Philip Webster, Political Editor
We've made some changes
to The Sunday Times
Gordon Brown pinned his hopes for his and Labour’s recovery on a package of strongly Blairite reforms to hospitals, schools, police and welfare yesterday.
Poorly performing hospitals that fail to satisfy patients will lose finance and face ultimate closure and there will be direct intervention in the housing market, with £200 million of taxpayers’ money used to buy unsold homes to help poorer families, Mr Brown said as he foreshadowed 18 Bills for the next parliamentary programme.
Changes to the laws on flexible employment will also mean that millions of working parents with older children will get the right to demand to work part-time from next April.
The day after his £2.7 billion U-turn on the 10p tax rate Mr Brown said that helping family finances was his immediate priority. It was the latest stage of a fightback that continues today when Mr Brown holds his monthly Westminster press conference.
Cherie Blair revealed to The Times at the weekend that her husband has been advising Mr Brown during his current troubles and that Mr Brown could have taken the top job earlier if he had embraced Mr Blair’s public service reforms. Many of the radical measures outlined yesterday would have earned the strong approval of Mr Blair, with new powers for patients, parents and young workers.
Last night in London Mr Brown pledged to put ambition and aspiration at the centre of social policy, and said that public service and welfare reform would move farther and faster on diversity of supply. He promised a health service reform Bill including a new constitution setting out patients’ entitlements to minimum standards of access, quality and safety.
Mr Brown said that payments to NHS hospitals would be adjusted according to patient satisfaction with them and their success rates. In a clear warning that poor hospitals will be closed or given new management, he promised powers to ensure that no healthcare provider should fall below minimum standards.
There will be an education Bill to ensure that, by 2011, no school underperforms, with an independent qualifications system, more power for parents to receive information on children’s progress, and a bigger say on standards and the siting of schools.
Mr Brown announced a £200 million fund to buy unsold new homes and rent them to social tenants or make them available through a shared-ownership scheme. An additional £100 million would be made available to shared equity schemes to help more first-time buyers to purchase newly built homes.
Mr Brown said that the right to flexible working would be extended to parents with older children from April, along with new rights for agency workers. The “right to request” flexible work will be extended to mothers and fathers of secondary school children. At present only those with children aged 6 or younger have that right.
Although ministers say that details of the proposals will be subject to consultation with business, it is expected that parents with children aged 16 and under will all be included in the end. Industry leaders immediately criticised the move, saying that next April was too soon for such a major change.
A police reform Bill would make chief constables accountable to a directly elected representative. There may also be moves to introduce different degrees of homicide, including provocation, diminished responsibility, complicity and infanticide – subject to consultation and a new sentencing commission to monitor the size of prison populations. Tests for immigrants to receive British citizenship are to be made tougher, with newcomers expected to learn English and prove that they are making an economic contribution.
The long-term unemployed will be forced to retrain or have their benefits cut under a welfare reform Bill. Incapacity benefit claimants will be required to go through medical assessments and given a personalised programme to help them return to work.
Eight million people on low incomes will be encouraged to save with a National Savings scheme, with every pound they deposit matched by a contribution from the Government. And after the Northern Rock collapse, protection for depositors’ savings will be extended, probably to £100,000.
David Cameron said that he welcomed many of the measures, as his party had proposed them in the first place. “This Queen’s Speech has nothing to do with the long-term needs of the country and everything to do with your short-term political survival,” he told Mr Brown.
“We need a government that tackles the underlying causes of poverty, that fights family breakdown, that breaks open the monopoly of state education. We need a government that can work with the voluntary sector.”
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Goverments, Right or Left, must re-establish authority after the havoc caused by civil liberty groups and the irresponsable enlargement of the EU. To fund the public sector and save declining societies we need less financial greed, redistribution of income and a`clamp down on tax avoidance schemes.
peter fieldman, paris, france
The country was sick of Blair and 'Blairism' after ten years of surruptitous privatisation of public services - all the time under the umbrella of 'private good; public bad'.
The only beneficiaries of privatisation are the managers who inherit millions of pounds from the sale and the shareholders.
Tony Probert, Locking, UK
I challenge Brown & Cameron to go out into the nation to see if they can find a source of a small sum of long term equity capital to create new jobs, ie, prosperity, ie increased tax income. In fact such local capital no longer exists. They should both concentrate upon the real needs of ciizens.
Chris Coles, Medstead, Alton, United Kingdom
here we go again. more blairism!!!!
what is actually blairism???
lies,deceit and more lies.
ebbi britt, valencia,
It is a bit rich for Cameron to claim that his policies have been stolen. The big weakness in the Conservative approach is being long on hyperbole and short on real policies. Yet people haven't noticed as they are simply fed up of the current government. Give us some firm policies Mr Cameron!
Charles Mather, Gloucester, UK
Tom,
Excellent point! All these green ~sin~ taxes on the driver based on emmissions while they just expanded onto Heathrow?! Who are they kidding?
They tax everyone (including the poor) to death and they wonder why people aren't saving? They have no money to save...it is not rocket science.
Alex, London, England
where does this funding come from? more borrowing? higher taxes?
he wants to help our finances? fine, lower the absurd petrol duty and road tax.
how do you encourage low income families to save when they have no disposable income because the cost of living is so high?
Labour is hopeless!
Alex, London, England
Mike L Chippenham, you might not have noticed but every time the Conservatives put up a policy, magpie Nulab hijack it. If you had listened to Cameron's response to Brown yesterday you would have heard him identify that nearly all the initiatives were Conservative. Why give them more ammunition?
Roy , Derby,
A Jones, UK, UK
It is 800 people and 4 large house builders. All the money is targeted at new homes.
Steve, Lincoln, UK
More pledges! Brown's promises and pledges face the fame fate as Nulab's Manifesto; DOOMED TO BE IGNORED. But more money will be borrowed and WASTED.
Criminals benefit; oh Yes! and Government is benefiting from VAT on purchases of SECURITY equipment. CRIME DOES PAY for GOVERNMENT
M. Cawdery, Portadown, Co. UK, EU
Poor hospitals get less money, good hospitals get more money, oh yeah that'll fix the problem. Incentives to save for people who don't have the disposable income to save - yeah really useful way of fixing the spend spend culture. Help for 1st buyers, by competing with them to buy their 1st home?
Rob, Edinburgh, UK
So the taxpayer is going to match pound for pound peoples savings?
Soon, with all these extended work breaks only those without children will be working.
Oh well! Welcome to Labour's wonderland.
I am old enough to remember when labour was a sensible party.
Not a bunch of suited stalinists
Howard, Basildon, England
I am reminded of the following "When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares it is his duty"
Caesar&Cleopatra Act 111
Gordon Brown is trying to convince us it is his duty and he is the man to get us out of the mess he made, shame upon him.
Roger Parkes, Tunbridge Wells, England
The longer Brown clings to office the better he makes Blair look and, by any yardstick, Blair was appalling.
As for the LibDems i'd rather get leprosy than get them. No danger of either of those happening thankfully.
Robert, Bracknell, England
So, having not supported public service reform as chancellor, Brown suddenly see's it as his saviour. It's a bit late for that, he stymied Blair and the public have no faith in him. Anything Brown does now is just re-arranging deck chairs as NuLabour sinks.
David Leslie, Perth, Scotland
Brown will do anything to save his skin
adam, aberdeen, uk
"We need a government that tackles the underlying causes of poverty, that fights family breakdown, that breaks open the monopoly of state education. We need a government that can work with the voluntary sector. - Dave
Er, nowhere, Dave, have you said how you'd do it!
Do you mean the LibDems?
Mike L, Chippenham, Wilts
Labour are beyond help and voters are far too cyical to beleievb that the PM's proposals aren't spin. Labour have bankrupoted this great country and can not get it n their heads that you can' tax until the pips squeak and expect to get voted in. It really is thta simple.
Robert Marshall, London,
If Gordon Browne can't make his own decisions, he should go now. We are stuck with poor pensions as a direct result of his "raids" on Pension investment funds, stuck with the highest Petrol/Diesel duties in Europe, and complete capitulation to Brussels. Crewe can give its verdict - I hope.
Roger , Solihull, UK
Why do we always get these HUGE, RADICAL announcements which will change the whole of Britain FOREVER and then a few days later we never hear about them again?
Louis, Liverpool, England
The next round of life in the land of the
Magic Brown About
Keep the new policy music playing and government will intervene and meddle and spend other people's money and make more pointless laws.
As Tom noted this is criminalising ordinary life while the criminals laugh at us.
Bryan D, Brentwood, GB
£200 Million to buy unsold housing?,so at an average £200,000 a house, thats 1000 People your helping if your lucky. Once you include the Goverment dept to oversee this ,stamp duty,legal fees possibily 800 People. This isn't even a pledge for £200 Million a year - its a one off pot of money.
A Jones, UK, UK
I agree, Tom, not to mention soldiers being sent to fight an illegal war, without even decent equipment. This is utterly shameful and disgusting.!!
Patricia, Ipswich, England
The unpopularity of Brown and the Labour party is not only about the tax reforms. The plethero of new laws designed to criminalise the ordinary working person while thugs and real criminals get laughingly short sentences. Where councils misuse powers designed to stop terrorists.. we've had enough!
Tom, Stevenage, UK