that no
ordinary person could ever dream of?
What type of government is it, who when parents queue at
foodbanks, tells mothers there is no help to feed their hungry
children but there’s money to lavish tax cuts on bankers and
billionaires?
That budget was proof, if ever it was needed, that we speak for
Britain in saying a new government is needed and we need a Labour
government now.
When workers see their pay packets cut, disabled people live in
fear, when women working part time face sanctions, these Tories
protect the gas and oil profits, instead of protecting the poor.
I tell you we speak for Britain in saying we need as Prime Minister now.
These Tories tell us that after 12 years of their own stagnation
they now have a plan for growth but all they’ve given us is a
plan to grow more poverty, hunger and despair.
They tell us they are ripping up the orthodoxy but it’s the same
old Tory orthodoxy back - that wealth will trickle down and a
rising tide lifts all.
We’ve seen that story before. It means more sinking beneath the
waves. It sees pay and conditions worsen. It leads to the
offensive, grotesque fiction of Ministers telling us that to make
bankers work harder, pay them more but to make working people
work harder, pay them less.
Friends, doesn’t that tell you it’s time for change, time for
fairness. Friedns, it’s time for Labour.
And it renders social security so threadbare, that food banks are
now the safety net and churches turn their halls into ‘warm
banks’.
I thank those running them. But we seek government to create a
society where foodbanks are no longer needed. Because we
shouldn’t have to rely on charities to feed children and keep
pensioners warm.
This isn’t the way, as says, to secure growth in our
economy. Because you can’t build sustainable growth when so many
are left behind.
What we need is an economy of all talents with full and
fulfilling employment. Worklessness is such a waste.
I remember queuing with my dad at the dole in the 80s, I remember
the desperate look on faces.
So for young people not in work or training and the thousands of
over 50s now not in jobs but want one, we will reform Jobcentres
and employment services to help more people into work as we
target our ambition of the highest employment in the G7.
We’ll do it, not through Tory threats or sanctions. But through
active help with training, coaching and support for those who
need it.
We’ll do it not by wasting money on big outsourcing corporations
but instead delivered on the ground, in partnership with
community groups, local authorities and services like the NHS.
And we’ll insist these jobs adhere to a very simple principle
that when people work for a living, they should be paid a decent
living wage as we tackle in-work poverty too.
And we’ll reform, overhaul and replace the Tory Universal Credit
system. We’ll treat people with dignity, not burden them with
impossible debts, support children not punish them and we’ll
reinstate a principle Labour has championed since the days of
Barbara Castle but ditched by the Tories, the financial
independence of women should be protected in our social security
system too.
A few weeks ago, I received this letter from a mother:
“Sorry, it took so long to post after writing: I struggled to
justify the price of the stamp.
“My babies are sound asleep but I cannot sleep: I sit awake
terrified for their future.
“I am stressing about what to feed my kids tomorrow.
“What is going to be done, Mr Ashworth?”
What is to be done, Mr Ashworth?
What sort of a government ignores pleas like that? I’ve known
hardship and how it seeps through every aspect of your being.
Consumes every decision.
How it excludes from the necessaries, comforts and pleasures of
society and haunts for the rest of your life. Children never
forget going to school hungry and ill clad.
We’re one the biggest economies in the world yet 4 million
children live in poverty and tonight, thousands of children
hungry, cold and have no bed to sleep in at all. It doesn’t have
to be like this.
Social inequality need not be etched into the landscape of this
nation. Defeating child poverty is the obligation our generation
owes to the next.
Never forget Labour in government lifted millions of children out
of poverty before and that’s the change we can make again.
So, friends, this is our mission:
Full employment and decent pay;
Security in retirement;
A better world for our children;
Because as Nelson Mandela said:
“Overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity but an act of
justice.”
Let us rise to that cause and build a future of opportunity,
fairness and justice for all.
