Tory failure ahead of the Autumn Statement

Today: Tory failure ahead of the Autumn Statement

The Tories’ failure to tackle the cost-of-living crisis has helped cost the Exchequer £116.5 billion – leading to higher borrowing and broken promises on the deficit.

The price tag, equivalent to almost £4,000 for every taxpayer, is based on new research from the House of Commons Library being published by the Labour Party.

This shows that low pay and stagnant salaries, combined with soaring housing costs and the failure to tackle root causes of increased welfare bills, means that over the course of this Parliament:
• Income tax receipts have fallen short of forecasts by more than £66 billion.
• National Insurance Contributions are £25.5 billion lower than expected.
• Spending on social security is £25 billion higher than planned.
‎Building a recovery that works for everyday people is the real test of the Autumn Statement. But that isn't a separate priority from tackling the deficit. Building a recovery that works for most people is an essential part of balancing the books.

Britain's public finances have been weakened by a Tory-led Government overseeing stagnant wages which keep tax revenues low‎.

Ed Miliband's priority as Prime Minister will be tackling that cost-of-living crisis so that hard work is properly rewarded again, so that our children can dream of a better future, so that our public services including the NHS are safe.

Background - facts on Tory failure
• The most recent Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings found that in the last year, full-time wages grew by just 0.1% – the smallest rate of annual growth since the series began and well below the rate of inflation.
• Real wages have fallen more in the last year than they did in the previous two years while real median wages for all employees have fallen by more than £1,600 a year since 2010.
• Over the course of this Parliament working people are set to see the biggest fall in wages of any Parliament since 1874-1880. And it’s set to be the first time since the 1920s that people are worse off at the end of the Parliament than they were at the beginning.
• There are currently 4.9 million workers earning less than the living wage – a figure that has increased from 3.4 million in 2009 – and a recent report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that around 60% of those who moved into work in the last year are paid less than the living wage.
• There are currently more than 1.3 million people working part-time because they can’t get a full-time job – an increase of almost 250,000 since the General Election. This failure for people to be able to work the hours they need means they are ever more reliant on tax credits and benefits to help make ends meet.
• The Office for National Statistics calculates that there are 1.4 million zero-hours contracts in the economy and in some companies they have become the norm.

To read Labour's full pre-Autumn Statement briefing document, "Tory Britain: Squeezing the middle not the deficit", click here.

Today: George Osborne's spin on the NHS has already unravelled

George Osborne has not found an extra £2 billion for the NHS, as he claims, but instead is proposing to recycle funds already in the Department of Health budget. This is crisis cash because of the fragile financial state of the NHS after the Government’s £3 billion reorganisation.

The Chancellor's spin is of no help at all to an NHS in real crisis now. George Osborne is offering nothing to ease the pressure this winter and only false promises for the future. This will only reinforce the view that David Cameron and George Osborne simply can’t be trusted with the NHS.

Labour’s plan is fully funded and will give the NHS £2.5bn a year over and above the plans left by this Government.

Key messages

Labour has set out a new plan for Britain's future, a plan that works for ordinary families, rewarding the hard work they do and saving the NHS they rely on.

The Tories can’t build a better future for working people because they stand up only for a privileged few. With the NHS going backwards and a recovery which works just for a few, working people can’t afford five more years of David Cameron.

You can’t trust Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats. They broke their promises and have been too weak to stand up to the Tories.

UKIP can't stand for working people: they're more Tory than the Tories, a party made up of Tory people, promoting Tory policies, bankrolled by Tory donors.

For additional briefing, please contact briefing@labour.org.uk