In recent weeks, I’ve been out campaigning across our country. From Swindon to Stoke, from Mansfield to Great Yarmouth, the most common thing people mention is how stretched their family finances are.
Energy bills high. Food prices through the roof.
A Tory penalty on mortgages – a direct result of their disastrous kamikaze budget - with 600,000 families re-mortgaging onto higher rates in the past six months alone.
Of course, the cost of living crisis has snowballed over the last year. Our economy has been weakened, leaving us vulnerable to the energy crisis. The Tory economic crash has left working people paying the bill.
But the truth is that this is a failure over 13 years of Tory government. The evidence is clear.
Today, we reveal new figures that show how, since 2010, workers across the UK are seeing a £400 hit on their pay packet each month.
Wages have fallen over the last decade compared to when Labour was in government, and many earn less when allowing for inflation.
At the same time, we’re being clobbered by the highest tax burden since the Second World War.
We are stuck in a high tax, low growth, low wage Tory trap. The only way out, in a way that is both pro-business and pro-worker, is through economic growth. Not just for those at the top – but for everyone.
That’s why we’ve made it the driving ambition of the next Labour government. Our mission to secure the highest sustained growth in the G7 will be about creating good jobs across every part of the country.
From the plumbers, builders and pipefitters needed to insulate 19 million homes through our Warm Homes Plan, to our plans to bring in a genuine Living Wage, to how we’ll make Britain the best place to start and grow a business – Labour will make sure that working people see the benefits of that growth where they live.
Our growth mission will mean more money in your pocket, your local high street thriving, and a stronger economy with higher living standards all round.
Right now, people are asking themselves: am I better off now than I was 13 years ago when the Tories came into power? The answer is no. Never have people paid so much and got so little in return.
And now, during the local elections, the Tory cupboard is once again bare.
Instead of bringing in a proper windfall tax on oil and gas giants to freeze council tax this year as Labour would, the Tories have left gaping loopholes allowing them to avoid paying their fair share.
Instead of abolishing a £3billion tax loophole that sees the super rich avoid paying what they owe here – or “this non-dom thing” as the Prime Minister so casually calls it – and spending the money on building our NHS workforce, they’ve chosen to carry on putting the burden on working people.
Instead of bringing in 13,000 more neighbourhood police and PCSOs back on our streets as Labour will, they’d rather let anti-social behaviour and crime continue to go up.
It is clear that it’s time for a change. Our country has so much to offer. Labour will unlock that potential and promise.
By tackling to the cost of living crisis right now, growing our economy and bringing in a genuine Living Wage – a Labour government will build a better Britain and make you and your family better off.
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