THE Prime Minister has promised to turn on the spending taps if voters let him stay on in No 10 — starting with 50,000 more nurses for the NHS.
Unveiling his blueprint for power yesterday, Boris Johnson banished the past decade of austerity.
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The Tories’ election manifesto pledges £100billion to rebuild Britain’s creaking transport and infrastructure network, billions more for schools and 20,000 more police.
And there is tailor-made help to ease the burden on struggling workers, from tax cuts to childcare boosts.
Mr Johnson enshrined his top six election policies — along with his pledge to crack on with Brexit — as solemn guarantees to voters.
He insisted his polling day offer is a major “step change” from the belt-tightening of his predecessors David Cameron and Theresa May.
Hailing what he dubbed “the biggest ever cash boost to the NHS”, he said: “I believe absolutely passionately it’s our job as One Nation Conservatives to support a step change in funding of our great public services, particularly the NHS.
“This is a new government. It is a very dynamic, positive and active government.
“We think now is the time to invest in our public services, but to do it in a way that maintains the long-term prosperity of our country.”
NHS ‘not for sale’
THE NHS will not be for sale in any trade deal with the US if the Tories win the election, Boris Johnson said yesterday.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has accused the PM of plotting a post-Brexit sellout leading to £500million a week extra spending on medicines.
It has been repeated at every Labour election rally.
But the Conservative manifesto states: “When we are negotiating trade deals the NHS will not be on the table.
“The price the NHS pays for drugs will not be on the table.
“The services the NHS provides will not be on the table.”
Independent charity Full Fact rubbished Labour’s £500million claim.
It stated: “This figure is extreme and unrealistic.
“It has not been the case in countries which have agreed trade deals with the USA, such as Australia.”
NEW TAX CUTS
A total of £3billion in extra spending a year is pledged in the Tory manifesto, on top of Mr Johnson’s initial extra splurge of £13.8billion more for public services, unveiled in September.
In addition, the PM offered up £3.3billion in new tax cuts yesterday, with most of it coming by raising the National Insurance threshold to give every worker in the country an £85 tax bill cut next year for starters.
The vast majority of the new spending will be paid for by shelving a big new corporation tax cut for businesses, giving the Treasury £6billion a year extra to spend.
But Boris drew stark contrast between his spending offer and Labour boss Jeremy Corbyn’s £83billion-a-year state splurge — plans that would see him spending 28 times what the Tories are promising.
Mr Johnson insisted only his offer is credible, because “we’re doing it in a sensible way”.
He added: “We’re making big commitments but we can only do that because we manage the economy sensibly.”
He stressed “the stakes have never been higher, and the choice has never been starker” than they are on December 12. And he tore into his hard left rival for offering only “dither and drift and deadlock and division”.
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Mr Johnson said his vision for Britain depended on the need to first “get Brexit done” — his campaign catchphrase that appears on the manifesto cover and no less than 22 times inside.
And he mocked the Opposition leader’s fence-sitting.
To laughter from Tory faithful in the West Midlands marginal seat of Telford, he said: “Jeremy Corbyn won’t tell us whether he would even be willing to advise people to vote in favour of his own deal.
“He used to be indecisive — now he’s not so sure.”
The Tory leader put the NHS front and centre of his manifesto offer in a bid to counter Mr Corbyn’s main election claim that the National Health Service is only safe in Labour’s hands.
The 50,000 extra nursing posts will be paid for with an £800million cash injection for health chiefs.
There will be 14,000 new student nurses, 5,000 more from an increase in nursing degree apprenticeships, retaining a further 18,500 by improving terms and conditions and recruiting 12,500 from abroad.
The uplift represents a near 20 per cent increase on today’s current number of 280,000.
£100bn to keep Britain moving
By Jonathan Reilly
THE Prime Minister pledged a bumper £100billion pot of cash to repair Britain’s creaking infrastructure.
The windfall will beef up Britain’s roads and generate new railway links, especially in the North.
It will also upgrade bus and tram links and provide more charging points for electric cars.
The manifesto says the aim is to “level up and connect this country, so that everyone can get a fair share of its future prosperity”.
Around £22billion-worth of the projects have been announced, with £78billion more to be unveiled during the next parliament’s term.
Already known is that £2billion will go on filling potholes in Britain’s roads.
And £500million will be spent on reinstating local railway lines axed under the Beeching cuts in the 1960s.
The Northern Powerhouse Rail project will focus on links between Leeds and Manchester.
Then the Government will “focus on Liverpool, Tees Valley, Hull, Sheffield and Newcastle”.
And a Midlands Rail Hub would strengthen links between Birmingham, Leicester, Nottingham, Coventry, Derby, Hereford and Worcester.
There were also fresh policy promises to introduce a “Right to Retrain” for all adults, so workers can keep pace with technological change, funded by a £3billion National Skills Fund.
The PM also pledged a major package on the environment as well as animal welfare, calling on Tory activists: “Let’s go carbon neutral by 2050, and Corbyn neutral by Christmas”.
A significantly tougher sentencing regime for serious criminals and more powers for police also feature prominently.
But while the manifesto was full of aspiration, there were no detailed plans on how to build the 300,000 new houses that Britain needs every year, nor a specific solution to fix the social care crisis that politicians have ducked for 20 years.
And, at just 60 pages in length, this year’s Conservative manifesto is significantly stripped down from the party’s controversial offer in 2017.
Strategists carried out a major “de-risking” exercise to try to ensure they avoid the calamitous polling lead collapse that Theresa May suffered.
There was also no mention of Mr Johnson’s Tory leadership pledge to cut taxes for the better off by increasing the basic rate of income tax band to £80,000.
Last night Paul Johnson, director of respected think tank the Institute for Fiscal Studies, called the manifesto “modest”.
He added: “As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.”
But it was welcomed by business leaders, who had reacted in horror to Labour’s red socialist agendas.
CBI deputy director-general Josh Hardie said: “Businesses will be heartened by a pro-enterprise vision, while looking for even more ambition on areas such as access to skills, infrastructure and reaching net zero.”
- A poll of polls taken before the manifesto launch gave the Tories a 12-point lead over Labour.It came after an Opinium poll for the Observer had the Tories on 47 per cent and Labour on just 28 per cent — a massive 19-point lead.
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THE common-sense Tory manifesto will have Brits up and down the country sighing with relief.
It was a dose of reality after Jeremy Corbyn’s ludicrously overblown wishlist.
Labour committed to lumbering Britain with catastrophic extra debt to deliver a socialist “revolution”. The absurd levels of spending were deemed “not credible” by impartial experts the party itself cited.
Boris Johnson reminded us yesterday what proper, grown-up politics looks like.
He will not raise income tax, VAT or National Insurance, seize control of the railways and hand benefits to all.
And if you’re a grafter, his practical, pragmatic pledges look infinitely more enticing than Labour’s.
Under a Tory majority your child will have a great chance of getting a place at a good local school, you’ll get a GP appointment, and visiting a sick relative in hospital won’t cost an arm and a leg.
With Boris Johnson at the helm, precious taxpayer money will be spent not on an “audit on the impact of Britain’s colonial legacy” – the Marxists’ latest bizarre wheeze – but on reinvigorating the front line of Britain’s public services.
The armed forces will not be hollowed out, the NHS will be turbocharged with 50,000 new nurses, and the police force will swell by 20,000 officers.
These are big, important investments, but Boris has found a way to make them without bankrupting the country: staggeringly, for every extra £1 the Tories spend running the Government, Labour is planning to spend £28.
And crucially, because Boris is prepared to say no to unfulfillable promises, his pledges are actually deliverable.
When a woman on TV asked him to compensate people who believe they lost out due to pension age changes, he gave a sympathetic but honest answer.
Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell, a professional protester with no experience of governing and a loose relationship with the truth, pledged an eye-watering £58billion more to solve it.
It wasn’t in Labour’s manifesto. It’s EXTRA. Where that vast sum will come from is anyone’s guess.
And if the gap in credibility between the two manifestos is gaping, it is nothing to the gap in motive.
Where Corbyn is motivated by grievance, hatred and score-settling, the PM wants to unleash Britain’s potential.
Boris might not have all the answers, but what he has given us is a firm promise to deliver Brexit in two months, and rebalance spending towards those who have suffered the worst during ten years of fixing Labour’s last economic disaster.
And with his infectious optimism, sunny disposition and unshakable patriotism, we believe he can deliver.
