Labour Pledges Better UK But Funding Questioned

Labour's leader has attempted to convince voters he can be trusted with the economy, pledging to cut the deficit every year and saying: "I am ready" to lead the country.

Ed Miliband promised to get the Budget back into surplus "as soon as possible" and said that everything listed in the party's manifesto could be paid for.

He made promises on childcare, tuition fees and the NHS, saying they were fully funded and would not require any additional borrowing.

But political rivals said "nobody will be fooled" by ideas that would take the country back to economic chaos.

And health charity the King's Fund questioned Mr Miliband's funding, saying Labour was the only one of the three main parties not to pledge to find the extra £8bn a year an NHS review said was needed.

Also, experts warned Labour still has unanswered questions about how and where cuts and tax rises would come.

The manifesto, launched by the Labour leader on the set of Coronation Street and titled Britain Can Be Better, promised to "secure the family finances of the working people of Britain".

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Mr Miliband said the manifesto was not a "shopping list of proposals" as he sought to persuade a sceptical public he could be trusted with the nation's finances by introducing a "triple lock" of responsibility.

He said a Labour Government would: cut the deficit every year, that every measure contained in the manifesto was fully funded and Labour would meet fiscal rules with the national debt falling.

Mr Miliband attempted to capitalise on the Conservatives' refusal to spell out how they would find the extra £8bn of funding for the NHS and said David Cameron's party had proposed £20bn of unfunded commitments.

He said: "Nothing is more dangerous to our NHS than pretending you’ll be able to protect it without being able to say where the money’s coming from. You can't fund the NHS with an IOU and the Conservative Party need to learn that."

But Mr Miliband made some eye-catching pledges in the 84-page Labour Party Manifesto 2015 including:

:: Wrap around childcare - primary schools to provide care from 8am-6pm

:: Raising the minimum wage to £8 an hour

:: Abolishing non-dom rules, abolishing zero-hour contracts

:: £2.5bn Time to Care fund for NHS off back of mansion tax and tobacco firm levy

:: Increase income tax for those earning more than £150,000

:: No increase in income tax, VAT, National Insurance for those on basic and higher rate income tax

:: Scrap winter fuel allowance for pensioners with an income of more than £42,000 a year

:: Freeze energy prices

:: Tighten tax avoidance rules to yield £7.5bn a year

:: Cut tuition fees to £6,000

:: More powers for the Welsh and Scottish Parliament

:: Extend the vote to 16-year-olds

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Chancellor George Osborne said the manifesto had provided "no new ideas for Britain" and said the Conservative manifesto, which will be launched on Tuesday, would provide a better future for the country.

He said Labour's plans would see "higher taxes, more debt and a return to the economic chaos of the past".

Prime Minister David Cameron said: "What's striking is, Labour are committed to running a budget deficit forever. So this is not a conversion to responsibility, it is a con trick and more borrowing would mean more taxes.

"So, frankly, it's the same old Labour and the same old mess that they produced the last time they were in government."

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg caused controversy by comparing Labour's pledge on borrowing to a bottle-a-day alcoholic "saying they have no plans to drink more vodka". He added the manifesto was "not worth the paper it's written on".

Chris Ham, chief executive of The King's Fund said: "It is hard to see how Labour's plans to dismantle the Health and Social Care Act could be achieved without disruptive structural changes to the NHS.

"The big question is about funding, with Labour now the only one of the three main parties not to have pledged to find the £8bn a year in additional funding called for in the NHS five year forward view.

"Given this is the minimum requirement if the NHS is to continue to meet patient needs and maintain standards of care, this leaves a significant gap at the heart of its plans."

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has said Labour's plans would leave the deficit at £30bn - it currently stands at £90bn - by 2020.

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Speaking after Mr Miliband's speech, IFS director Paul Johnson told The Daily Politics Labour's manifesto had provided "no additional clarity" on how quickly it wanted to reduce the deficit.

He said: "The Labour party have repeated what they have said over the last several months, which is that they want to get to get to current budget balanced as soon as they can in the next parliament.

"Now, it really, really matters how soon that is. If they want to get there within three years, which is sort of what they might be thought to have signed up to in the fiscal responsibility charter earlier this year, that's a really significant amount of spending cuts or tax rises over the next three years.

"If they are happy to wait until the end of the parliament, which is also sort of consistent with what they signed up to, then actually we don't need any spending cuts over the next five years."

With 24 days to go until the General Election, Mr Miliband said at the manifesto launch: "The reason we can make these commitments is because we will make sure those with the broadest shoulders bear the greatest burden.

"So we'll reverse David Cameron's tax cut for millionaires to help pay down the deficit.

"We'll crack down on hedge funds who avoid paying their fair share. We'll stop HMRC operating double standards.

"And we'll do something that no government has done for over 200 years - we'll say enough is enough to the people who live here, work here, send their kids to school here but don't want to pay taxes here and we will abolish the non-dom rule."

Polls show that voters trust Labour less with the economy than the Conservatives and Mr Miliband has struggled to play down forgetting to mention the deficit in his conference speech.

Labour says it will have the current Budget in surplus by the end of the next parliament, however, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats have said they will do so by 2017/18.

In an answer to recent criticism that Labour is against big business and wealth-creators, Mr Miliband said Labour was "pro business but not pro business as usual".

He said Labour would champion small and medium-sized businesses with a cut in business rates to help them create the jobs, wealth and profits of the future.