Labour

Richard Burgon MP, Labour’s Shadow Justice Secretary, responding to comments made by the President of the Prison Governors Association, said:

“The President of the Prison Governors Association today confirmed the deep crisis in our prisons.  Her members are understandably devastated by the decline of their service.  This crisis has been created by the disastrous policies of the Conservative Government. Prison officer numbers have been slashed while overcrowding has risen.

“Last week it was announced that violence in our prisons was at record levels. This week we have seen riots in The Mount and Erlestoke prisons. The situation cannot be allowed to continue.  Prisoners are not being rehabilitated and this is putting the public at risk. Only a Labour government will provide the investment, staff and attention needed to end the prisons crisis the Conservatives created and are failing to resolve.“

Barbara Keeley MP, Shadow Cabinet Minister for Social Care, commenting on the BBC’s You and Yours report of the shortfall in the numbers of care home beds said:

“Seven years of Tory inaction has taken a toll on the social care sector.  The Tories’ record is clear –  insufficient beds in residential care, one in three nursing homes failing inspections and 1.2 million older people living with unmet care needs.

“Keeping people out of hospital and residential care means investing properly in home care, intermediate facilities and supported housing. Yet, this Government has chosen instead to cut local authority budgets, taking £4.6 billion out of social care.

“We need a Labour Government to give social care the investment required to meet the needs of our growing older population. Our Manifesto set out our plans to increase social care budgets by £8 billion over the next Parliament and to work towards a National Care Service.”

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Tory cancellation of promised electrification works will lengthen journey times, increase carbon emissions and raise the cost of the rail network

By scrapping the electrification of the TransPennine route, the Tories are essentially pulling the plug on the proposed Crossrail for the Northern Powerhouse project, which could no longer be a fully electrified network.

Cancelling electrification projects around the country will add significantly to journey times:

• Journeys between Manchester and Liverpool will add nearly 30 minutes

•  Journeys between Leeds and Newcastle will add over 20 minutes.

• Cancelling the electrification of the Cardiff to Swansea section of the Great Western Mainline puts at risk the estimated journey time saving between Swansea and London with Super Express trains of 19 minutes.

Labour has made a £10 billion commitment to “Crossrail for the North” to reverse decades of underinvestment in Northern transport infrastructure that has undermined the economic potential of the north of England and help deliver 850,000 new jobs by 2050.

Network Rail estimates that electrification and the running of electric vehicles can help to reduce CO2 emissions by an average of 20 to 30 per cent compared to their diesel counterparts and the maintenance costs for electric trains are 33 per cent lower than for diesel.

Network Rail also estimates that electric passenger vehicles fuel savings are between 19 and 26 pence per vehicle mile.

Andy McDonald MP, Labour’s Shadow Transport Secretary, commenting on the findings, said:

“The Government’s disgraceful U-turn on their promise to deliver electrification on the Midland Mainline, Trans-Pennine and Great Western routes will threaten economic growth in areas of England and Wales already suffering from poor connectivity and underinvestment.

“Pulling the plug on electrification shows the Tories’ disregard for Wales and Yorkshire, which will continue to suffer from underinvestment, and proves the ‘Midlands Engine’ and the ‘Northern Powerhouse’ are just more empty slogans from this Government.

“The Tories are trying to pull the wool over people’s eyes by claiming that diesel bi-mode trains will deliver the same benefits as electrification, despite saying for years that failure to electrify the network costs more in the long run, causes more pollution, worsens air quality, lessens capacity and makes services slower and less reliable.

“Not only will Labour deliver the promised electrification, we will address the imbalance in transport infrastructure spending, committing to building a Crossrail for the North and enhancing and expanding the rail network in order to drive economic growth and rebalance our economy for the many not the few”.

Ends

Richard Burgon MP, Labour’s Shadow Justice Secretary, responding to Government proposals to privatise the collection of court fines, said:

“It is unbelievable that the Government is planning further privatisation to the justice system. 

“The outsourcing of Civil Enforcement Officers will combine weaker oversight with pressure to maximise profits and risks more and more people becoming victim of rogue private bailiffs.

“A previous attempt to privatise all enforcement work was abandoned, but only after the Conservative government had wasted millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money pursuing it. It should not be putting such a flawed idea back on the table.

“From the deep failures in the part-privatised probation system to the scandal surrounding G4S tagging contracts, the Conservative Government’s obsession with privatisation is at the expense of delivering a fair justice system that works for all.”

Peter Dowd MP, Labour’s Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, responding to reports in the Times that the Chancellor is considering to again extend the time until he balances the books until 2027, said:

“If these reports are true, it demonstrates once again that this Tory Government is economically inept and would have failed to meet every fiscal target they have set themselves.

“It also suggests that the Chancellor has had to break cover once more to brief the press that he will fail to meet his own target for balancing the books in a bid to get his excuses in early ahead of the Autumn Budget later this year.

“Only a Labour Government will provide the investment our economy needs, underpinned by our Fiscal Credibility Rule, in order to balance the books and build the high wage, high skill jobs of the future.”