Ahead of next week’s Budget, commentators know that Rishi Sunak’s promise to grow the economy is now in tatters.
The prime minister can no longer credibly claim that his plan is working or that he has turned the corner on more than fourteen years of economic decline under the Conservatives that has left Britain worse off. This is Rishi Sunak’s recession and the news will be deeply worrying for families and business across Britain.
Our country needs a long term plan to turn this around. Labour has a plan to get growth back, improve living standards and invest in our public services. A plan that will bring more investment and cheaper bills.
Our economy is now smaller than when Rishi Sunak entered 10 Downing Street in 2022. GDP per capita fell in every quarter of the last year. If the UK economy had grown at the average rate of other OECD economies over the past decade, it would now be £140 billion larger – equivalent to £5,000 per household every year. That would also mean an additional £50 billion in tax revenues to invest in our crumbling public services.
Today, the average British family is 20 per cent worse off than their German counterparts.
One in three working-age families have less than £1,000 in savings. Over this year and last, the fixed rate mortgages of more than three million people will come to end, all paying the price of the Tory mortgage bombshell.
And while there are 700,000 more people out of the workforce now than when the pandemic struck four years ago, training opportunities are being held back. There were 5,305 unemployment benefit claimants in Feltham and Heston constituency in January 2024 (6.1% of the population aged 16-64) and 730 claimants aged 18-24. Both of these are far higher than the national rate.
The Conservatives have overseen more than a decade of decline in skills and training opportunities. Under their watch, apprenticeship starts have fallen by over 200,000 – with every single region seeing a fall. Small business engagement with apprenticeships has fallen by 49% since 2016.
In Feltham and Heston, there are almost 500 fewer learners starting an apprenticeship than there were in 2011. The Conservative Party can’t fix the problem, they are the architects of the problem. Britain needs change. Our economy needs change.
Labour’s plan for growth is about making working people better off, because this is set to be the first Parliament on record where living standards in this country have actually contracted. Household income growth is down by 3.1% and Britain is worse off.
Putting economic stability first by introducing a new fiscal lock to bring economic security back to family finances. Because never again will we allow a repeat of the devastation of Liz Truss and the Conservatives’ mini-budget that crashed the economy and left working people worse off.
And as well as investing in our NHS, our schools and colleges and in our police, I am proud that we will make work pay by strengthening employment rights, delivering a genuine living wage and ending fire and rehire.
Together, we’ll turn the page on Tory failure and get Britain’s future back.