CONTENTS 

FOREWORD BY JEREMY CORBYN 6 

A GREEN INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION 9 
ECONOMY AND ENERGY 11 
TRANSPORT 19 
ENVIRONMENT 22 
ANIMAL WELFARE 25 

REBUILD OUR PUBLIC SERVICES 27 
FUNDING 29 
NHS AND SOCIAL CARE 31 
NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE 37 
POLICE AND SECURITY 42 
JUSTICE 46 
COMMUNITIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT 49 
FIRE AND RESCUE 52 
DIGITAL, CULTURE, MEDIA AND SPORT 53 

TACKLE POVERTY AND INEQUALITY 57 
WORK 59 
WOMEN AND EQUALITIES 65 
MIGRATION 70 
SOCIAL SECURITY 72 
HOUSING 77 
CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES 81 

THE FINAL SAY ON BREXIT 87 

THE FINAL SAY ON BREXIT 89 

A NEW INTERNATIONALISM 93 
A NEW INTERNATIONALISM 95 
EFFECTIVE DIPLOMACY 97 
DEFENCE AND SECURITY 100 
INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY AND SOCIAL JUSTICE 103 


<footer text="FOREWORD"> 

This election will shape our country for 
a generation. It is your opportunity to 
transform our country, so that it works 
not just for a few, but for all of us. It 
is a chance to deliver the real change 
Britain needs. This manifesto sets out 
how a Labour government will do that. 

Some people say this is the Brexit 
election. But it's also the climate 
election, the investment election, the 
NHS election, the living standards 
election, the education election, the 
poverty election, the fair taxes election. 
Above all, it's the change election. 

It's time to take on the vested interests 
holding people back. The last decade 
has seen a wealth grab by a privileged 
few, supported by the Conservatives, 
at the expense of the majority. The 
big polluters, financial speculators and 
corporate tax-dodgers have had a free 
ride for too long. 

Labour will build a fairer Britain that 
cares for all, where wealth and power 
are shared. 

I am not prepared to continue to see 
more families without a proper home 
and more people queuing at food banks 
or sleeping rough on the streets. 

I am not prepared to put up 
with communities blighted by lack 
of investment, endless cuts to vital 
services and millions struggling to 
make ends meet, while tax cuts are 
handed to the richest. 

We can do better than this. How can 
it be right that in the fifth richest 
country in the world, people's living 
standards are going backwards and life 
expectancy is stalling? 

The Conservative Government is failing. 
It has failed on the economy, on the 
climate crisis, on investment for the 
future, on public services and on Brexit. 
It is simply not working for most people. 

A Labour government will unlock the 
potential of all those held back for too 
long. Labour will be on your side. 

Labour will rewrite the rules of the 
economy, so that it works for everyone. 
We will rebuild our public services, by 
taxing those at the top to properly fund 
the services we all rely on. 

We will launch the largest-scale 
investment programme in modern 
times to fund the jobs and industries of 
the future, so that no one is held back 
and no community left behind. This is a 
fully costed programme to upgrade our 
economy and transform our country. 

We will kick-start a Green Industrial 
Revolution to tackle the climate 
emergency by shifting to renewable 
energy, investing in rail and electric 
cars, and making housing energy-
efficient, to reduce fuel poverty and 
excess winter deaths. 

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THE FUTURE IS OURS 
TO MAKE. 

IT'S TIME FOR REAL 
CHANGE - FOR THE MANY, 
NOT THE FEW. TOGETHER, 
WE CAN DELIVER IT. 

We will create a million climate jobs 
in every region and nation of the 
UK - good, skilled jobs that will bring 
prosperity back to parts of our country 
neglected for too long. 

We will bring rail, mail, water and energy 
into public ownership to end the great 
privatisation rip-off and save you 
money on your fares and bills. 

We will deliver full-fibre broadband 
free to everybody in every home in 
our country by creating a new public 
service, boosting the economy, 
connecting communities and putting 
money back in your pocket. 

We will end food bank Britain, and lift 
children and pensioners out of poverty. 

We will bring in a Real Living Wage of 
at least &pound;10 per hour for all workers 

- with equal rights at work from day 
one on the job. We will end insecurity 
and exploitation by ending zero-hours 
contracts and strengthening trade 
union rights. 
Labour will create a National Education 
Service to provide support and 
opportunity throughout your life: from 
Sure Start centres to top-quality early 
years education; well-funded schools 
with lower class sizes to free university 

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tuition with no fees; and free lifelong 
learning, giving you the chance to 
reskill throughout your life. 

Labour will give the NHS the funding 
it needs, end privatisation, and never 
let our health service be up for grabs in 
any trade negotiation. We'll expand our 
NHS to offer free prescriptions for all 
and free basic dentistry, building on its 
founding principles. 

We will end the social care crisis that 
has left 1.5 million elderly people 
without the care they need. Labour will 
fund free personal care for older people 
and extra care packages. 

I'm really worried by the rise in crime 

- and the fact that the most serious 
violent crime has risen even further. We 
will reverse a decade of cuts to police 
and vital public services that have 
shown you simply can't keep people 
safe on the cheap. 
Labour will protect our security at home 
and abroad. After years of failed foreign 
interventions and wars, we will end the 
'bomb first, talk later' approach and 
instead have a foreign policy based on 
peace, justice and human rights. 

And we will get Brexit sorted in six 
months by giving people the final 
say - with a choice between a sensible 
leave deal or remain. We will implement 
whatever the British people decide. 

The choice could not be clearer at this 
election. Labour will put wealth and 

power in the hands of the many. Boris 
Johnson's Conservatives will look after 
the privileged few. 
This manifesto offers the chance of 
real change for every generation and 
every community. When Labour wins, 
the nurse wins, the pensioner wins, the 
student wins, the office worker wins, the 
engineer wins. We all win. 
We can and we must do better 
as a country. 
This is our last chance to tackle 
the climate emergency. 
The future is ours to make. It's time for 
real change - for the many, not the few. 
Together, we can deliver it. 
Jeremy Corbyn 
Leader of the Labour Party 
This manifesto deals both with Labour's 
policies which apply across the United 
Kingdom and, where responsibilities 
have been devolved, it also sets out 
our policies for England. 
In devolved areas such as health, 
education and local government, 
Labour's detailed policies for 
Scotland and Wales are set out 
in the manifestos published by 
our Welsh and Scottish parties. 
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A GREEN 
INDUSTRIAL 
REVOLUTION 

11 ECONOMY AND ENERGY 
19 TRANSPORT 
22 ENVIRONMENT 
25 ANIMAL WELFARE 


ECONOMY AND ENERGY ECONOMY AND ENERGY 
This election is We must confront this change while dealing with 
about the crisis the growing inequality and insecurity in Britain. 
of living standards 
and the climate 
Labour led the UK Parliament in declaring a climate 
and environmental emergency. The next Labour 
and environmental government will lead the world in fighting it, with a 
emergency. Whether 
we are ready or not, 
we stand on the brink 
of unstoppable change. 
plan to drive up living standards by transforming our 
economy into one low in carbon, rich in good jobs, 
radically fairer and more democratic. 
The climate crisis ties us all into a common fate. This 
election is our best hope to protect future generations 
from an uninhabitable planet. The Intergovernmental 
Panel on Climate Change has said we need to cut 
global emissions in half by 2030 to have a chance of 
keeping global heating within safe limits - that means 
acting now, and acting decisively. 
The Tories wasted a decade serving the interests of 
big polluters. Labour will use the crucial next decade 
to act. The Tories slashed support for renewable 
energy while pushing through dangerous fracking. 

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11 


Now Britain is decades off course on 
vital emissions targets. 

That's why Labour will kick-start a Green 
Industrial Revolution that will create one 
million jobs in the UK to transform our 
industry, energy, transport, agriculture 
and our buildings, while restoring 
nature. Our Green New Deal aims to 
achieve the substantial majority of our 
emissions reductions by 2030 in a way 
that is evidence-based, just and that 
delivers an economy that serves the 
interests of the many, not the few. 

Just as the original Industrial Revolution 
brought industry, jobs and pride to 
our towns, Labour's world-leading 
Green Industrial Revolution will rebuild 
them, with more rewarding, well-paid 
jobs, lower energy bills and whole 
new industries to revive parts of our 
country that have been neglected for 
too long. For some, industrial transition 
has become a byword for devastation, 
because successive Conservative 
governments were content to sit back 
and leave the fate of whole industries 
and communities at the mercy of 
market forces. A Labour government 
will never let that happen. 

We will work in partnership with the 
workforce and their trade unions 
in every sector of our economy, so 
that they lead the transition in their 
industries, creating new, good-quality 
jobs and making sure that their 

extensive skills are passed on to 
the next generation of workers. 

We will show the world how prioritising 
sustainability will not only deliver 
immediate improvements to everyone's 
lives but also offer humanity a pathway 
to a more equitable and enlightened 
economy: one that protects our 
environment, reins in corporate power, 
revitalises democracy, unites our 
communities, builds international 
solidarity and promises a better quality 
of life for all. The scale of the challenge 
requires nothing less. 

Tackling the destruction of our planet 
is a question of justice - for the 
communities at home and abroad 
who are most affected by it and 
for our children who will bear the 
consequences if we don't. Social justice 
will define Labour's approach. We will 
make sure that the costs of the green 
transition fall fairly and are mostly 
borne by the wealthy and those most 
responsible for the problem. 

2019 saw the blossoming of a global 
movement calling on politicians to 
wake up and act on the climate and 
environmental emergency. Labour 
welcomed that movement and, as a 
government in waiting, we have turned 
its demands into detailed, credible 
plans for real change. 

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Investment 

Delivering the far-reaching change 
needed to tackle the climate and 
environmental emergency will require a 
full mobilisation of national resources, 
both public and private. 

Labour will create a Sustainable 
Investment Board to bring together 
the Chancellor, Business Secretary and 
Bank of England Governor to oversee, 
co-ordinate and bring forward this 
investment - involving trade unions 
and business. We will ask the Office for 
Budget Responsibility to incorporate 
climate and environmental impacts 
into its forecasts so that the cost of not 
acting will be factored into every 
fiscal decision. 

The cost of not acting is far greater 
than the cost of acting. We will launch 
a National Transformation Fund of 
&pound;400 billion and rewrite the Treasury's 
investment rules to guarantee that 
every penny spent is compatible with 
our climate and environmental targets 

- and that the costs of not acting are 
fully accounted for too. Of this, &pound;250 
billion will directly fund the transition 
through a Green Transformation Fund 
dedicated to renewable and low-carbon 
energy and transport, biodiversity and 
environmental restoration. 
We will create a National Investment 
Bank, backed up by a network of 
Regional Development Banks, to 
provide &pound;250 billion of lending 
for enterprise, infrastructure and 
innovation over 10 years. They will 

be mandated to lend in line with our 
mission to decarbonise our economy 
while increasing productivity and 
creating good jobs across the country. 
As well as large-scale national and 
regional projects, smaller loans will 
be available through our new Post 
Bank based in Post Office branches, 
enabling thousands of bottom-up 
transformational changes by start-ups, 
small businesses, local co-operatives 
and community projects in towns and 
villages up and down the country. 

We will make sure that the UK's 
financial sector is helping to tackle the 
emergency rather than fuelling it. We 
will do this by improving the fitness 
of our financial authorities to mobilise 
green investment and by giving them 
powers to manage the risk to financial 
stability posed by short-sighted 
investment in polluting assets. 

Just 100 companies globally are 
responsible for the majority of carbon 
emissions. We won't be afraid to tackle 
this wanton corporate destruction by 
taking on the powerful interests that are 
causing climate change. We will change 
the criteria a company must meet to be 
listed on the London Stock Exchange 
so that any company that fails to 
contribute to tackling the climate and 
environmental emergency is delisted. 

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Levelling Up Across the Country 

Many parts of Britain would need 
this investment even without a climate 
and environmental emergency. Years 
of under-investment and neglect 
by Westminster have left too many 
communities feeling powerless and 
too many areas left behind with low-
quality jobs, weak productivity and 
slow growth. 

The climate and environmental 
emergency is a chance to unite the 
country to face this common challenge 
by mobilising all our national resources, 
both financial and human. But we will 
only succeed by ensuring that everyone 
shares in the benefits. Labour will make 
sure that investment is spread evenly 
across the whole country and will give 
powers and funding to every region and 
nation of the UK. 

We will bring about a radical 
decentralisation of power in Britain so 
that local people and communities are 
given far greater control over their own 
lives and prospects. 

A Local Transformation Fund in each 
English region will be used exclusively 
to fund infrastructure projects decided 
at a local level, as will devolved 
governments in Wales, Scotland 
and Northern Ireland. Our Regional 
Development Banks will be governed 
by boards made up of key local 
stakeholders such as local chambers of 
commerce, trade unions and councillors 

- with Scotland, Wales and Northern 
Ireland empowered to make similar 
arrangements. They will set priorities for 
lending, giving every region and nation 
a new and powerful lever to rebuild their 
economy on their own terms. 

We will shift the political centre 
of gravity by placing the National 
Transformation Fund Unit, a key part of 
the Treasury, in the North of England 
and build up the regional offices of 
government in each of the nine English 
regions to co-ordinate government 
policies at the regional level, as well as 
ensuring a regional voice in Whitehall. 

Energy 

Energy use in buildings accounts for 
56% of the UK's total emissions, making 
it the single most polluting sector. We 
will develop the recommendations 
of our '30 by 2030' report to put the 
UK on track for a net-zero-carbon 
energy system within the 2030s - and 
go faster if credible pathways can 
be found. We will deliver nearly 90% 
of electricity and 50% of heat from 
renewable and low-carbon sources 
by 2030. 

We will build: 

&bull; 7,000 new offshore wind turbines 
&bull; 2,000 new onshore wind turbines 
&bull; Enough solar panels to cover 22,000 
football pitches. 
&bull; New nuclear power needed for energy 
security. 
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We will trial and expand tidal energy 
and invest to reduce the costs of 
renewable and low-carbon hydrogen 
production. We will upgrade almost 
all of the UK's 27 million homes to the 
highest energy-efficiency standards, 
reducing the average household energy 
bill by &pound;417 per household per year by 
2030 and eliminating fuel poverty. We 
will introduce a zero-carbon homes 
standard for all new homes. 

As part of heat decarbonisation, we will 
roll out technologies like heat pumps, 
solar hot water and hydrogen, and 
invest in district heat networks using 
waste heat. 

To balance the grid, we will expand 
power storage and invest in grid 
enhancements and interconnectors. 

We will expand distributed and 
community energy, and immediately 
and permanently ban fracking. 

We will support energy workers 
through transition and guarantee them 
retraining and a new, unionised job on 
equivalent terms and conditions. 

We will introduce a windfall tax on oil 
companies, so that the companies that 
knowingly damaged our climate will 
help cover the costs. We will provide a 
strategy to safeguard the people, jobs 
and skills that depend on the offshore 
oil and gas industry. 

Ownership 

We will not achieve the promise of a fair 
and sustainable economy if we repeat 
the mistakes of the carbon era, when 
the capture of a natural resource for 
private profit created a vastly unequal 
and polluting economy dominated by 
powerful vested interests. 

It's not just carbon. From the 
depletion of fish stocks to the 
burning of the Amazon, profit has 
proved a poor regulator for use of 
our natural resources. 

Whether it is the trillions of litres of 
water lost through leakages, barriers to 
renewable energy connecting to the 
grid or the billions of pounds of bill-
payers' money being siphoned off in 
dividends to wealthy shareholders, 
Tory privatisation of our utilities has 
been a disaster for both our planet and 
our wallets. 

We will put people and planet before 
profit by bringing our energy and 
water systems into democratic public 
ownership. In public hands, energy and 
water will be treated as rights rather than 
commodities, with any surplus reinvested 
or used to reduce bills. Communities 
themselves will decide, because utilities 
won't be run from Whitehall but by 
service-users and workers. 

Public ownership will secure democratic 
control over nationally strategic 
infrastructure and provide collective 
stewardship for key natural resources. 

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In the case of energy, it will also help 
deliver Labour's ambitious emissions 
targets. Whereas private network 
companies have failed to upgrade the 
grid at the speed and scale needed, 
publicly owned networks will accelerate 
and co-ordinate investment to connect 
renewable and low-carbon energy while 
working with energy unions to support 
energy workers through the transition. 

Under Labour's plans: 

&bull; A new UK National Energy Agency will 
own and maintain the national grid 
infrastructure and oversee the delivery 
of our decarbonisation targets. 
&bull; 14 new Regional Energy Agencies 
will replace the existing district 
network operators and hold statutory 
responsibility for decarbonising 
electricity and heat and reducing 
fuel poverty. 
&bull; The supply arms of the Big Six energy 
companies will be brought into public 
ownership where they will continue to 
supply households with energy while 
helping them to reduce their 
energy demands. 
The Conservatives allowed the 
proceeds of North Sea oil to be 
squandered on tax cuts for the richest 
and captured in profits for the few, 
instead of investing them in our future. 
We now stand at an even greater 
crossroads in the development of our 
national economy. Under Labour, our 
green future will be owned by all of us. 

Whenever public money is invested 
in an energy generation project, the 
public sector will take a stake and return 
profits to the public. 

Industry and Innovation 

Averting climate catastrophe offers 
huge economic opportunities. 
But Britain will only benefit from 
a Green Industrial Revolution with 
the right policies. 

Over the past three decades, Britain has 
reduced its emissions at the expense 
of domestic industry by offshoring 
production. This is an accounting trick, 
not a solution. It does not protect the 
climate, is unfair to other countries 
and it damages jobs and communities 
at home. 

Labour will take full responsibility for our 
carbon footprint instead of passing the 
buck. We will instruct the Committee 
on Climate Change to assess the 
emissions the UK imports as well as 
those it produces, and recommend 
policies to tackle them, including making 
UK industry the greenest in the world. 

The Conservatives have presided over a 
lost decade of productivity and allowed 
Britain to fall behind in the green 
technologies of the future. Labour will 
make sure this never happens again. 

Targeted science, research and 
innovation will be crucial to tackling the 
climate crisis, dealing with the plastic 

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waste filling our oceans and addressing 
other societal challenges, such as 
an ageing population and antibiotic 
resistance. As part of our plan to usher 
in a Green Industrial Revolution, Labour 
will create an innovation nation, setting 
a target for 3% of GDP to be spent on 
research and development (R&D) by 
2030. We will achieve this target by 
increasing direct support for R&D and 
reforming the innovation ecosystem to 
better 'crowd in' private investment. 

We will establish a Foundation 
Industries Sector Council to provide 
a clean and long-term future for our 
existing heavy industries like steel 
and glass and fund R&D into newer 
technologies like hydrogen and carbon 
capture and storage. 

A thriving steel industry will be vital 
to the Green Industrial Revolution. 
Labour will support our steel through 
public procurement, taking action on 
industrial energy prices, exempting new 
capital from business rates, investing 
in R&D, building three new steel 
recycling plants and upgrading existing 
production sites. 

We will ensure that new technologies 
aren't just invented here, but are 
engineered, manufactured and 
exported from here. We will put 
British innovation at the heart of 
our procurement to support local 
sourcing and reshoring, so that every 
investment we make strengthens 
our manufacturing and engineering 

sectors and supply chains and creates 
hundreds of thousands of good, 
unionised jobs here at home. 

We will use the power of public 
procurement to strengthen local jobs 
and supply chains and will require all 
companies bidding for public contracts 
to recognise trade unions, pay suppliers 
on time and demonstrate equalities 
best practice. 

As we transition, we will ensure the UK's 
automotive sector isn't left behind by 
the electric revolution by investing in 
three new gigafactories and four metal 
reprocessing plants. By supporting 
UK-made electrical steel we will ensure 
robust support for an end to end UK 
supply chain. We'll also take on the 
global plastics crisis by investing in a 
new plastics remanufacturing industry 
creating thousands of jobs, ending 
exports of plastic waste and reducing 
our contribution to ocean pollution. 

Labour's progressive trade strategy will 
be aligned with our industrial strategy 
to help develop the industrial base 
needed to deliver high-quality exports 
and the decent jobs that go with them. 
Labour will champion exports from 
the environmental goods and services 
sector, building on the 300,000 jobs 
that the sector already sustains. We 
will uphold the highest environmental 
and social regulations in all our trade 
relations, and will never downgrade 
standards as 'barriers' to trade. 

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Skills 

Our Green Industrial Revolution will 
create at least one million well-paid, 
unionised jobs in the UK. We will train 
people in the skills they need to access 
these jobs of the future. 

Britain's skills crisis has grown under 
the Tories. The Apprenticeship Levy 
has been beset by problems, leaving 
employers paying into a training budget 
they are unable to spend. And it is 
not delivering for small businesses. 
We cannot afford to carry on like this. 

Labour will make it easier for employers 
to spend the levy by allowing it to be 
used for a wider range of accredited 
training, in line with guidelines set by 
the Institute for Apprenticeships and 
Technical Education and government's 
wider priorities for the economy. 

We will launch a Climate Apprenticeship 
programme to enable employers to 
develop the skills needed to lead the 
world in clean technology. 

Under this programme, employers 
will be expected to allocate 25% of 
the funds in their Apprenticeship 
Levy accounts to training Climate 
Apprentices. These funds can be spent 
directly or allocated to a ring-fenced 
Climate Apprenticeship Fund, which 

will be topped up with any surplus 
raised through Inclusive Ownership 
Funds and made accessible to nonlevy-
paying businesses. 

Targeted bursaries will be available to 
women, BAME people, care leavers, 
ex-armed forces personnel, and people 
with disabilities to encourage them to 
take up climate apprenticeships - the 
STEM of the future. 

We will further help small businesses 
by increasing the amount that can 
be transferred to non-levy-paying 
employers to 50% and introducing 
an online matching service to help 
levy-paying businesses find smaller 
businesses to transfer their funds to. 

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TRANSPORT TRANSPORT 
Labour will build a 
sustainable, affordable, 
accessible and integrated 
transport system, 
founded on the principle 
that transport is an 
essential public service. 

Cutting emissions will drive our transport policies. We 
will review public expenditure on transport to ensure 
that it promotes environmental sustainability and 
contributes to decarbonisation. 

Bus services have been devastated by the 
Conservatives, despite carrying more people than any 
other mode of public transport. Women are especially 
dependent on buses, which also provide a lifeline 
for both older and younger people and for many 
economically disadvantaged groups. 

Labour will ensure that councils can improve bus 
services by regulating and taking public ownership 
of bus networks, and we will give them resources 
and full legal powers to achieve this cost-effectively, 
thereby ending the race to the bottom in working 
conditions for bus workers. Where councils take control 
of their buses, Labour will introduce free bus travel for 
under-25s. We will increase and expand local services, 

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19 


reinstating the 3,000 routes that have 
been cut, particularly hitting rural 
communities. 

Labour will deliver improvements for 
rail passengers by bringing our railways 
back into public ownership, using 
options including franchise expiry. This 
will enable us to make fares simpler and 
more affordable, rebuild the fragmented 
railways as a nationally integrated 
public service, cut the wastage of 
private profit, improve accessibility for 
disabled people, ensure safe staffing 
levels and end driver-only operation. 

Our publicly owned rail company 
will steer network planning and 
investments. It will co-ordinate 
mainline upgrades, resignalling, 
rolling stock replacement and major 
projects. We will implement a full, 
rolling programme of electrification. 
Our model will ensure continuity of 
skills, jobs and supply chain capacity 
to reduce costs, improve productivity 
and support the economic benefits of 
Labour's Green Industrial Revolution. 

We will introduce a long-term 
investment plan including delivering 
Crossrail for the North as part of 
improved connectivity across the 
northern regions. We will consult with 
local communities to reopen branch 
lines. We will also unlock capacity 
and extend high-speed rail networks 
nationwide by completing the full 
HS2 route to Scotland, taking full 
account of the environmental impacts 
of different route options. We will 

deliver rail electrification and expansion 
across the whole country, including in 
Wales. We will ensure that these major 
infrastructure projects are a model 
of good employment practice and 
pay due regard to the environmental 
impact. 

We will promote the use of rail freight 
in order to reduce carbon emissions, air 
pollutants and congestion on the roads 
and expand the provision of publicly 
owned rail freight services. 

We will increase the funding available 
for cycling and walking. We will bring 
together transport and land-use 
planning to create towns and cities 
in which walking and cycling are the 
best choice: safe, accessible, healthy, 
efficient, economical and pollution-
free. We will help children's health and 
well-being by ensuring street designs 
provide freedom for physically active 
outdoor play and by introducing 
measures to ensure the zones around 
our schools are safer, with cleaner air. 

Our transport programme is focused on 
creating better, publicly accessible local 
transport systems. By improving public 
transport, Labour will help people to 
become less reliant on their cars, for our 
better health, for a cleaner environment 
and to improve quality of life in our 
towns and cities. The Conservatives 
have committed to ending new sales of 
combustion engine vehicles by 2040. 
Labour will aim for 2030. 

We will position the UK at the forefront 
of the development and manufacture 

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of ultra-low emission vehicles and will 
support their sale. We will invest in 
electric vehicle charging infrastructure 
and in electric community car clubs. 
We will accelerate the transition of our 
public sector car fleets and our public 
buses to zero-emissions vehicles. 

We will reform taxi and private hire 
services, including a review of licensing 
authority jurisdictions, setting national 
minimum standards of safety and 
accessibility and updating regulations 
to keep pace with technological change 
and to close loopholes to ensure a level 
playing field. 

We will adopt an ambitious 
Vision Zero approach to UK road 
safety, striving for zero deaths and 
serious injuries. Labour will invest 
to make our neglected local roads, 
pavements and cycleways safer for 
the everyday journeys of both drivers 
and vulnerable road users. We will 
review all tolled crossings. 

Labour recognises the Davies 
Commission's assessment of pressures 
on airport capacity in the South East. 
Any expansion of airports must pass 
our tests on air quality, noise pollution, 
climate change obligations and 
countrywide benefits. We will examine 
fiscal and regulatory options to ensure 
a response to the climate crisis in a way 
that is fair to consumers and protects 
the economy. 

We will take action to end nationality-
based discrimination in seafarer pay. 

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ENVIRONMENT ENVIRONMENT 
A Labour government's 
Green Industrial 
Revolution is 
complemented by 
our Plan for Nature. 
Our commitments 
to ecosystem repair 
and environmental 
protections work hand 
in hand with sustainable 
jobs and industries, and 
social justice. 

We are facing a climate and environment emergency, 
and unlike the Tories we will not trade our environment 
in pursuit of reckless trade agreements. 

Labour will review and improve protected area 
designations, from National Parks to local nature 
reserves and urban green spaces. 

We will introduce a Climate and Environment 
Emergency Bill setting out in law robust, binding 
new standards for decarbonisation, nature recovery, 
environmental quality and habitats and species 
protection. 

We will maintain and continuously improve the 
existing EU standards of environmental regulation. 

A Healthy Environment 

Our polluted air contributes to over 40,000 premature 
deaths a year and poisons our environment, with 

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further impacts on children's health. But 
the Conservatives' air-quality measures 
are so inadequate they have been 
found to be illegal. 

Labour will introduce a new Clean Air 
Act, with a vehicle scrappage scheme 
and clean air zones, complying with 
World Health Organisation limits for 
fine particles and nitrous oxides. 

We will provide an extra &pound;5.6 billion 
in funding to improve the standard 
of flood defences and respond 
to the increased risk of flooding, 
prioritising areas at risk in North 
West England, Yorkshire and the East 
Midlands that have been neglected 
by Conservative investments. 

Nature Restoration 

Our Plan for Nature will set legally 
binding targets to drive the restoration 
of species and habitats. 

We will embark on an ambitious 
programme of tree planting, with both 
forestry and native woodland species. 

We will fully fund the Environment 
Agency and other frontline environment 
agencies, and improve upstream 
river management. 

We will create new National Parks 
alongside a revised system of other 
protected area designations, which 
will guard existing wildlife sites and 
join up important habitats, while also 
ensuring more people can enjoy living 
closer to nature. 

We will establish a new environmental 
tribunal to ensure that administrative 
decisions are consistent with 
environmental and nature-recovery 
obligations. 

Land 

Land is a public good, but it is not a 
common asset. In 1979, 20% of land 
was owned by the public sector. 
Today, that has halved. 

Green Belts protect one tenth of our 
land and offer conservation of some 
of our natural environment. Introduced 
by Labour in 1947 to provide access 
to the countryside, they are threatened 
by developments. 

A Labour government will maintain 
agricultural and rural structural funds 
but repurpose them to support 
environmental land management 
and sustainable methods of food 
production. 

We will invest in more county farms to 
replace those lost, and will work with 
agricultural organisations to increase 
access into farming for new entrants. 

Food 

A quarter of all food purchased is 
wasted every year, equivalent to over 
20 million tonnes of greenhouse gas 
emissions, costing over &pound;20 billion. 

Yet Britain has an epidemic in food-
related ill health, obesity, malnutrition 

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and diabetes, as well as increased food 
insecurity - with a boom in food bank 
use and record levels of hunger. 

Labour will introduce A Right to Food. 
We will end 'food bank Britain'. We will 
ensure everyone has access to healthy, 
nutritious, sustainably produced food. 
We will halve food bank usage within 
a year and remove the need for them 
altogether in three years. We will 
establish a National Food Commission 
and review the Allotments Act. We 
will make food security a reason to 
intervene in the economy and work with 
local councils to minimise food waste 

We will put farmers, fishers, food 
producers and workers at the heart 
of our plans for delivering healthy 
food locally. We will support local 
food networks, expand access to 
farm holdings and ensure rights of 
union representation for all food and 
agricultural workers. We will re-establish 
an Agricultural Wages Board in England 
so every part of the UK is covered. 

We will set maximum sustainable 
yields for all shared fish stocks, 
redistribute fish quotas along 
social and environmental criteria 
and, if people vote to leave the EU, 
require the majority of fish caught 
under a UK quota to be landed in 
UK ports. 

We aim to achieve net-zero-carbon 
food production in Britain by 2040. 

Waste and Recycling 

Waste, including plastic waste, pollutes 
our land and seas, killing wildlife and 
contaminating our food. 

We will make producers responsible 
for the waste they create and for 
the full cost of recycling or disposal, 
encouraging more sustainable design 
and manufacturing. In government in 
Wales, Labour has transformed the 
position of recycling, placing them in 
the top five globally for recycling rates. 
A UK Labour government will learn 
from Wales' example, and will also 
back bottle-return schemes. 

We will invest in three new recyclable 
steel plants in areas with a proud history 
of steel manufacturing. 

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ANIMAL WELFARE ANIMAL WELFARE 
The Conservatives will 
sacrifice animal welfare 
standards in trade deals 
with other countries. 
They threaten to bring 
back fox hunting and are 
pursuing the ineffective 
badger cull - the 
largest destruction of 
a protected species in 
living memory. 

Labour has published an ambitious animal welfare 
manifesto which reiterates our commitments to 
prohibit foxhunting and end the cull of badgers. 

In England, we will introduce an animal welfare 
commissioner, prohibit the sale of snares and glue 
traps, end the badger cull and ban the keeping of 
primates as pets. We will work internationally to end 
commercial whaling, ban the importation of hunting 
trophies of threatened species, and boost police 
resources to tackle rural and wildlife crime. 

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25 


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REBUILD 
OUR PUBLIC 
SERVICES 

29 FUNDING 
31 NHS AND SOCIAL CARE 
37 NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE 
42 POLICE AND SECURITY 
46 JUSTICE 
49 COMMUNITIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT 
52 FIRE AND RESCUE 
53 DIGITAL, CULTURE, MEDIA AND SPORT 


FUNDING FUNDING 
Universal public services, 
collectively provided 
through general taxation 
and free at the point of 
use for all, are how we 
guarantee the right to a 
good life. 

Public services do more than make sure everyone 
has the basics. They create shared experiences and 
strengthen social bonds. They make our lives richer and 
more fulfilling. 

A decade of Tory cuts has pushed our public services 
to breaking point. Labour offers real change - we 
will make Britain's public services the best and most 
extensive in the world. 

We will pay for this by creating a fairer taxation system, 
asking for a little more from those with the broadest 
shoulders, and making sure that everyone pays what 
they owe. 

We will reverse some of the Tories' cuts to corporation 
tax while keeping rates lower than in 2010. 

We'll ask those who earn more than &pound;80,000 a year to 
pay a little more income tax, while freezing National 
Insurance and income tax rates for everyone else. 

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29 


We will end the unfairness that sees 
income from wealth taxed at lower 
rates than income from work. VAT is 
a regressive tax that hits the poorest 
hardest and we guarantee no increases 
in VAT. 

We will launch the biggest ever 
crackdown on tax avoidance and 
evasion and reform the inefficient 
system of tax reliefs. 

Public services must also be 
accountable. Labour will end the 
current presumption in favour of 
outsourcing public services and 
introduce a presumption in favour of 
insourcing. And we will stop the public 
getting ripped off by taking back all 
PFI contracts over time. 

When services are procured from 
the private sector, companies will be 
assessed against best practice public 
service criteria, including provisions 
for collective bargaining, fair wage 
clauses, adherence to environmental 
standards, effective equalities policies, 
full tax compliance and application of 
pay ratios. In the public sector, we will 
enforce maximum pay ratios of 20:1. 

We will repair the damage the Tories 
have done to our social fabric, with 
a &pound;150 billion Social Transformation 
Fund to replace, upgrade and expand 
our schools, hospitals, care homes and 
council houses. Public buildings will be 
modernised to ensure a reduction in 
their carbon footprint. 

Our most valuable assets are the 
dedicated people who work in 
our public services, but under this 
government their pay has been cut in 
real terms. Labour will restore public 
sector pay to at least pre-financial 
crisis levels (in real terms), by delivering 
year-on-year above-inflation pay rises, 
starting with a 5% increase, to reward 
and retain the people who do so much 
for us all. 

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NHS AND SOCIAL CARE NHS AND SOCIAL CARE 
The National Health 
Service is one of Labour's 
proudest achievements. 
The right to free-atthe-
point-of-use 
healthcare, universal and 
comprehensive in scope, 
is socialism in action. 

A decade of Tory health cuts and privatisations has 
pushed our greatest institution to the brink. Our 
hospitals are crumbling, equipment is outdated, IT 
systems are inadequate and community facilities 
are neglected. 

There are 100,000 staff vacancies in NHS England, 
including a shortage of 43,000 nurses. There are 
15,000 fewer hospital beds. Every winter, bed 
occupancy rates exceed dangerous levels. Patients 
now wait far too long to see their GP, for an ambulance 
or for treatment. 

Our immediate task is to repair our health services. 

Our urgent priority is to end NHS privatisation. 

Our mission is to create the conditions to prevent 
illness and enable people to live longer, healthier lives. 

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31 


Quality Care for All 

A Labour government will invest in the 
NHS to give patients the modern, well-
resourced services they need. We will 
increase expenditure across the health 
sector by an average 4.3% a year. This 
investment enables us to end patient 
charges, guarantee the standards of 
healthcare patients are entitled to 
receive from NHS England, invest in 
education for the health workforce and 
restore public health grants. 

Our investments mean we deliver the 
standards of care enshrined in the NHS. 
We will stabilise our overstretched A&E 
departments. We will improve stroke, 
heart disease and cancer survival rates 
by providing earlier diagnosis and 
improved screening rates. We will call a 
moratorium on bed cuts. 

Every penny spent on privatisation and 
outsourcing is a penny less spent on 
patient care. Labour will end and reverse 
privatisation in the NHS in the next 
Parliament. We will repeal the Health 
and Social Care Act and reinstate the 
responsibilities of the Secretary of 
State to provide a comprehensive and 
universal healthcare system. We will end 
the requirement on health authorities to 
put services out to competitive tender. 
We will ensure services are delivered 
in-house and also bring subsidiary 
companies back in-house. We will halt 
the fire sale of NHS land and assets. 

We will publish an infrastructure plan to 
return NHS England to the international 
average level of capital investment 

and to ensure future decisions are 
transparent and balanced fairly 
between every region. We will complete 
the confirmed hospital rebuilds and 
invest more in primary care settings, 
modern AI, cyber technology and 
state-of-the-art medical equipment, 
including more MRI and CT scanners. 

We will ensure data protection for 
NHS and patient information, a highly 
valuable publicly funded resource that 
can be used for better diagnosis of 
conditions and for ground-breaking 
research. We will ensure NHS data is not 
exploited by international technology 
and pharmaceutical corporations. 

We will uphold the principle of 
comprehensive healthcare by providing 
free annual NHS dental check-ups. 
We will guarantee universal healthcare 
by ensuring women's and children's 
health services are comprehensive, 
by protecting the rights of EU workers, 
other migrants and refugees and by 
ensuring all our services are made 
accessible to BAME, LGBT+ and 
disabled patients. We will end 
mixed-sex wards. 

We will ensure our NHS becomes a netzero-
carbon service with an NHS Forest 
of one million trees, more efficient 
heating and insulation systems, greater 
reliance on renewable energy, including 
more solar panelling and a transition to 
electric paramedic vehicles, NHS fleet 
cars and hybrid ambulances. 

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We will introduce mandatory standards 
for NHS in-patient food and will provide 
free hospital parking for patients, staff 
and visitors. 

Joined-up Care 

As medical technologies advance, 
we will live with a wider array of 
chronic conditions. Health and care 
must become more joined-up, more 
accessible, more personal and more 
preventative. 

We will stop Tory plans to further 
entrench the private sector delivery 
of health care under the cover of 
integration plans set out in the NHS 
Long Term Plan. Instead we will join up, 
integrate and co-ordinate care through 
public bodies. 

A Labour government will develop a 
planned model of joined-up community 
care, enabling people to live longer lives 
in better health in their own homes. We 
will ensure the voices of local people 
and NHS staff are heard in future 
developments of the health system. 

We will allocate a greater proportion of 
overall funding to close-to-home health 
services and build interdisciplinary, 
patient-focused services across 
primary care, mental health and social 
care. We will ensure patients in deprived 
and remote communities will have 
better access to primary care services. 
We will also ensure those living with 
long-term conditions can access the 
care they need. 

To support our transition to community 
health care services, we will expand GP 
training places to provide resources for 
27 million more appointments each year 
and ensure community pharmacy is 
supported. 

Mental Health 

A Labour government will provide 
an additional &pound;1.6 billion a year to 
ensure new standards for mental 
health are enshrined in the NHS 
constitution ensuring access to 
treatments is on a par with that 
for physical health conditions. 

Our mental health hospitals are not fit 
for purpose. Over 1,000 people with 
mental health problems face hospital 
stays in old, dormitory-style hospital 
wards, while less than one in four 
A&E departments have the facilities 
to deal with people experiencing a 
mental health crisis. We will invest 
&pound;2 billion to modernise hospital facilities 
and end the use of inappropriate, 
out-of-area placements. 

The legislation for detaining people 
with learning disabilities and mental 
illnesses is outdated. We will implement 
in full the recommendations set out in 
the independent review of the Mental 
Health Act, so that people are given 
choice, autonomy and the treatment 
they need. 

We will invest more in eating disorders 
services and ensure NICE guidelines on 
eating disorders are implemented. 

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We will improve access to psychological 
therapies to ensure they deliver the 
quality care patients deserve. We will 
ensure provision of 24/7 crisis services. 

Only one in four children and young 
people are able to receive help from a 
mental health professional. Our &pound;845 
million plan for Healthy Young Minds will 
more than double the annual spending 
on children and adolescent mental 
health services. 

We will establish a network of open-
access mental health hubs to enable 
more children to access mental health 
and recruit almost 3,500 qualified 
counsellors to guarantee every child 
access to school counsellors. 

Inequalities 

Life expectancy is stalling and infant 
mortality rates are increasing, especially 
among those living in our most deprived 
communities. 

A Labour government will target a 
reduction in health inequalities with 
a comprehensive children's health 
strategy. We will introduce a Future 
Generations Well-being Act, enshrining 
health aims in all policies and a new 
duty for NHS agencies to collaborate 
with directors of public health. 

We will invest more than &pound;1 billion in 
public health and recruit 4,500 more 
health visitors and school nurses. We 
will increase mandated health visits, 
ensure new mothers can have access to 

breastfeeding support and 
introduce mental health assessments 
in a maternal health check six weeks 
after birth. 

We will invest in children's oral health, 
tackle childhood obesity and extend 
the sugar tax to milk drinks. We will 
ban fast-food restaurants near schools 
and enforce stricter rules around the 
advertising of junk food and levels of 
salt in food. We will take actions to 
significantly reduce infant deaths and 
ensure families who lose a baby receive 
appropriate bereavement support as 
well as protections at work. 

The re-emergence of measles is an 
indictment. We will urgently put in place 
a vaccination action plan to regain our 
measles-free status in WHO listings. 

We will fully fund sexual health services 
and roll out PrEP medication. 

We will address drug-related deaths, 
alcohol-related health problems and 
the adverse impacts of gambling 
as matters of public health, treated 
accordingly in expanded addiction-
support services. Alcoholic drinks will 
be labelled with clear health warnings. 
We will review the evidence on 
minimum pricing. 

We will implement a Tobacco 
Control Plan and fund smoking 
cessation services. 

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Workforce 

A Labour government will end the crisis 
in our health and care services, plan for 
the future and guarantee real-terms pay 
rises every year. 

Agenda for Change terms and 
conditions will be put into law 
alongside safe staffing limits for all 
staff. We will invest, train and develop 
NHS staff throughout their careers. 
We will introduce a training bursary 
for nurses, midwives and allied 
health professionals. We will 
remove the obstacles to ethical 
international recruitment. 

A Labour government will review the tax 
and pension changes implemented by 
the Tory government to ensure that the 
workforce is fairly rewarded and that 
services are not adversely affected. 

We will provide mental health 
support for staff and create a working 
environment within the NHS that is 
safe, flexible and free from harassment, 
bullying or violence. 

Medicine 

Under a Labour government the 
NHS will be at the forefront of the 
development of genomics and cell 
therapies so that patients can benefit 
from new treatments for cancer 
and dementia, whilst ensuring the 
UK continues to lead in medical 
developments. 

The Orkambi cystic fibrosis drug is just 
the latest example of patients held 
to ransom by corporations charging 
extortionate prices for life-saving drugs. 

We will establish a generic drug 
company. If fair prices are rejected for 
patented drugs we will use the Patents 
Act provisions, compulsory licences and 
research exemptions to secure access 
to generic versions, and we will aim to 
increase the number of pharmaceutical 
jobs in the UK. 

We will play an active role in the 
medical innovation model, ensuring 
rewards and incentives match the areas 
of greatest health need. 

We will ensure that all parts of the 
NHS, the treatment of patients, the 
employment of staff and medicine 
pricing are all fully excluded and 
protected from any international 
trade deals. 

We will progress clinically appropriate 
prescription of medical cannabis. 

We will abolish prescription charges 
in England. 

Social Care 

Social care funding cuts have left 1.5 
million older people without the care 
they need. 

Almost &pound;8 billion has been lost from 
social care budgets since 2010. This is 
having a profound impact on unpaid 
carers in this country, with 2.6 million 

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carers quitting their jobs to provide care 
to family members. The current care 
system is at risk of collapse. 

A Labour government will build 
a comprehensive National Care 
Service for England. We will provide 
community-based, person-centred 
support, underpinned by the principles 
of ethical care and independent living. 
We will provide free personal care, 
beginning with investments to ensure 
that older people have their personal 
care needs met, with the ambition 
to extend this provision to all 
working-age adults. 

We will develop eligibility criteria that 
ensures our service works for everyone, 
including people with complex 
conditions like dementia. We will 
ensure no one ever again needs to face 
catastrophic care costs of more than 
&pound;100,000 for the care they need in old 
age, which we will underscore with a 
lifetime cap on personal contributions 
to care costs. 

We will also invest in other social care 
packages to reverse the damage done 
by Conservative cuts and provide 
additional care packages to support 
both older people and working-age 
adults living independently in their 
own homes. 

Our investments in social care services 
will enable us to more than double the 
number of people receiving publicly 

funded care packages, improve the 
standard of care provided to them and 
remove the distinction between health 
and care needs. 

The provision of additional care 
packages also means we can support 
autistic people and people with 
learning disabilities to move out from 
inappropriate inpatient hospital settings 
and provide support in their own homes 

Our National Care Service will work in 
partnership with the NHS, ensuring care 
is delivered for people, not for profit. 
Contracts for providing care will not 
be awarded to organisations that do 
not pay their fair share of taxes and do 
not meet our high standards of quality 
care. Our focus will be on the ethical 
delivery of care that ensures growing 
public sector provision and providers 
who meet standards of transparency, 
compliance and profit capping. 

Nearly one and a half million people 
work in the care sector, but there are 
over 100,000 vacancies. Labour will 
invest to end the social care crisis, end 
15-minute care visits and provide care 
workers with paid travel time, access to 
training and an option to choose regular 
hours. We will increase the Carer's 
Allowance for unpaid full-time carers. 

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NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE NATIONAL EDUCATION SERVICE 
Education makes our 
economy stronger, 
our society richer 
and our people more 
fulfilled. Whether it is 
businesses finding people 
with the right skills, a 
tech start-up making our 
economy more dynamic 
or more people in better 
paid work and able to 
contribute to public 
services, we all benefit 
from an educated society. 

But education isn't just vital to our economy - it lets 
people develop their talents, overcomes injustices and 
inequalities and helps us understand each other and 
form social bonds. 

The Conservatives have starved our education system 
of funding, transferring costs onto students, staff and 
communities. They have lost sight of its value. 

From cutting budgets of schools, disproportionately 
in deprived areas, to closing Sure Start centres 
and underfunding support for those with special 
educational needs and disabilities, Conservative 
policy has meant those in most need have lost out. 

That's why our National Education Service will be at 
the heart of Labour's plan for real change. It will provide 
free education for everyone throughout their lives and 
will nurture every child and adult to find a path that's 
right for them, by promoting all types of learning, 
skill and knowledge - technical, vocational, academic 
and creative. 

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37 


Early Years 

Early years education is vital to 
children's development. Children from 
disadvantaged backgrounds start 
falling behind their peers before they 
even start school. Early years education 
also helps parents - usually mothers 

- by providing a bridge between 
maternity/parental leave and school. 
But the current system falls far short 
of what is needed. One thousand Sure 
Start centres have closed since 2010, 
while the Tories' so-called free childcare 
offer is desperately underfunded 
and excludes many of the most 
disadvantaged children. 

We will reverse cuts to Sure Start and 
create a new service, Sure Start Plus, 
with enough centres to provide a 
genuinely universal service, available 
in all communities, focused on the 
under-2s. 

Labour will radically reform early years 
provision, with a two-term vision 
to make high-quality early years 
education available for every child. We 
will also extend paid maternity leave to 
12 months. 

Within five years, all 2, 3 and 4-yearolds 
will be entitled to 30 hours of free 
preschool education per week and 
access to additional hours at affordable, 
subsidised rates staggered with 
incomes. Labour will also work to extend 
childcare provision for 1-year-olds 

and to ensure that childcare provision 
accommodates the working patterns 
of all parents. 

We will improve child development by 
transitioning to a qualified, graduate-
led workforce. We value the experience 
of current early years workers, and will 
offer free training to the workforce to 
attain these qualifications on the job. 

Achieving this vision will require 
significant investment. We will increase 
funding and end the fragmentation 
of the current system by funding 
providers directly, making things 
simpler and more sustainable for 
both parents and providers. 

We will recruit nearly 150,000 additional 
early years staff, including Special 
Educational Needs Co-ordinators, and 
introduce a national pay scale, driving 
up pay for the overwhelmingly 
female workforce. 

Maintained nursery schools provide a 
proven, high-quality service but they 
are under threat from Tory cuts. We will 
provide sustainable, long-term funding 
to secure their future. 

Schools 

Labour will make sure schools are 
properly resourced with increased longterm 
funding, while introducing a fairer 
funding formula that leaves no child 
worse off. We will invest to upgrade 
schools that have fallen into disrepair. 

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Labour's funding settlement will ensure 
pupils are taught by a qualified teacher, 
that every school is open for a full five 
days a week, and maximum class sizes 
of 30 for all primary school children. We 
will also fund more non-contact time 
for teachers to prepare and plan. 

Schools have faced years of budget 
cuts, leaving headteachers forced 
to beg parents for money for basic 
equipment. Despite promising to 
reverse their own cuts, the Tories latest 
funding announcement leaves 83% of 
schools still facing cuts next year. 

Schools are being subjected to 
intensified testing, inspection, league 
tables and competition. These aren't 
improving pupil achievement or 
narrowing the attainment gap, but 
are contributing to a growing teacher 
recruitment and retention crisis. 

The narrowing curriculum is 
denying many children access to 
modern languages, arts and music, 
or technical and engineering skills 
that will be essential in a world 
shaped by climate change. 

The academies system is 
over-centralised, inefficient and 
undemocratic. Parents, communities 
and even teachers are shut out of 
decisions about schools and vulnerable 
children are being let down. And there 
is no evidence that academies deliver 
better results. 

The Conservatives have failed a 
generation of children with special 

educational needs and disabilities, who 
have endured years of cuts and chaos. 
Labour will provide the necessary 
funding for children with special 
educational needs and disabilities. 

Labour will end the 'high stakes' 
testing culture of schools by 
scrapping Key Stage 1 and 2 SATs 
and baseline assessments, and 
refocussing assessment on supporting 
pupil progress. 

We will introduce an Arts Pupil Premium 
to fund arts education for every 
primary school child. We will review the 
curriculum to ensure that it enriches 
students and covers subjects such as 
black history and continues to teach 
issues like the Holocaust. Pupils will 
learn both the science of climate and 
environmental emergency, and the 
skills necessary to deal with them. 

We will end the fragmentation and 
marketisation of our school system by 
bringing free schools and academies 
back under control of the people who 
know them best - parents, teachers 
and local communities. 

Under our system: 

&bull; Budget and day-to-day decisions 
will be transferred back to schools, 
overseen by an accountable governing 
body with elected representatives. 
&bull; Responsibility for delivery of education and 
support for young people will sit with local 
authorities, they will manage admissions. 
and have responsibility for school places, 
including the power to open schools 
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&bull; Oversight and coordination, including 
of continuous, peer-to-peer school 
improvement modelled on the London 
Challenge, will be carried out by 
regional offices of the NES. 
&bull; All schools will be subject to a 
common rulebook, set out in 
legislation. 
We will replace Ofsted and transfer 
responsibility for inspections to a 
new body, designed to drive school 
improvement. 

A new teacher supply service will tackle 
the waste of funds going to private 
supply teacher agencies thanks to 
the government's failure to recruit and 
retain experienced teachers. 

We will take action to end 'off-rolling', 
removing the perverse incentives for 
schools to let pupils fall out of the 
system, by making schools accountable 
for the outcomes of pupils who leave 
their rolls. 

We will properly regulate all education 
providers and reform alternative 
provision (AP) to ensure an excellent 
education is the right of every child, and 
improve the outcomes and life chances 
of some of the most vulnerable children 
in society. 

We will 'poverty-proof' schools, 
introducing free school meals for all 
primary school children, encouraging 
breakfast clubs, and tackling the cost of 
school uniforms. 

We will bring back the School Support 
Staff Negotiating Body and national 
pay settlements for teachers. 

We will close the tax loopholes enjoyed 
by elite private schools and use that 
money to improve the lives of all 
children, and we will ask the Social 
Justice Commission to advise on 
integrating private schools and creating 
a comprehensive education system. 

Further Education 
and Lifelong Learning 

With automation and the Green 
Industrial Revolution bringing major 
changes to industry, it is more 
important than ever that people have 
the opportunity to retrain and upskill 
throughout their lives. 

Under the Tories, adult education 
has undergone 10 years of managed 
decline. England already faces a 
shortage of people with higher-level 
technical qualifications, and demand 
for these skills will only grow as we 
create new green jobs. 

Instead of investing in people to 
prepare them for the jobs of the future, 
the Conservatives have slashed funding 
and cut opportunities. 

Labour will ensure fairness and 
sustainability in further education, 
aligning the base rate of per-pupil 
funding in post-16 education with 
Key Stage 4, providing dedicated 
capital funding to expand provision 

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and bringing back the Education 
Maintenance Allowance as the Welsh 
Labour Government has done. 

Labour will make lifelong learning a 
reality, giving everyone a free lifelong 
entitlement to: 

&bull; Training up to Level 3. 
&bull; Six years training at Levels 4-6, with 
maintenance grants for disadvantaged 
learners. 
We will introduce additional 
entitlements for workers in industries 
that are significantly affected by 
industrial transition. 

We will make sure training delivers the 
right skills by giving employers a role 
in co-design and co-production of 
qualifications. 

We will restore funding for English for 
Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) 
courses and restore and expand the 
Union Learning Fund, giving workers 
the right to accrue paid time off for 
education and training. 

Labour will reform existing careers 
advice, working towards an integrated 
information, advice and guidance 
system that covers the entire NES. 

We will reverse the fragmentation 
and privatisation of further and adult 
education, incorporating it into a single 
national system of regulation that 
functions for education as our NHS 
does for healthcare provision. 

Higher Education 

Under the Tories, universities are 
treated as private businesses, left 
at the mercy of market forces, while 
top salaries soar and students pay 
more for less. Tuition fees have 
trebled and maintenance grants have 
been scrapped, leaving the poorest 
graduates with an average debt 
of &pound;57,000. 

Labour will end the failed free-market 
experiment in higher education, 
abolish tuition fees and bring 
back maintenance grants. We will 
fundamentally rethink the assessment 
of research and teaching quality, and 
develop a new funding formula for 
higher education that: 

&bull; Ensures all public HE institutions 
have adequate funding for teaching 
and research. 
&bull; Widens access to higher 
education and reverses the 
decline of part-time learning. 
&bull; Ends the casualisation of staff. 
We will transform the Office for 
Students from a market regulator to a 
body of the National Education Service, 
acting in the public interest. 

We will introduce post-qualification 
admissions in higher education, 
and work with universities to ensure 
contextual admissions are used across 
the system. 

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POLICE AND SECURIT Y POLICE AND SECURIT Y 
The primary duty 
of government is to 
keep people safe. Our 
communities were 
endangered when the 
Conservatives took 
21,000 police officers 
off our streets. 
Recorded crime has risen, including violent crimes 
like knife crime, which has risen to record high levels, 
up 80% in the last five years. Last year more than 11 
million crimes were recorded, and the proportion of 
offences charged has fallen across all categories: 
violence, drugs, robbery, burglary, weapons possession 
and vehicle theft. Prosecutions have fallen to a record 
low level. Some offences have been decriminalised in 
practice. Only 1.4% of reported rapes are prosecuted. 
Crime rates reflect the society we live in. 
Conservative cuts to services have eroded the 
fabric of local communities. The rate of school 
exclusions has increased, as has social inequality 
- crime rates are driven by both. 
Where the Conservatives have failed, a Labour 
government will take action to address the causes 
of crime and end the epidemic. We will invest in our 
communities and public services to build the stronger, 

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fairer society that keeps us all safer. 
Rebuilding our criminal justice services, 
we will focus on crime prevention and 
early interventions, giving people the 
best chance of rehabilitation. 

We will rebuild our youth services and 
guarantee young people's access to 
youth workers. We will invest in a youth 
justice system in which schools, local 
authorities, health authorities and 
youth services work together to divert 
young people away from the pathways 
towards crime. 

Police 

A Labour government will invest in 
policing to prevent crime and make 
our communities safer, and we will 
enforce the laws protecting police 
and other emergency workers from 
violent assault. 

We will rebuild the whole police 
workforce, recruiting more police 
officers, police community support 
officers and police staff. We will 
re-establish neighbourhood policing 
and recruit 2,000 more frontline officers 
than have been planned for by the 
Conservatives. We will work with police 
forces to invest in a modern workforce 
to tackle the rise in violent crime and 
cybercrime under the Tories. To deliver 
these priorities, Labour will work with 
police and crime commissioners to 
reform police funding and share new 
resources fairly, and to ensure that 
local needs are met. 

The Tory approach to policing has 
been different: reckless, remote, 
authoritarian, ineffective policing 
on the cheap. It has led to what HM 
Inspectorate of Constabulary described 
as dangerous, disturbing practices, 
with investigations shelved, vulnerable 
victims let down and dangerous 
suspects remaining at large. 

We will retain local democratic 
accountability for police forces and 
reform the police funding formula to 
ensure sufficient, sustainable resources 
are fairly allocated. We will agree 
resources with the police authorities 
to combat crime and restore 
community policing by consent. 

Effective police work requires the police 
to serve their communities and work 
collaboratively with youth workers, 
mental health services, schools, drug 
rehabilitation programmes and other 
public agencies. A police force working 
within our communities, with the 
capacity to gather local intelligence, 
is also the frontline of our domestic 
security - the first eyes and ears of 
effective counter-terrorism. 

We will work to eliminate institutional 
biases against BAME communities. 
Proportionate stop-and-search based 
on intelligence is a needed tool of 
effective policing, but the use of 
expanded powers means black and 
Asian men are still more likely to be 
stopped and searched, poisoning 
relations between the police and the 
local communities they serve. 

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We will ensure better police training 
on domestic abuse and offences 
arising from coercive control, as well 
as historical abuses and other crimes 
neglected by the reduced forces 
operating under Tory austerity. 

A Labour government will establish a 
Royal Commission to develop a public 
health approach to substance misuse, 
focusing on harm reduction rather than 
criminalisation. 

We will introduce minimum legal 
standards of service for all victims 
of crime. 

Security 

We will address the failure of the 
Conservatives to take effective 
measures against a growing problem 
of extreme or violent radicalisation. 
We will ensure closer counter terrorism 
co-ordination between the police 
and the security services, combining 
neighbourhood expertise with 
international intelligence. 

We will ensure the powers exercised by 
the security services are proportionate 
and used in accordance with human 
rights. We will review the circumstances 
requiring judicial warrant. We will 
ensure agencies are accountable and 
strengthen the powers of the Joint 
Intelligence and Security Committee. 
We will constrain the right of the Prime 
Minister to suppress publication of 
committee reports. 

A Labour government will review our 
security strategies. 

We will review the Prevent programme 
to assess both effectiveness and 
potential to alienate communities 
and consider alternatives including 
safeguarding programmes to protect 
those vulnerable to the recruitment 
propaganda and ideologies of the 
far-right and others who promote terror 
as a political strategy. 

We will review the Protect programme 
to ensure that public authorities take 
appropriate security measures, without 
alienating the communities they serve. 

We will evaluate the mobile phone 
trials with the aim of introducing an 
emergency alert system. 

We will use our diplomatic services, 
our aid budgets and our international 
standing to promote peaceful solutions 
to conflicts and tackle the risks arising 
from poverty, natural catastrophes and 
population displacements. Our national 
security is linked to global threats. We 
will respect international law and avoid 
needless military interventions. 

Our security co-operation 
arrangements with EU neighbours 
are essential for our safety. If the 
British people confirm their decision 
to leave, we will prioritise agreement 
of a new UK-EU Security Treaty. 

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Cybersecurity 

Cybercrime and cyberwarfare are 
growing, all around the world. Every 
aspect of our lives, from the NHS to 
our nuclear facilities, from transport 
systems to communications networks 
is vulnerable. 

A Labour government, ever more 
dependent on digital technology, 
will overhaul our cybersecurity by 
creating a co-ordinating minister and 
regular reviews of cyber-readiness. 

We will review the role and remit of 
the National Cyber Security Centre to 
determine whether it should be given 
powers as an auditing body, with the 
ability to issue warnings to private 
and public sector organisations and 
designate risk. 

We will also review the structures and 
roles of the National Crime Agency, 
to strengthen the response to all 
types of economic crime, including 
cybercrime and fraud, and ensure a 
modern, technologically advanced 
police service that has the capacity 
and skills to combat online crime, 
supported by a new national strategy 
on cybercrime and fraud. 

Border Security 

Our border security prevents serious 
crimes including child abduction, 
people trafficking, smuggling of drugs 
and guns, terrorism and modern 
day slavery. The Tories have further 
weakened our borders, cutting another 
200 jobs over the last four years. 
They have failed to deliver exit checks. 
In place of an effective border control 
they have required landlords, teachers 
and medical staff to work as unpaid 
immigration officers, creating a hostile 
environment. 

A Labour government will review 
our border controls to make them 
more effective. 

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JUSTICE JUSTICE 
Smarter justice requires 
cross-government action 
to reduce the impact 
of adverse childhood 
experiences and to break 
the vicious cycle of 
poverty, inequality 
and crime. 
We will champion a joined-up approach, fostering 
close working relationships between criminal justice 
agencies with education authorities, health services 
and others by establishing violence-reduction units 
and ensuring vulnerable people get the support they 
need by boosting public health, mental health and 
early years services. Prison is not the best place to 
address the drug addictions, mental illnesses and 
debts that lead many people into crime. 
The crisis in our criminal justice system has left 
communities less safe, victims less supported and 
people less able to defend their rights. Labour will 
defend the rule of law. 
Cutting thousands of prison officers has driven record 
levels of prison violence. A Labour government will 
restore total prison officer numbers to 2010 levels, 
and phase out dangerous lone working. We will bring 
PFI prisons back in-house and there will be no new 

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private prisons. We will tackle the prison 
maintenance backlog and develop a 
long-term estate strategy. 

The Ministry of Justice's own 
evidence shows tens of thousands of 
crimes could be prevented if robust 
community sentences replace short 
prison sentences. We will set new 
standards for community sentences 
and introduce a presumption against 
prison sentences of six months 
or less for non-violent and 
non-sexual offences. 

We will invest in proven alternatives to 
custody, including women's centres, 
expand problem-solving courts and 
plug the funding gap in the female 
offender strategy. We will further 
consider the evidence for effective 
alternatives and rehabilitation of 
prolific offenders. 

A Labour government will reunify 
probation and guarantee a publicly run, 
locally accountable probation service. 
Under Labour, probation staff and 
professional standards will once again 
be properly valued. 

Legal aid cuts mean essential legal 
help is too often denied. To help people 
enforce their rights, we will restore all 
early legal aid advice, including for 
housing, social security, family and 
immigration cases. 

We will recruit hundreds of new 
community lawyers, promote public 
legal education and build an expanded 
network of law centres. 

We will ensure legal aid for inquests 
into deaths in state custody and the 
preparation of judicial review cases. 
We will consult on the civil legal aid 
means-test levels and act on the 
criminal legal aid review. 

We will defend workers' ability to 
recover legal representation costs 
from negligent employers. 

We will keep the right for workers to 
be represented and recover their 
costs in cases of employer negligence 
leading to injury at work. We will review 
the eligibility criteria for the criminal 
injuries compensation scheme. 

A Labour government will halt 
court closures and cuts to staff, and 
undertake a review of the courts reform 
programme. We will facilitate a more 
representative judiciary while upholding 
its independence, and review funding 
for the Crown Prosecution Service. 

We will tackle the disproportionate 
levels of BAME children in custody, 
review the youth custody estate, 
strengthen youth courts and build 
on the Lammy Review. 

Violence against women and girls is 
unacceptable as is many women's 
experience of criminal justice agencies. 
We will set new standards for tackling 
domestic and sexual abuse and 
violence, and appoint a Commissioner 
for Violence against Women and Girls. 
We will establish an independent review 
into shamefully low rape prosecution 
rates. We will establish a National 

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Refuge Fund, ensure financial stability 
for rape crisis centres and reintroduce 
a Domestic Abuse Bill. 

We will improve the safety of the 
family court system for domestic 
violence victims and prohibit their 
cross-examination by their abuser. 
We will introduce protections for victims 
of so-called revenge porn. Labour will 
introduce a no-fault divorce procedure. 
We will uphold women's reproductive 
rights and decriminalise abortions. 

We will establish public inquiries 
into historical injustices including 
blacklisting and Orgreave, and ensure 
the second phase of the Grenfell 
Inquiry has the confidence of all 
those affected, especially the bereaved 
families and survivors. We will also 
consider a public inquiry in the case 
of Zane Gbangbola. 

We will require judicial warrants for 
undercover operations and retain the 
Mitting Inquiry into undercover policing. 

We will release all papers on the 
Shrewsbury 24 trials and 37 Cammell 
Laird shipyard workers and introduce 
a Public Accountability Bill. We will 
ensure fair compensation for the 
victims of contaminated blood 
products across the UK. 

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COMMUNITIES AND 
LOCAL GOVERNMENT 
COMMUNITIES AND 
LOCAL GOVERNMENT 
Labour will reverse the While those who make decisions in Whitehall can seem 
Tory decade of austerity 
for local government and 
aim to restore council 
spending powers to 2010 
levels over the lifetime of 
distant and detached, our local councillors live among 
us, shopping on the same high street, using the same 
parks and leisure centres and sending their children to 
the same schools. Thriving local councils are vital to 
Labour's democratic transformation of 
the Parliament. the economy. 
Councils are the collective voice of local communities 
and are on the frontline in delivering many essential 
public services. 
Tory cuts, which have been deliberately targeted 
at the poorest areas of the country, have plunged 
our councils into crisis and pushed many services 
to breaking point. Decades of privatisation and 
outsourcing have hollowed out council capacity, 
taken money out of communities and undermined 
democratic accountability. 

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49 


We will act to bring services - from bin 
collections to management of local 
leisure centres - back in-house within 
the next Parliament, improving service 
quality, saving money and ensuring the 
people who deliver vital local services 
are treated decently. 

Rural councils deliver public services 
differently, and this needs to be 
reflected in funding allocation 
mechanisms. We will introduce a 'ruralproofing' 
process so that all our laws, 
policies and programmes consider their 
impact on rural communities. 

Where local areas experience a sharp 
rise in demand for services, we will make 
council funding more reactive, and will 
work with councils to establish such a 
fund to meet changing circumstances. 

Our high streets are being decimated 
by store closures and jobs losses. 
High streets are more than places to 
shop, they are places we go for culture, 
company and character. We will revive 
high streets by stopping bank branch 
closures, banning ATM charges and 
giving local government new powers 
to put empty shops to good use. 

Business rates are causing real issues 
for high-street retailers and others. 
A Labour government will review 
the option of a land value tax on 
commercial landlords as an 
alternative and develop a retail 
sector industrial strategy. 

We will make sure the rights of 
consumers are enhanced and 

protected, that safety standards are 
maintained and improved, and that 
local authority trading standards 
departments and other consumer 
protection agencies have the resources 
to enforce those rights and standards 

We will stop Crown Post Office closures 
and bring Royal Mail back into public 
ownership at the earliest opportunity, 
reuniting it with the Post Office and 
creating a publicly owned Post Bank 
run through the post office network 
to ensure every community has easy 
access to face-to-face, trusted and 
affordable banking. 

A Business Development Agency will be 
based in the Post Bank, providing free 
support and advice on how to launch, 
manage and grow a business. 

Pubs are community hubs but 18 are 
closing each week in Britain. Labour will 
list pubs as Assets of Community Value 
so community groups have the first 
chance to buy local pubs when they 
are under threat. 

We will ensure libraries are preserved 
for future generations and updated 
with Wi-Fi and computers. We will 
reintroduce library standards so that 
government can assess and guide 
councils in delivering the best 
possible service. 

As well as the presumption to insource 
public services, we will build community 
wealth by giving communities the 
powers and resources they need to 
keep public spending circulating in 

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the local economy, rather than being 
sucked offshore to corporate tax 
havens. We will extend community 
control in the private sector by 
supporting local and community 
businesses. We will give a new 
Co-operative Development Agency 
a mission to double the size of the 
co-operative sector. 

Labour will put the voices of local 
people at the heart of planning. We will 
rebalance power in the planning system 
by giving local government greater 
freedom to set planning fees and by 
requiring the climate and environmental 
emergency to be factored into all 
planning decisions. 

Young people have been let down by 
the Conservatives. At least 750 youth 
centres have closed since 2012. Too 
many young people now have nowhere 
to go, nothing to do and no one to help 
them with their problems. Labour will 
build a properly funded, professionally 
staffed National Youth Service, and 
will guarantee every young person has 
access to local, high-quality youth work. 

Vulnerable children have suffered most, 
with many left waiting until crisis point 
for support. Councils are having to meet 
the needs of more at-risk children with 
lower funding. 

Labour will launch a wholesale 
review of the care system, including 
kinship care, considering national 
standards such as a central register 

of foster parents and regulation of 
semi-supported housing, to ensure 
we meet the needs of every child. 

We will rebuild early intervention 
services and replace the Troubled 
Families programme with a Stronger 
Families programme, refocused on 
long-term support to reduce the risk 
of children going into care. 

We will protect and build on 
Staying Put for over-18s in care 
and the Adoption Support Fund. 

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FIRE AND RESCUE FIRE AND RESCUE 
The Conservatives have 
cut 11,500 firefighter jobs 
and closed dozens of fire 
stations. Response times 
have got slower and lives 
have been put at risk. 
A Labour government will halt the cuts and further 
invest in our Fire and Rescue Service, recruiting at 
least 5,000 new firefighters. We will learn lessons from 
the public inquiries into Grenfell and earlier disasters. 
We will establish a broadly based implementation 
taskforce, but will not wait for final recommendations 
to make urgently needed changes. We will ensure 
dedicated fire controls under Fire and Rescue Service 
governance and provide resources for a public Fire 
and Rescue College to ensure that necessary training, 
research and planning is undertaken. 
We will conduct a review of the Fire and Rescue 
Service, evaluating safe staffing levels and consulting 
on national minimum standards. We will establish in 
law a standards body for fire prevention, protection 
and intervention, with trade union representation 
at all levels. We will reinstate separate governance 
arrangements for Fire and Rescue Service and police 
services. We will give fire services the duty to coordinate 
the emergency response to floods locally. 

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DIGITAL , CULTURE, 
MEDIA AND SPORT 
DIGITAL , CULTURE, 
MEDIA AND SPORT 
Digital broadband infrastructure and 

Digital and technological 
advancements bring challenges, 
but also huge opportunities. In the 
age of AI and automation, digital 
connectivity will underpin our future 
economy. We will need world-class 
digital infrastructure in which everyone 
can share. 

Labour will deliver free full-fibre 
broadband to all by 2030. 

We will establish British Broadband, 
with two arms: British Digital 
Infrastructure (BDI) and the British 
Broadband Service (BBS). We will bring 
the broadband-relevant parts of BT 
into public ownership, with a jobs 
guarantee for all workers in existing 

retail broadband work. 

BDI will roll out the remaining 90-92% 
of the full-fibre network, and acquire 
necessary access rights to existing 
assets. BBS will coordinate the delivery 
of free broadband in tranches as 
the full-fibre network is rolled out, 
beginning with the communities worst 
served by existing broadband networks. 
Taxation of multinationals, including 
tech giants, will pay for the operating 
costs of the public full-fibre network. 
The plan will boost jobs, tackle regional 
inequality and improve quality of 
life as part of a mission to connect 
the country. 

We will enforce a legal duty of care to 
protect our children online, impose fines 

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53 


on companies that fail on online abuse 
and empower the public with a Charter 
of Digital Rights. 

Culture 

Britain's thriving arts, culture and 
creative industries drive investments 
and encourage tourism. 

A Labour government will open up 
career opportunities in these industries 
for everyone and consult on ways to 
address the gender imbalance in the 
digital creative industries. 

We will introduce an Arts Pupil Premium 
to every primary school in England - 
a &pound;160 million annual boost for schools 
to ensure creative and arts education 
is embedded in secondary education, 
and providing a pathway to grow our 
thriving creative sector. 

We will invest in the towns and 
communities neglected for too long, 
with a &pound;1 billion Cultural Capital Fund 
to transform libraries, museums and 
galleries across the country. 

We will make the distribution of 
National Lottery funding more 
transparent to help communities 
get their fair share of project funding. 

We will maintain free entry to 
museums, because everyone should 
have access to our shared heritage. 
Building on the success of the UK City 
of Culture, we will launch a Town of 
Culture competition. 

We will work with trade unions and 
employers to make creative jobs 
accessible for all, ensuring diversity 
in these industries so that everyone 
sees themselves represented on 
screen and on stage. We will review 
the copyright framework to ensure 
fair remuneration for artists and 
content creators. 

Media 

A Labour government will ensure a 
healthy future for all our public service 
broadcasters, including BBC Alba and 
S4C. We will protect free TV licences for 
over-75s. 

A free and fair press is vital to protecting 
democracy and holding the powerful to 
account. 

We will address misconduct and 
the unresolved failures of corporate 
governance raised by the second stage 
of the abandoned Leveson Inquiry. We 
will take steps to ensure that Ofcom 
is better able to safeguard a healthy 
plurality of media ownership and to 
put in place clearer rules on who is fit 
and proper to own or run TV and radio 
stations. We will take action to address 
the monopolistic hold the tech giants 
have on advertising revenues and will 
support vital local newspapers and 
media outlets. 

We will consult media-sector workers 
and trade unions to establish an inquiry 
into the 'fake news' undermining trust in 

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media, democracy and public debate, 
and on a legal right of public interest 
defence for journalists. 

Sport 

Sport enriches our lives, binds 
communities together and helps 
us all to stay healthy. 

Sport must be accessible and run in the 
interests of those who participate in it 
and love it. 

In football, the professional game 
has become divided between the 
extremes of the very rich and the very 
poor with clubs in Bury and Bolton 
facing collapse. A Labour government 
will examine the state of the game, 
its governance and regulation, its 
ownership rules and the support and 
funding of the clubs that are vital to 
local communities. We will review the 
'fit and proper person test' for club 
owners and directors and ensure that 
supporters' trusts have a proper role so 
that the professional game is properly 
run for all its fans and all its clubs. 

A Labour government will legislate for 
accredited football supporters' trusts to 
be able to appoint and remove at least 
two club directors and purchase shares 
when clubs change hands. We will 
regulate safe standing in stadiums and 
ensure that a proportion of the Premier 
League's television rights income is 
spent on grassroots football facilities. 

We will add the ICC Cricket World 
Cup to the list of crown jewel sporting 
events that are broadcast free-to-air. 

We will commission an independent 
review into discrimination in sport. 

Gambling 

A Labour government will curb 
gambling advertising in sports and 
introduce a new Gambling Act fit for 
the digital age, establishing gambling 
limits, a levy for problem gambling 
funding and mechanisms for consumer 
compensations. 

Civic Society 

In the years of austerity it was 
non-government organisations that 
often held the social fabric of our 
society together, protecting our 
communities from even greater 
harm and providing precisely targeted 
support. As we rebuild our public 
services, we will support and maintain 
the social capital values of these 
organisations. 

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TACKLE 
POVERTY AND 
INEQUALITY 

59 WORK 
65 WOMEN AND EQUALITIES 
70 MIGRATION 
72 SOCIAL SECURITY 
77 HOUSING 
81 CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES 


WORK WORK 
Work should provide 
a decent life for all, 
guaranteeing not just 
dignity and respect in the 
workplace, but also the 
income and leisure time 
to allow for a fulfilling life 
outside it. 

Under the Tories, pay has stagnated while insecurity 
and inequality are rising. 

Work no longer guarantees a way out of poverty. 
Of 14.3 million people in poverty, nine million live in 
families where at least one adult works. Real wages 
are still lower than before the financial crisis, while 
dividends paid to shareholders are up 85%. 

Labour will eradicate in-work poverty in our first term 
by tackling the structural causes of poverty and 
inequality, such as low pay and high living costs, 
while raising the floor provided by our social safety net. 

Too many people have found themselves in a spiral of 
debt as wages fell and housing costs rose. Labour will 
cap the total amount that can be paid in overdraft fees 
or interest on a loan. 

We will rapidly introduce a Real Living Wage of at least 
&pound;10 per hour for all workers aged 16 and over, and use 

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savings to public finances to help small 
businesses manage the extra cost. 

We will give workers a stake in the 
companies they work for - and a share 
of the profits they help create - by 
requiring large companies to set up 
Inclusive Ownership Funds (IOFs). Up 
to 10% of a company will be owned 
collectively by employees, with 
dividend payments distributed equally 
among all, capped at &pound;500 a year, 
and the rest being used to top up the 
Climate Apprenticeship Fund. The cap 
will rise to ensure that no more than 
25% of dividends raised by IOFs are 
redistributed in this way. 

And we will explore other innovative 
ways of responding to low pay, 
including a pilot of Universal 
Basic Income. 

Growing numbers of the workforce are 
self-employed. While for some this 
brings freedom and autonomy, it can 
also bring insecurity. Self-employed 
people will benefit from a broad range 
of our policies, from free childcare and 
full-fibre broadband to face-to-face 
lending and business support through 
our Post Bank. 

We will also seek to develop tailored 
support and protections for the self-
employed, including: collective income 
protection insurance schemes, annual 
income assessments for those on 
Universal Credit, and better access to 
mortgages and pension schemes. 

We will tackle late payments that 
leave small businesses and the 
self-employed waiting months to 
be paid, including banning late payers 
from public procurement. 

Ministry for Employment Rights 

Throughout history, working people 
in Britain have improved their lives by 
coming together to demand rights 
and protections. Even after decades 
in which workers' rights have been 
cut back and their unions' capacity 
to defend them have been slashed, 
the Tories believe that workers' terms 
and conditions should be dictated by 
employers on a 'take it or leave it' basis. 

We are proud of the trade union 
movement's historic achievements in 
giving people a voice at work through 
collective action. It is not just part of our 
history; it is also part of our future. Only 
by shifting the balance of power back 
towards workers will we achieve decent 
wages, security and dignity at work. 

The next Labour government will 
transform people's lives for the better 
through the biggest extension of 
workers' rights in history. 

We will give working people a voice 
at the Cabinet table by establishing 
a Ministry for Employment Rights. 

We will start to roll out sectoral 
collective bargaining across the 
economy, bringing workers and 
employers together to agree legal 

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minimum standards on a wide range of 
issues, such as pay and working hours, 
that every employer in the sector must 
follow. Sectoral collective bargaining will 
increase wages and reduce inequality. 
This will also stop good employers 
being undercut by bad employers. 

We will tackle insecurity by: 

&bull; Giving everyone full rights from day 
one on the job. 
&bull; Strengthening protections for 
whistleblowers and rights against 
unfair dismissal for all workers, with 
extra protections for pregnant women, 
those going through the menopause 
and terminally ill workers. 
&bull; Ending bogus self-employment 
and creating a single status of 
'worker' for everyone apart from 
those genuinely self-employed in 
business on their own account, so that 
employers can not evade workers' 
rights; and banning overseas-only 
recruitment practices. 
&bull; Introducing a legal right to collective 
consultation on the implementation of 
new technology in workplaces. 
&bull; Banning zero-hour contracts and 
strengthening the law so that those 
who work regular hours for more than 
12 weeks will have a right to a regular 
contract, reflecting those hours. 
We will help people balance work and 
family life by: 

&bull; Increasing wages through sectoral 
collective bargaining. 
&bull; Requiring breaks during shifts to 
be paid. 
&bull; Requiring cancelled shifts to be paid 
and proper notice for changes 
in hours. 
&bull; Giving all workers the right to flexible 
working. 
&bull; Extending statutory maternity pay 
from nine to 12 months. 
&bull; Doubling paternity leave from two 
weeks to four and increasing statutory 
paternity pay. 
&bull; Introducing statutory bereavement 
leave, guaranteeing workers time 
off to grieve the loss of close family 
members or following miscarriage. 
&bull; Introducing four new bank holidays 
celebrating our four patron saints' 
days. 
&bull; Reviewing family-friendly employment 
rights, including rights to respond to 
family emergencies. 
We will make sure people are treated 
equally at work by: 

&bull; Requiring employers to devise and 
implement plans to eradicate the 
gender pay gap - and pay inequalities 
underpinned by race and/or disability 
- or face fines. 
&bull; Requiring employers to maintain 
workplaces free of harassment, 
including harassment by third parties. 
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&bull; Increasing protection against 
redundancy for people wherever 
they work. 
&bull; Giving statutory rights to equalities 
representatives. 
&bull; Setting up a Royal Commission to 
bring health (including mental health) 
and safety legislation up to date. 
&bull; Ensuring that public-facing workers 
are protected by toughening the law 
against abuse and violence. 
&bull; Banning unpaid internships. 
We will remove unfair and unnecessary 
restrictions on trade unions, allowing 
people to come together and speak up 
on issues that affect them at work. 

We will: 

&bull; Allow trade unions to use secure 
electronic and workplace ballots. 
&bull; Remove unnecessary restrictions on 
industrial action. 
&bull; Strengthen and enforce trade unions' 
right of entry to workplaces to 
organise, meet and represent their 
members and to recruit. 
&bull; Ban union-busting, strengthen 
protection of trade union 
representatives against unfair 
dismissal and union members from 
intimidation, harassment, threats and 
blacklisting. 
&bull; Repeal anti-trade union legislation 
including the Trade Union Act 2016 
and create new rights and freedoms 
for trade unions to help them win a 
better deal for working people. 

&bull; Simplify the law around union 
recognition. 
&bull; Give union reps adequate time off 
for union duties. 
We will develop collective income-
protection insurance schemes for the 
self-employed. We will introduce a 
maximum workplace temperature to 
protect workers and require employers 
to take counteracting measures. 

For years, the UK has been in breach 
of our international obligations. We 
will bring UK law into line with the 
International Labour Organisation 
standards it has ratified, so Britain leads 
the world, instead of engaging in a race 
to the bottom. 

Working Time 

Time off to rest, relax and be with family 
is essential to a happy and fulfilling life, 
but workers in the UK put in some of the 
longest hours in Europe. 

Labour will tackle excessive working 
hours. Within a decade we will reduce 
average full-time weekly working hours 
to 32 across the economy, with no 
loss of pay, funded by productivity 
increases. 

We will meet this target by: 

&bull; Ending the opt-out provision for 
the EU Working Time Directive and 
enforcing working-time regulations. 
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&bull; Setting up an independent Working 
Time Commission to advise on 
raising minimum holiday entitlements 
and reducing maximum weekly 
working time. 
&bull; Mandating bargaining councils to 
negotiate reductions in working time. 
&bull; Investing to increase productivity 
and making sure workers share the 
benefits. 
We will keep restrictions on Sunday 
trading in place and review unpaid 
overtime. 

Enforcement 

Rights don't mean anything unless 
they're enforced, but that is not 
happening under the Tories. 

That doesn't just hurt workers who lose 
out, it is also bad for employers who 
follow the law and are undercut by 
unscrupulous competitors prepared 
to break it. 

Strong trade unions are the best and 
most effective way to enforce rights at 
work. Labour will also introduce a new, 
unified Workers' Protection Agency 
to enforce workplace rights, including 
the Real Living Wage. It will be given 
extensive powers to inspect workplaces 
and bring prosecutions and civil 
proceedings on workers' behalf. 

We will keep employment tribunals 
free, extend their powers, and 
introducenew Labour Courts with a 
stronger role for people with industrial 
experience on panels. 

Rewriting the Rules 

Social justice also means levelling the 
playing field between small and big 
business, and ensuring that democracy 
and accountability are valued across 
society, including in the private sector. 

Businesses are the heartbeat of our 
economy, creating jobs, wealth and 
innovations. 

But the upper echelons of corporate 
Britain have been corrupted by a 
culture in which the long-term health 
of a company is sacrificed for a quick 
buck for a few: a short-term culture 
has seen some treasured companies 
asset-stripped, leaving workers, small 
business suppliers and pensioners in 
the lurch. Too often, the link between 
reward and long-term performance is 
broken for short-term greed. 

Labour will take on short-termism and 
corporate greed, making sure good 
businesses are rewarded, not undercut. 
We will rewrite the rules of the economy 
and ensure everyone plays by them. 

We will amend the Companies Act, 
requiring companies to prioritise 
long-term growth while strengthening 
protections for stakeholders, including 
smaller suppliers and pension funds. 
We will tackle late payments that leave 
small businesses waiting months to be 
paid, including banning late payers from 
public procurement. 

For small businesses, we will ensure no 
quarterly reporting for businesses below 
the VAT threshold. 

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We will require one-third of boards to 
be reserved for elected worker-directors 
and give them more control over 
executive pay - because when those 
who depend on a company have a say 
in running it, that company generally 
does better and lasts longer. 

We will introduce a broader 'public 
interest test' to prevent hostile 
takeovers and asset-stripping 
weakening our industrial base and 
destroying treasured home-grown 
companies. And we will give workers 
a voice on public bodies such as the 
Competition and Markets Authority. 

We will let struggling companies go into 
protective administration, so they can 
be sold as a going concern rather than 
collapsing into insolvency. 

Audits are vital to corporate 
accountability, but the auditing industry 
is dominated by a few players riddled 
with conflicts of interest. Labour will 
separate audit and accounting activities 
in major firms and impose more robust 
rules on auditors. 

We will tackle regulatory capture and 
streamline regulation by creating a new 
Business Commission, responsive to 
parliamentary select committees. 

Social Justice Commission 

Labour will usher in a new era of social 
justice in Britain. Everyone in our society 
should be allowed to flourish regardless 

of what class or postcode they are born 
into, or the colour of their skin. 

But that's impossible when you cannot 
meet your most basic needs and have 
to choose between eating and heating 
your home. Britain is one of the richest 
countries in the world, but under the 
Tories millions of people can't make 
ends meet. 

They tell us we shouldn't care about 
inequality, because social mobility 
allows those who work hard to get 
on. But nobody becomes a billionaire 
through hard work alone, and as 
inequality has grown, it has become 
more entrenched. 

For Labour, the true measure of fairness 
is not social mobility but social justice. 

Implicit in the notion of social mobility 
is the idea that poverty and inequality 
are acceptable provided some people 
can climb the social ladder. 

Social justice, on the other hand, 
demands that we end poverty, reduce 
inequality and create a society in which 
the conditions for a fulfilling life are 
available to everyone. 

Labour will replace the Social Mobility 
Commission with a Social Justice 
Commission, based in the Treasury, 
with wide-ranging powers to hold us, 
and future governments, to account. 

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WOMEN AND EQUALITIES WOMEN AND EQUALITIES 
Labour is the party of 
equality, committed to 
achieving a world free 
from all forms of bigotry 
and discrimination. 
Whether campaigning 
on the streets or 
passing legislation in 
government, Labour 
is the only party to 
consistently stand with 
women, disabled people, 
people from ethnic 
minority backgrounds 
and LGBT+ communities. 

The Conservatives have failed to tackle society's 
burning injustices. Instead, they have inflicted injustice 
after injustice on women, Black, Asian and Minority 
Ethnic (BAME) and LGBT+ communities and disabled 
people. Over 85% of the burden of Tory/Lib Dem cuts 
has fallen on the shoulders of women. 

Labour will create a new Department for Women 
and Equalities, with a full-time Secretary of State, 
responsible for ensuring all our policies and laws are 
equality-impact assessed in order to deliver a fairer 
society for women and all under-represented groups. 
We will establish a modernised National Women's 
Commission as an independent advisory body to 
contribute to a Labour government. 

We are guided by our firm commitment to the Human 
Rights Act and Convention on Human Rights that have 
been consistently attacked by the Conservatives. We 
will ratify both the Istanbul Convention on preventing 
domestic abuse and the ILO Convention on Violence 
and Harassment at work. 

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65 


We will put class at the heart of Britain's 
equality agenda and create a new 
ground for discrimination on the basis 
of socio-economic disadvantage. 

Women 

Labour will put women at the heart of 
our government and programme. Next 
year marks the 50th anniversary of the 
Equal Pay Act, yet women still earn 13% 
less than men. Labour will take action to 
close the gender pay gap by 2030. 

We will also: 

&bull; Deliver gender pay equality by making 
the state responsible for enforcing 
equal pay legislation for the first time. 
The new Workers' Protection Agency 
working with HMRC will ensure that 
employers take equal pay seriously 
and take positive action to close the 
gender pay gap. Women will no longer 
be left to take enforcement action by 
themselves through the courts. 
&bull; Require all employers with over 250 
employees to obtain government 
certification on gender equality or face 
further auditing and fines. By the end 
of 2020, we will lower the threshold to 
workplaces with 50 employees, whilst 
providing the necessary additional 
support for small businesses. 
&bull; Revolutionise parents' rights by 
increasing paid maternity leave from 
nine to 12 months, doubling paternity 
leave to four weeks and extending 
pregnancy protection. We will ban the 
dismissal of pregnant women without 
prior approval of the inspectorate. 

&bull; Transform the workplace and require 
all large employers to have flexible 
working, including a menopause 
policy, and consider changes to 
sickness and absence practices. 
&bull; Enable positive action for recruitment 
to roles where employers can justify 
the need for more diversity and 
introduce a right for all workers to 
request flexibility over their hours from 
the first day of employment. 
&bull; Ensure that the single-sex-based 
exemptions contained in the Equality 
Act 2010 are understood and fully 
enforced in service provision. 
&bull; Create a safer society for women 
and prioritise domestic abuse as a 
health issue, introduce 10 days of paid 
leave for survivors of domestic abuse, 
and ensure women's refuges receive 
the long-term sustainable funding 
they need. Misogyny and violence 
against women and girls will become 
hate crimes. 
&bull; Increase women's representation 
across parliament by building on 
the Equality Act, passed by the 
last Labour government, and enact 
Section 106 so that all political parties 
publish diversity data about electoral 
candidates. 
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Race Equality 

Achieving racial equality is a bedrock 
Labour value. It has never been more 
important than in the current climate. 
We are proud of the way our country 
has been shaped by the contributions, 
cultures and values of people from 
around the world. 

The Conservatives have fanned the 
flames of racism, using difference 
to divide. They have made BAME 
people pay the price for their austerity 
project and scapegoated refugees and 
migrants. Never was this starker than 
with their 'hostile environment', leading 
to the scandalous treatment of the 
Windrush generation. Hate crime has 
more than doubled in the last five years. 
This is a wake-up call for all of us. 

Labour will ensure a pathway to 
economic inclusion for all, putting 
an end to all forms of racism and 
discrimination in our economy and 
society. Inclusion will be at the heart 
of its programme for government. 

We will: 

&bull; Seek to end the politics of hate and 
commission an independent review 
into the threat of far-right extremism 
and how to tackle it. 
&bull; Put wealth and power in the hands of 
the many, extend pay-gap reporting 
to BAME groups and tackle pay 
discrimination on the basis of race. 
&bull; Commit our National Investment 
Bank to addressing discrimination in 
access to finance, which many BAME 
business owners face; and take action 
to ensure that BAME and women 
business owners have access to 
government contracts and spending. 

&bull; Implement recommendations of 
the Lammy Review to address the 
disparity of treatment and outcomes 
for BAME people within the criminal 
justice system. 
&bull; Create an Emancipation Educational 
Trust to educate around migration and 
colonialism, and to address the legacy 
of slavery and teach how it interrupted 
a rich and powerful black history which 
is also British history. 
On religious discrimination, we will: 

&bull; Strengthen protection for religious 
communities and amend the law 
to include attacks on places of 
worship (including synagogues, 
temples, mosques and churches) 
as a specific aggravated offence. 
&bull; Review current levels of funding for 
and access to the Places of Worship 
Protective Security Funding Scheme, 
maintain funding in real terms for the 
Community Security Trust, and consult 
on giving it statutory protection to 
ensure that religious communities 
have the support they need. 
Disability with Dignity 

Over the last 10 years, through 
a catalogue of punitive welfare 
policies, the dignity of people with 

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disabilities has been degraded by the 
Conservatives. Not one, but two UN 
reports describe the government having 
committed 'systematic violations' of the 
rights of disabled people - while their 
families have been 'driven to breaking 
point' by cuts to social care. 

More disabled people are now living in 
poverty, and people have died because 
of this government's choice to make 
the most vulnerable pay for tax cuts 
for the few. Labour will end this cruelty, 
restoring the protections that disabled 
people and their families - many of 
whom shoulder the cost of their care 

- should expect in one of the richest 
countries in the world. 
Labour supports the principle of 
'nothing about us without us'. 

We will: 

&bull; Champion the social model of 
disability throughout government. 
Through our new Department for 
Women and Equalities, we will 
ensure that disabled people can be 
independent and equal in society, with 
choice and control over their own lives. 
&bull; Transform the workplace for disabled 
people by requiring that all employers 
be trained to better support them, 
while introducing mandatory disability 
pay-gap reporting for companies with 
over 250 employees. 
&bull; End disability discrimination and 
update the Equality Act to introduce 
new specific duties including disability 
leave, paid and recorded separately 

from sick leave. 

&bull; Recommend that the Equality 
and Human Rights Commission 
prepare a specific code of practice 
on reasonable adjustments to 
supplement existing codes. This 
will provide an appropriate balance 
between flexibility and clarity on 
how 'reasonable' cost is determined. 
The code will also set timescales 
for implementation of reasonable 
adjustments to end the long and 
distressing delays experienced by 
disabled workers. 
&bull; Reinstate the Access to Elected Office 
Fund to enable disabled people to run 
for elected office. 
&bull; Adopt a British Sign Language Act, 
giving BSL full legal recognition in law. 
We will work with employers, trade 
unions and public services to improve 
awareness of neurodiversity in the 
workplace and in society. 

LGBT+ Equality 

Labour has a proud history of standing 
shoulder to shoulder with LGBT+ 
people. We abolished Section 28, 
equalised the age of consent, created 
civil partnerships, and only with 
Labour votes could equal marriage 
become law. Labour is committed to 
reforming the Gender Recognition Act 
2004 to introduce self-declaration for 
transgender people, but we are not 

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complacent about the culture shift 
required to make LGBT+ inclusivity a 
reality. The Conservatives have been 
slow to understand the scale of abuse 
and discrimination LGBT+ people 
continue to face in our society. 

Labour will eliminate remaining areas 
of discrimination in law, ensuring 
that LGBT+ people can live in safety 
and dignity. 

We will: 

&bull; Put LGBT+ equality at the heart of 
government, ensuring our public 
services are LGBT+ inclusive and 
delivering on the national LGBT 
Action Plan. 
&bull; Take steps to safeguard LGBT+ rights 
inside or outside the EU, such as 
retaining and promoting the Human 
Rights Act. 
&bull; Tackle the homelessness and rough 
sleeping crisis in the UK, ensuring 
that all strategies and services 
are tailored to understand needs 
unique to LGBT+ homeless people, 
particularly young people who make 
up a disproportionate number of our 
currently homeless people. 
&bull; Provide sufficient funding for schools 
to deliver mandatory LGBT+ inclusive 
relationships and sex education. 
&bull; Fully fund sexual health services and 
roll out PrEP medication. 
&bull; Respond fast and firmly wherever 
LGBT+ people face violence 
or persecution internationally 
and appoint a dedicated global 
ambassador to the Foreign Office on 
LGBT+ issues. 
Labour will work with organisations and 
charities already making the UK a more 
equal and fairer society and together 
we will build a country for the many, 
not the few. 

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MIGRATION MIGRATION 
A Labour government 
will establish a humane 
immigration system 
and end the 'hostile 
environment' that caused 
the Windrush scandal 
of British citizens being 
deported. Instead, our 
system will be built on 
human rights and aimed 
at meeting the skills and 
labour shortages that 
exist in our economy and 
public services. 

Our immigration system must allow us to recruit the 
people we need, and to welcome them and their 
families. Our work visa system must fill any skills or 
labour shortages that arise. The movement of people 
around the world has enriched our society, 
our economy and our culture. 

We will take decisive action to regulate the labour 
market to stop the undercutting of wages and 
conditions, and the exploitation of all workers including 
migrant workers. It is the actions of bad bosses and 
successive Conservative governments that have driven 
down wages and working terms and conditions. Labour 
will ensure all workers have full and equal rights from 
day one, with a Real Living Wage for all. 

The Conservative policy of pursuing net migration 
targets has undermined our economy and our public 
services, refusing entry to essential key workers 
including nurses. It has created a hostile environment 

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within our communities, encouraged 
the demonisation of migrants and 
enabled the callous use of three million 
residents as bargaining chips in our 
negotiations over EU withdrawal. 

Moreover, the Tories have not once 
met their own targets. Their migration 
policies are a complete and damaging 
failure, whichever way they are 
looked at. 

We will scrap the 2014 Immigration 
Act introduced by the Tories with their 
Liberal Democrat coalition partners. 
We are for a levelling up of rights, not a 
race to the bottom. We will not tolerate 
a two-tier system for those entitled to 
be here. 

The Windrush scandal continues 
to create new victims. We will 
end its injustices and provide fair 
compensation to those who have 
unfairly suffered. 

We will end indefinite detention, review 
the alternatives to the inhumane 
conditions of detention centres, and 
close Yarl's Wood and Brook House, 
from which immediate savings would 
contribute towards a fund of &pound;20 million 
to support the survivors of modern 
slavery, people trafficking and domestic 
violence. We will ensure justice for 
migrant domestic workers and restore 
the overseas domestic workers' visa. 

If we remain in the EU, freedom of 
movement would continue. If we leave, 
it will be subject to negotiations, but 
we recognise the social and economic 

benefits that free movement has 
brought both in terms of EU citizens 
here and UK citizens abroad - and we 
will seek to protect those rights. 

In accordance with our values and 
domestic laws, we will uphold the 
right to a family life for British, EU and 
non-EU residents alike. We will end 
the deportation of family members of 
people entitled to be here and end the 
minimum income requirements which 
separate families. 

Refugees 

Refugees are victims of wars, 
environmental catastrophes, 
famine or persecution. 

This government has failed its 
international legal obligations to 
refugees and to allow people to 
exercise their rights to seek asylum. 

A Labour government will uphold those 
rights and meet those obligations. 
We will work with others to resume 
rescue missions in the Mediterranean, 
co-operate with the French authorities 
to put an end to the horrific camps, 
and establish safe and legal routes for 
asylum seekers. 

Once here, refugees will have the right 
to work, access to public services 
and will be treated humanely by 
government at all levels. 

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SOCIAL SECURIT Y SOCIAL SECURIT Y 
Labour holds social 
security in the same 
esteem as our health and 
education systems. 
It is there to help each 
of us in times of need. 
If someone falls on hard 
times - because they 
lose their job, get sick or 
lose a loved one - Labour 
will help them live with 
dignity and provide 
support to get them 
back on their feet. 

While Labour wants a society in which people care for 
one another, the Tories are trying to pitch us against 
each other. 

Under the Tories, the social security system has lost 
sight of its purpose. Poverty has become endemic, 
the glue that binds our society together has come 
unstuck and, in the words of the United Nations, the 
UK's social safety net 'has been deliberately removed 
and replaced with a harsh and uncaring ethos'. 

The cruelty and heartlessness of the Tories has made 
the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) a 
symbol of fear. When people feel the DWP is more 
about harassment than a helping hand, something has 
gone seriously wrong. Labour will completely change 
this culture, replacing the DWP on day one with a 
Department for Social Security, which will be there to 
help and support people, not punish and police them. 

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We will put children at the heart of 
everything we do, developing a cross-
governmental National Strategy for 
Childhood focusing on health, security, 
well-being and poverty. We will give 
effect to the UN Convention on the 
Rights of the Child. 

Universal Credit 

The Tories' flagship social security 
programme, Universal Credit (UC), 
has been a catastrophe. It has pushed 
thousands of people into poverty, 
caused families to lose their homes and 
forced parents to visit food banks in 
order to feed their children. 

Labour will scrap UC. We will 
immediately stop moving people onto 
it and design an alternative system that 
treats people with dignity and respect. 
Our ambition in designing this system 
will be to end poverty by guaranteeing 
a minimum standard of living. 

We will start developing this system 
immediately. But we have learned the 
lessons from Tory failure: major policy 
change can't be delivered overnight, 
especially when people's lives depend 
on it. So we will also implement an 
emergency package of reforms to 
mitigate some of the worst features 
of UC while we develop our 
replacement system. 

We will end the five-week wait by 
introducing an interim payment 
based on half an estimated monthly 
entitlement. We will immediately 
suspend the Tories' vicious sanction 
regime and ensure that employment 
support is positive not punitive. 

We will stop 300,000 children from 
being in poverty by scrapping the 
benefit cap and the two child limit, so 
ending the immoral and outrageous 
'rape clause'. We will pay childcare costs 
up front so that parents aren't forced to 
turn down work or get into debt to pay 
for childcare. 

Labour will protect women in abusive 
relationships by splitting payments 
and paying the child element to the 
primary carer. We will make it easier for 
people to manage their living costs by 
introducing fortnightly payments and 
paying the housing element directly to 
landlords. 

The Conservative's 'digital only' 
approach is excluding vulnerable 
people. Labour will end the digital 
barrier and offer telephone, face-toface 
and outreach support. We will 
recruit 5,000 additional advisors to 
deliver this. 

Tory cuts are pushing people into rent 
arrears and leaving them at risk of 
homelessness. We will stop housing 
costs running away from benefits 
by scrapping the bedroom tax and 
increasing the Local Housing Allowance. 

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Disabled People 

Labour stands with and for disabled 
people. We will always challenge stigma 
and discrimination wherever it is found 
and support the right of disabled 
people to live independently and be 
treated with respect. 

The Tories' rhetoric of 'scroungers' 
and 'skivers' has whipped up hatred of 
disabled people, with disability hate 
crime skyrocketing, up 37% in the last 
year alone. Labour will never demonise 
disabled people or the unemployed. 

Labour follows the social model of 
disability - it is not people's condition 
or impairment that disables them, 
but society's failure to adapt to those 
conditions and impairments. We are 
committed to removing the barriers 
constructed by society and ensuring 
that disabled people can participate 
fully and equally in our society. 

The Conservatives have created a 
hostile environment for disabled people, 
who have borne the brunt of Tory cuts. 
The United Nations has said that the 
Tories have systematically and gravely 
violated disabled people's rights by 
denying them the support they are 
entitled to. 

Labour will end this hostile environment. 

We will give effect to the UN 
Convention on the Rights of Persons 
with Disabilities and amend the 
Equality Act to reflect the social 
model of disability. 

We will stop the dehumanising Work 
Capability and PIP Assessments, 
which repeatedly and falsely find ill or 
disabled people fit to work, and make 
sure all assessments are done in-house. 

Social security is meant to help 
disabled people cope with the 
additional costs and disadvantages 
they face. But the Tories have cut back 
that support to inadequate levels. Time 
and again disabled people have had to 
fight through the courts to receive the 
support they are entitled to. 

Labour will make sure people who are ill 
and disabled receive the support they 
need to lead full, independent lives. 

We will: 

&bull; Increase Employment and Support 
Allowance by &pound;30 per week for those 
in the work-related activity group. 
&bull; Raise the basic rate of support for 
children with disabilities to the level of 
Child Tax Credits. 
&bull; Ensure that severely disabled people 
without a formal carer receive extra 
support to enable them to meet the 
extra costs they inevitably face. 
We will support those who look after 
others, increasing the Carer's Allowance 
to the level of the Jobseeker's 
Allowance. 

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We will help disabled people who want 
to work by bringing back specialist 
employment advisors, introducing 
a government-backed Reasonable 
Adjustments Passport scheme to help 
people move between jobs more easily, 
and reviewing support for disabled 
people at work, including the Access to 
Work scheme. 

Pensions 

People work hard for most of their lives 
and deserve a decent retirement free of 
financial stress and insecurity. 

Under the Tories, 400,000 pensioners 
have been pushed into poverty and 
a generation of women born in the 
1950s have had their pension age 
changed without fair notification. 
This betrayal left millions of women 
with no time to make alternative plans 

- with sometimes devastating personal 
consequences. 
Labour recognises this injustice, and 
will work with these women to design 
a system of recompense for the losses 
and insecurity they have suffered. 

We will ensure that such an injustice 
can never happen again by legislating 
to prevent accrued rights to the state 
pension from being changed. 

The Conservatives have repeatedly 
raised the state pension age despite 
overseeing a decline in life expectancy. 
Labour will abandon the Tories' plans 

to raise the State Pension Age, leaving 
it at 66. We will review retirement ages 
for physically arduous and stressful 
occupations, including shift workers, 
in the public and private sectors. 

We will maintain the 'triple lock' and 
guarantee the Winter Fuel Payment, 
free TV licences and free bus passes 
as universal benefits. 

Thanks to automatic enrolment, 
which was introduced by the last 
Labour government, record numbers 
of employees are now in workplace 
pension schemes. But too many 
people are still not saving enough 
for a comfortable retirement. 

We will stop people being auto-enrolled 
into rip-off schemes and seek to 
widen and expand access for more 
low-income and self-employed workers. 
We will establish an independent 
Pensions' Commission, modelled on the 
Low Pay Commission, to recommend 
target levels for workplace pensions. 

We will create a single, comprehensive 
and publicly run pensions dashboard 
that is fully transparent, including 
information about costs and charges. 

We will legislate to allow the CWU-
Royal Mail agreement for a collective 
pension scheme to proceed and allow 
similar schemes. 

Labour has listened to the NUM and 
in government will end the injustice of 
the state taking 50% of the surplus in 
the Mineworkers' Pension Scheme and 

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introduce new sharing arrangements 
so that 10% goes to government and 
90% stays with scheme members. 
This new sharing arrangement will 
also apply to the British Coal Staff 
Superannuation Scheme. 

We will ensure that the pensions of UK 
citizens living overseas rise in line with 
pensions in Britain. 

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HOUSING HOUSING 
Everyone has the right to 
a decent, secure home. 
In 1945, Labour promised 
to 'proceed with a 
housing programme 
with the maximum 
practical speed until 
every family in this island 
has a good standard of 
accommodation'. In 2019, 
we renew that pledge. 
But too many people 
are being denied their 
right to a good home by 
our housing system that 
treats homes as financial 
assets rather than places 
to live. 

There is no starker symbol of the failing housing 
system than the horror of the Grenfell Tower fire. 
A Labour government will bring system-wide change, 
so that a tragedy like Grenfell never happens again. 
We will introduce a &pound;1 billion Fire Safety Fund to fit 
sprinklers and other fire safety measures in all high-
rise council and housing association tower blocks, 
enforce the replacement of dangerous Grenfellstyle 
cladding on all high-rise homes and buildings, 
while introducing mandatory building standards and 
guidance, inspected and enforced by fully trained 
Fire and Rescue Service fire safety officers. 

Grenfell Tower was the confirmation of a more far-
reaching crisis. Everyone knows of someone affected 
by the housing crisis: younger people unable to buy 
a first home, renters trapped in damp flats, families 
stuck on council waiting lists, leasehold home-owners 
hit by unfair fees, people who are homeless living and 
dying on our streets. The gap between the housing 

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77 


haves and have-nots is at the heart 
of the injustice in our country today. 

Since 2010, the Conservatives have 
slashed funding for new homes, 
refused to regulate for higher standards 
and given a free hand to commercial 
property developers. There are fewer 
new homes for social rent, a million 
more households stuck renting from 
a private landlord, 900,000 fewer 
young people owning a home and 
more than twice as many people 
sleeping on our streets. 

Only Labour has a plan to fix the 
housing crisis. We will act on every front 
to bring the cost of housing down and 
standards up, so that everyone has a 
decent, affordable place to call home. 

Labour will create a new Department 
for Housing, make Homes England a 
more accountable national housing 
agency and put councils in the driving 
seat. We will set out a strategy for a 
flourishing construction sector with a 
skilled workforce and full rights at work. 

Labour will set up a new English 
Sovereign Land Trust, with powers to 
buy land more cheaply for low-cost 
housing. We will use public land to build 
this housing, not sell it off to the highest 
bidder. Developers will face new 'use 
it or lose it' taxes on stalled housing 
developments. We will keep the Land 
Registry in public hands, and make 
ownership of land more transparent. 
We will make brownfield sites the 
priority for development and protect 
the green belt. 

Labour will tackle the climate crisis and 
cut energy bills by introducing a tough, 
new zero-carbon homes standard for 
all new homes, and upgrading millions 
of existing homes to make them more 
energy efficient. We will review the 
planning guidance for developments 
in flood risk areas. 

Council and Social Homes 

The only way to deliver on everyone's 
right to a good home is to build publicly 
funded social housing. 

Labour will deliver a new social 
housebuilding programme of more than 
a million homes over a decade, with 
council housing at its heart. By the end 
of the Parliament we will be building 
at an annual rate of at least 150,000 
council and social homes, with 100,000 
of these built by councils for social rent 
in the biggest council housebuilding 
programme in more than a generation. 
We will establish a new duty on councils 
to plan and build these homes in their 
area, and fund them to do so, with 
backing from national government. 

We will scrap the Conservatives' bogus 
definition of 'affordable', set as high 
as 80% of market rents, and replace it 
with a definition linked to local incomes. 
These council and housing association 
homes will be more affordable than 
market housing and built to higher 
standards. We will end the conversion 
of office blocks to homes that 
sidestep planning permission 
through 'permitted development'. 

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We will stop the haemorrhage of low-
cost homes by ending the right to 
buy, along with the forced conversion 
of social rented homes to so-called 
'affordable rent'. We will review the case 
for reducing the amount of housing 
debt councils currently hold. And we will 
give councils the powers and funding to 
buy back homes from private landlords. 

We will give tenants a stronger say in 
the management of their homes and 
stop social cleansing by making sure 
regeneration only goes ahead when 
it has the consent of residents, and 
that all residents are offered a new 
property on the same site and terms. 
We will fund a new Decent Homes 
programme to bring all council and 
housing association homes up to a 
good standard. 

Home Ownership 

Under the Tories, home ownership is 
getting further out of reach for more 
and more people. Numbers of new 
affordable homes to buy have fallen, 
and fewer younger people can afford 
their own home. We will build more 
low-cost homes reserved for first-time 
buyers in every area, including Labour's 
new discount homes with prices linked 
to local incomes. 

We will reform Help to Buy to focus 
it on first-time buyers on ordinary 
incomes. We will introduce a levy on 
overseas companies buying housing, 
while giving local people 'first dibs' 
on new homes built in their area. We 

will bring empty homes back into use 
by giving councils new powers to tax 
properties empty for over a year. 

Labour will end the scandal of leasehold 
for the millions who have bought their 
home but don't feel like they own it. 
We will end the sale of new leasehold 
properties, abolish unfair fees and 
conditions, and give leaseholders the 
right to buy their freehold at a price 
they can afford. We will introduce 
equivalent rights for freeholders on 
privately owned estates. 

Private Renters 

More than 11 million people rent from a 
private landlord and many of them are 
at the sharp end of the housing crisis. 
We will take urgent action to protect 
private renters through rent controls, 
open-ended tenancies, and new, 
binding minimum standards. 

Labour will stop runaway rents by 
capping them with inflation, and give 
cities powers to cap rents further. 

We will give renters the security they 
need to make their rented housing a 
home, with new open-ended tenancies 
to stop unfair, 'no fault' evictions. We 
will make sure every property is up to 
scratch with new minimum standards, 
enforced through nationwide licensing 
and tougher sanctions for landlords who 
flout the rules. We will fund new renters' 
unions in every part of the country - to 
allow renters to organise and defend 
their rights. 

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We will get rid of the discriminatory 
rules that require landlords to check 
people's immigration status or that 
allow them to exclude people on 
housing benefit. We will give councils 
new powers to regulate short-term lets 
through companies such as Airbnb. 

Homelessness 

No one should sleep without a roof 
over their head in one of the richest 
countries in the world. But under the 
Tories, the number of people sleeping 
rough has more than doubled. 

Over 125,000 children are now living in 
temporary accommodation, without a 
home to call their own - or the space 
they need to thrive. Labour will tackle 
the root causes of rising homelessness 
with more affordable homes and 
stronger rights for renters. 

Labour will end rough sleeping within 
five years, with a national plan driven by 
a prime minister-led taskforce. We will 
expand and upgrade hostels, turning 
them into places where people can 
turn their lives around. We will make 
available 8,000 additional homes for 
people with a history of rough sleeping. 
We will tackle the wider causes of 
homelessness, raising the Local 
Housing Allowance in line with the 30th 
percentile of local rents, and earmarking 
an additional &pound;1 billion a year for 
councils' homelessness services. 

We will bring in a new national levy on 
second homes used as holiday homes 
to help deal with the homelessness 
crisis, so that those who have done well 
from the housing market pay a bit more 
to help those with no home. 

We will save lives this winter by 
ensuring extra shelters and support are 
in place in all areas. And we'll repeal the 
Vagrancy Act and amend antisocial 
behaviour legislation to stop the law 
being used against people because 
they are homeless. 

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CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES 
For many people, politics 
doesn't work. The 
Westminster bubble is 
a world away from their 
daily lives. The Labour 
Party was founded to 
give working-class 
people a voice in politics. 

We want our political institutions to be connected fully 
to the wider electorate, and will take urgent steps to 
refresh our democracy. 

The time has come for the real changes that a Labour 
government will bring. 

We will act immediately to end the hereditary 
principle in the House of Lords, and work to abolish 
the House of Lords in favour of Labour's preferred 
option of an elected Senate of the Nations and 
Regions, but we also believe that the people must 
be central to historic political changes. 

The renewal of our Parliament will be subject to 
recommendations made by a UK-wide Constitutional 
Convention, led by a citizens' assembly. This 
Convention will answer crucial questions on how 
power is distributed in the UK today, how nations 
and regions can best relate to each other and how a 
Labour government can best put power in the hands 
of the people. 

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Only a Labour government will 
safeguard the future of a devolved UK, 
reforming the way in which it works to 
make it fit for the future. 

Britain is one of the most centralised 
countries in Europe. Labour will 
decentralise decision-making and 
strengthen local democracy. We 
reiterate our commitment to One 
Yorkshire, and will make directly elected 
mayors more accountable to local 
councillors and elected representatives. 

We will re-establish regional 
Government Offices to make central 
government more attuned to our 
English regions, to support our regional 
investments, and to enable the shift of 
political power away from Westminster. 

Our democratic revolution will also 
extend to elections. 

A Labour government will repeal the 
Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011, which 
has stifled democracy and propped up 
weak governments. We will maintain 
650 constituencies and respond 
objectively to future, independent 
boundary reviews. We will oversee the 
largest extension of the franchise in 
generations, reducing the voting age 
to 16, giving full voting rights to all 
UK residents, making sure everyone 
who is entitled to vote can do so by 
introducing a system of automatic voter 
registration, and abandoning plans 
to introduce voter ID which has been 
shown to harm democratic rights. 

Tackling Vested Interests 

Labour will change how politics is 
funded, banning donations from tax 
avoiders and tax evaders, and closing 
loopholes that allow the use of shell 
companies to funnel dark money 
into politics. 

We will free the voices of civil society 
by repealing the Lobbying Act 2014 
and overhauling the rules that govern 
corporate lobbying. We will introduce 
a lobbying register covering both 
in-house lobbyists and think tanks and 
extending to contacts made with all 
senior government employees, not 
just ministers. 

We will also increase the financial 
penalties available to the Electoral 
Commission and require imprints for 
digital political adverts. 

We will stop MPs from taking paid 
second jobs, with limited exemptions 
to maintain professional registrations 
like nursing. We will replace ACOBA, 
the business appointments committee, 
with a sufficiently resourced and 
empowered new body, governed by a 
diverse and representative board and 
established in law. We will also overhaul 
the system of ministerial appointments 
to public office. 

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We will bring greater transparency by 
extending Freedom of Information 
rules to cover private providers of 
public services, setting new standards 
of consistent disclosure practice and 
ending the six-month time limit in which 
the Information Commissioner can 
prosecute the deliberate destruction 
of public records. 

Northern Ireland 

The Good Friday Agreement and longterm 
peace in Northern Ireland is one 
of the great achievements of Labour 
in government. Therefore, as a priority, 
Labour will work quickly and tirelessly to 
secure the return of a genuine power-
sharing government in Northern Ireland. 

The devolved power-sharing institutions 
have not been running in Stormont 
for over 1,000 days. During this period 
people have suffered in the face of a 
funding crisis as austerity continues to 
damage public services, which Labour 
will resolve. 

Working with a new assembly and 
power-sharing government, Labour 
will invest an extra &pound;1.9 billion to end 
austerity and rebuild public services in 
Northern Ireland. 

Women in Northern Ireland should 
have access to abortions in Northern 
Ireland. A Labour government will fully 
implement new laws on equal marriage 
in Northern Ireland so that same-
sex couples are no longer treated as 
second-class citizens. We will work 
with all major parties in Northern Ireland 
to provide a good platform for the 
restoration of devolution alongside 
bringing forward and implementing 
a Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland as 
outlined in the Good Friday Agreement. 

A Labour government will also protect 
Northern Ireland and its people in any 
future Brexit outcome by ensuring 
that there is no return to a hard border 
between Northern Ireland and the 
Republic of Ireland or the creation of a 
regulatory border down the Irish Sea. 

Wales 

Labour's constitutional convention 
will include the Welsh Government's 
20-point plan for the future of the UK 
to better recognise the realities of a 
devolved UK. 

Alongside this work, we need long-term 
reform of how the UK allocates public 
expenditure to ensure that it reflects the 
needs of different parts of our country 
and that no nation or region of the UK is 
unfairly disadvantaged. 

Labour in Wales has pioneered the 
social partnership approach. With a UK 
Labour government investing an extra 

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&pound;3.4 billion in Wales, and a UK Ministry 
for Employment Rights we will be able 
to do much more. 

Wales led the first industrial revolution 
and with a Labour government in 
Westminster, we will be at the forefront 
of the Green Industrial Revolution 
of the future. We will create jobs in 
Wales through environmental energy 
schemes such as the Swansea Bay 
tidal lagoon project. 

The Tories have let down the people 
of Ynys M™n (Anglesey) by failing to 
deliver the Wylfa project. Labour will 
work with people on the island to 
maximise its potential for new nuclear 
energy, alongside investment in 
renewables. 

Nine years of Tory cuts have done 
untold damage and the Thomas 
Commission on Justice in Wales is clear 
that the justice system is not working 
for Wales. Labour governments in Wales 
and Westminster will work together, 
using the Commission's report, to put 
that right. 

Three years on from the 2016 EU 
referendum we understand much 
more about how Wales will be uniquely 
exposed to a hard Brexit. Only Labour 
will put this decision back in the hands 
of the people, and in Wales the Welsh 
Labour government will campaign 
to remain. 

Scotland 

Labour in government will give around 
700,000 Scottish workers a pay rise 
when we introduce a Real Living Wage 
of &pound;10 an hour. 

We will also provide Scotland with at 
least around &pound;100 billion of additional 
resources over two terms. This 
investment will transform Scotland's 
people, communities, public services 
and industries. 

As part of that additional resource 
Labour would want to see &pound;10 billion 
from our new National Transformation 
Fund invested in the building of 120,000 
council and social homes in Scotland 
over the next ten years, ending the 
housing crisis and creating up to 
50,000 jobs. 

This is the difference a UK Labour 
government would make to Scotland 

As part of our Green Industrial 
Revolution we will invest &pound;6 billion in 
retrofitting houses across Scotland, 
which will help tackle the climate 
emergency at the same time as 
lowering bills, ending fuel poverty 
and creating 35,000 jobs. 

A UK Labour government will also 
provide the Scottish National 
Investment Bank, under Scottish 
control, with &pound;20 billion of lending 
power to deliver funds to local projects 
and Scotland's small businesses. 

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Labour believes that Scottish 
independence would be economically 
devastating and it would be the many 
not the few who would pay the price. 
Scotland needs the transformative 
investment coming from a Labour 
government, not another referendum 
and not independence. 

A UK Labour government will focus on 
tackling the climate emergency, ending 
austerity and cuts, and getting Brexit 
sorted. That's why in the early years of 
a UK Labour government we will not 
agree to a Section 30 order request if 
it comes from the Scottish Government. 

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THE FINAL 
SAY ON 
BREXIT 

89 <footer text="THE FINAL SAY ON BREXIT"> 


<footer text="THE FINAL SAY ON BREXIT"> THE FINAL SAY ON BREXIT 
Labour will give the 
people the final say 
on Brexit. Within three 
months of coming 
to power, a Labour 
government will secure 
a sensible deal. And 
within six months, we 
will put that deal to a 
public vote alongside 
the option to remain. 
A Labour government 
will implement whatever 
the people decide. 

Only a Labour government will put this decision 
in the hands of the people to give you the final say. 
This will be a legally binding referendum and we 
will implement the people's decision immediately. 

The Tories have failed for three years to get Brexit 
sorted, in a shambles of repeated delays and 
uncertainty. Whether people voted Leave or Remain 
in 2016, people and businesses are crying out for 
politicians in Westminster to finally focus on the 
wider challenges we face. 

Labour rules out a no-deal Brexit, and we will end the 
scandal of billions of pounds of taxpayers' money 
being wasted on no-deal preparations. No deal has 
never been a viable option. It would do enormous 
harm to jobs, rights, security and to our NHS. 

Labour has led the campaign to stop a no-deal Brexit. 
A majority Tory government would pose a renewed 
threat of the UK crashing out with no deal. Only a 
Labour government can prevent this. 

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We will rip up the deeply flawed 
deal negotiated by Boris Johnson. 
We opposed his deal precisely because 
it would do such harm to workers' rights, 
environmental protections and to our 
manufacturing industry. 

Boris Johnson's deal is even worse than 
Theresa May's: it would leave the UK 
&pound;70 billion worse off by 2029; it would 
give the green light to deregulation 
undermining UK manufacturing; and it 
would leave our NHS at the mercy of 
a trade deal with Donald Trump. This 
sell-out deal is unacceptable to Labour. 

Labour will secure a new Brexit deal 
- one that protects jobs, rights and 
the environment, avoids a hard border 
in Northern Ireland and protects the 
Good Friday Agreement and the peace 
process. We will also ensure that there is 
no change in the status or sovereignty 
of Gibraltar. 

Our deal will be based on the principles 
we have set out over the last two years. 

It will include: 

&bull; A permanent and comprehensive 
UK-wide customs union, which is vital 
to protect our manufacturing industry 
and allows the UK to benefit from joint 
UK-EU trade deals, and is backed by 
businesses and trade unions. 
&bull; Close alignment with the Single 
Market - ensuring we have a strong 
future economic relationship with the 
EU that can support UK businesses. 
&bull; Dynamic alignment on workers' rights, 
consumer rights and environmental 
protections so that UK standards keep 
pace across Europe as a minimum, 
allowing the UK to lead the way, 
not fall behind. 
&bull; Continued participation in EU 
agencies and funding programmes, 
including in such vital areas of 
co-operation as the environment, 
scientific research and culture. 
&bull; Clear commitments on future security 
arrangements, including access to the 
European Arrest Warrant and shared 
databases, making people safer at 
home and abroad. 
Labour will secure a revised Withdrawal 
Agreement that provides legal protection 
for citizens' rights, meets our international 
obligations - particularly with regard 
to the Good Friday Agreement - and 
ensures an appropriate transition period 
to allow businesses and citizens to 
adapt to any new arrangements. 

We will also secure robust and legally 
binding protections for workers' rights, 
consumer standards and environmental 
protections, and ensure level-playingfield 
protections are maintained. Labour 
will never accept an outcome that puts 
rights and standards at risk. 

Once we have secured this new deal 
we will put it to a legally binding 
referendum alongside the option 
of remaining in the EU. 

This will take place within the first six 
months of a Labour government. 

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Labour is the only party that can 
heal the harmful divisions in our 
communities and address the 
devastation caused by 10 years of 
austerity, ruthlessly imposed on society 
by the Tories and Lib Dems. While other 
parties have exacerbated polarisation, 
defining everyone by how they voted 
in the 2016 EU Referendum, Labour has 
consistently reached across this divide. 

Only Labour will deliver a final say 
referendum. 

Only Labour will offer the choice of 
remaining in the EU, or leaving with 
a sensible deal. 

This final say referendum will not be a 
re-run of 2016. It will be legally binding. 
Labour will implement the decision of 
the British people immediately. 

Labour will introduce legislation to 
facilitate this referendum and to provide 
legal certainty and stability following 
the result. 

We will introduce a Withdrawal 
Agreement and Referendum Bill, 
providing the legal basis to conduct 
and implement the outcome of the 
referendum. 

We will scrap the Brexit legislation 
currently proposed by the Tories and 
introduce new legislation that is in line 
with Labour's priorities and principles 
to protect our economy, trade, jobs 
and rights. 

This will include new legislation to 
ensure support and certainty for UK 

farmers, our fishing industry and 
protection for our natural environment. 

Labour recognises the huge benefits of 
immigration to our country. Many British 
citizens have benefited from freedom 
of movement, which has given them 
the opportunity to study, work or retire 
abroad. Likewise our public services and 
our industry have benefited from skilled 
workers coming here. 

Labour believes that citizens' rights 
should never have been used as 
a bargaining chip in the Brexit 
negotiations, and recognises the huge 
anxiety this has caused for the three 
million EU nationals living in the UK and 
the 1.2 million UK nationals who have 
made their home elsewhere in the EU. 

We will end the uncertainty created by 
the EU Settlement Scheme by granting 
EU nationals the automatic right to 
continue living and working in the UK. 
This new declaratory system will allow 
EU nationals the chance to register 
for proof of status if they wish, but will 
mean they no longer have to apply 
to continue living and working in this 
country. This will help ensure reciprocal 
treatment for UK citizens living in the 
EU. It will also prevent a repeat of the 
shameful Windrush scandal and avoid 
unnecessarily criminalising hundreds 
of thousands of EU nationals. 

If in a referendum the British people 
decide to remain in the EU, this must 
not mean accepting the status quo. 
Labour will work with partners across 
Europe to make the case for radical 

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reform of the EU - in particular to 
ensure that its collective strength 
is focused on tackling the climate 
emergency, tax evasion and ending 
austerity and inequality. 

The EU needs a new political direction 
and, if the people decide the UK 
should remain in the EU, Labour will 
lead the way to ensure that change. 

For too long a politically inflicted wave 
of austerity has damaged communities 
across Britain and across Europe. 
The most vulnerable members in 
our society have suffered, while the 
super-rich continue to be rewarded by 
a system that allows them to thrive at 
the expense of the many. 

This must change. If the country 
decides to remain, a Labour 
government will take a different 
approach and strive to ensure that 
the EU works for people across our 
communities. The EU should focus on 
policies that value investment, protect 
public services and make those who 
have the most pay their fair share. 

If people decide to leave, a Labour 
government will work constructively 
with the EU on vital issues of mutual 
interest and to the mutual benefit of 
the UK and EU. But we will leave the EU. 

Most importantly, under a Labour 
government, you will get the final 
say on Brexit. 

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A NEW INTERNATIONALISM 

95 A NEW INTERNATIONALISM 
97 EFFECTIVE DIPLOMACY 
100 DEFENCE AND SECURITY 
103 INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY 
AND SOCIAL JUSTICE 


<footer text="A NEW INTERNATIONALISM"> A NEW INTERNATIONALISM 
Labour will put human 
rights, international law 
and tackling climate 
change at the heart of our 
international policies, and 
use our global influence 
to end the 'bomb first, 
talk later' approach to 
security. Labour will 
always do what is needed 
to protect the security of 
people in the UK. 

International peace and security will be a primary 
objective of a Labour government's foreign policy. 
Britain deserves better than the Conservatives' 
reckless approach to complex global challenges or 
the outsourcing of UK foreign policy to US President 
Donald Trump. 

Failed military interventions in countries like 
Libya have worsened security across North Africa, 
accelerating the refugee crisis. 

Our approach will be based on our values. 
Within the first year of government Labour will: 

&bull; Introduce a War Powers Act to ensure that no 
prime minister can bypass Parliament to commit 
to conventional military action. Unlike the 
Conservatives, we will implement every single 
recommendation of the Chilcot Inquiry. 
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&bull; Conduct an audit of the impact of 
Britain's colonial legacy to understand 
our contribution to the dynamics of 
violence and insecurity across regions 
previously under British colonial rule. 
&bull; Invest an additional &pound;400 million in our 
diplomatic capacity to secure Britain's 
role as a country that promotes peace, 
delivers ambitious global climate 
agreements and works through 
international organisations 
to secure political settlements to 
critical issues. 
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EFFECTIVE DIPLOMACY EFFECTIVE DIPLOMACY 
Internationalism is at 
the core of the Labour 
movement. We recognise 
our responsibility to 
confront injustices we see 
today and to correct the 
injustices of the past. 

We will: 

&bull; Establish a judge-led inquiry into our country's 
alleged complicity in rendition and torture, 
and the operation of secret courts. 
&bull; Issue a formal apology for the Jallianwala Bagh 
massacre, and hold a public review into Britain's 
role in the Amritsar massacre. 
&bull; Allow the people of the Chagos Islands and their 
descendants the right to return to the lands from 
which they should never have been removed. 
&bull; Uphold the human rights of the people of West 
Papua and recognise the rights of the people of 
Western Sahara. 
We have a duty to stand up for the security and 
sovereignty of our overseas territories, including the 
Falklands, and for the rights of our citizens and dual-
nationals abroad, and will continue fighting for justice 

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on behalf of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe 
and other British nationals wrongly 
imprisoned or suffering mistreatment 
in captivity abroad. 

Human Rights 

Human rights and international 
humanitarian law are fundamental 
pillars of a secure global system. These 
principles are under threat. Some of the 
world's most powerful states choose to 
sell arms to human-rights abusing states. 
Conservative ministers, including Boris 
Johnson, have signed off well over 
&pound;2 billion of arms sales to repressive 
regimes since June 2017. 

Around the world, human rights 
defenders and civil society activists 
remain vulnerable to attacks, often carried 
out with impunity. 

We will: 

&bull; Immediately suspend the sale of arms 
to Saudi Arabia for use in Yemen and to 
Israel for arms used in violation of the 
human rights of Palestinian civilians, and 
conduct a root-and-branch reform of 
our arms exports regime so ministers 
can never again turn a blind eye to 
British-made weapons being used 
to target innocent civilians. 
&bull; Reform the international rules-
based order to secure justice and 
accountability for breaches of human 
rights and international law, such as 
the bombing of hospitals in Syria, the 
illegal blockade of the Gaza Strip, the 
use of rape as a weapon of war against 
the Rohingya community in Myanmar 
and the indiscriminate bombardment of 
civilians in Yemen. 

&bull; We will work through the UN and 
the Commonwealth to insist on the 
protection of human rights for Sri 
Lanka's minority Tamil and Muslim 
populations. 
&bull; Appoint human-rights advisers 
to work across the Foreign Office and 
government to prioritise a co-ordinated 
approach to human rights. 
&bull; Advocate for human rights at every 
bilateral diplomatic meeting. 
Climate Diplomacy 

There is no greater injustice today than 
countries in the Global South paying 
the price for a climate crisis they did not 
cause. Yet some world leaders, including 
US President Donald Trump and Brazilian 
President Jair Bolsonaro, champion a 
climate-change denial agenda. 

Britain's climate-change diplomacy 
was respected internationally, playing 
an important role in securing the Paris 
Agreement, following the leading role 
the UK played in securing the Kyoto 
Agreement. However, Boris Johnson - 
who has described global warming as a 
'primitive fearÉ without foundation' - has 
overseen a 60% cut in the UK's global 
network of climate experts. 

Only Labour can rebuild Britain's 
leadership on the most serious threat 
to our shared humanity. 

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We will: 

&bull; Rebuild our climate expertise 
within the Foreign Office, putting 
climate diplomacy at the heart of 
our foreign policy. 
&bull; Use our influence at the UN, EU, G7, G20, 
World Bank, the Commonwealth and other 
global institutions to promote policies 
to tackle the climate emergency. 
&bull; Use our diplomatic expertise to 
negotiate and deliver more ambitious 
global targets to deal with the climate 
emergency, starting with COP 26 in 
Glasgow next year. 
Prioritising Conflict Prevention 
and Building Peace 

The Conservatives have failed to play 
a constructive role in resolving the 
world's most pressing humanitarian 
crises, including in Kashmir, Yemen and 
Myanmar, and the escalation of tensions 
with Iran. The treatment of the Kurdish 
people in Syria, including by Turkey, and 
of the Uighurs in China has been met 
with total inaction and apathy by the 
current UK government. In some cases, 
they set aside regard for international 
law, including refusing to criticise Crown 
Prince Mohammed Bin Salman of Saudi 
Arabia over the murder of journalist Jamal 
Khashoggi. 

Labour is committed to a comprehensive 
peace in the Middle East based on a two-
state solution - a secure Israel alongside 
a secure and viable state of Palestine. 
There can be no military solution to this 

conflict, which must be settled on the 
basis of justice and international law. 
All sides must avoid taking action that 
would make peace harder to achieve. 
That means both an end to the blockade, 
occupation and settlements, and an 
end to rocket and terror attacks. Labour 
will continue to press for an immediate 
return to meaningful negotiations leading 
to a diplomatic resolution. A Labour 
government will immediately recognise 
the state of Palestine. 

Labour will take all lawful action 
necessary to counter and confront all 
forms of terrorism, and we will advocate a 
long-term multinational political strategy, 
led by regional actors, to tackle the 
spread of extremism. 

We believe effective diplomacy 
can address the drivers of conflict 
and insecurity. 

We will: 

&bull; Build support for UN reform, 
including assessing and developing 
democratisation initiatives, and 
improving the engagement of the 
General Assembly in decision-making to 
ensure its institutions are more effective 
at achieving peace. 
&bull; Prioritise our responsibility to prevent 
conflict by investing in local capacities 
for peacebuilding in areas of conflict 
- advocating for political, multilateral 
strategies for peace. 
&bull; Act immediately to urge negotiations 
towards a political resolution to conflict 
wherever it arises, including in the Middle 
East and sub-Saharan Africa. 
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DEFENCE AND SECURIT Y DEFENCE AND SECURIT Y 
The primary duty 
of government is to 
guarantee the security 
of people in the UK. 
Labour's defence 
policy will be strategic 
and evidence-led. 
Our security at home 
is made stronger 
when the security of 
others elsewhere is 
guaranteed too. 

An incoming Labour government will undertake a 
Strategic Defence and Security Review to assess 
the security challenges facing Britain, including new 
forms of hybrid, cyber and remote warfare. This review 
will also take account of the climate emergency, and 
associated threats of resource competition, involuntary 
migration and violent conflict. 

Under the Conservatives: 

&bull; Boris Johnson refuses to publish the report 
into possible foreign interference by Russia 
in UK democracy. 
&bull; Trained army personnel have been cut from 102,000 
to just over 74,000. 
&bull; Armed forces and their families have been forced to 
live in sub-standard accommodation. 
&bull; Failing outsourced contracts have not been 
terminated. 
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&bull; Our Armed Forces personnel 
received below-inflation pay rises 
for seven years. 
The security challenges we face know 
no borders. Labour will increase funding 
for UN peacekeeping operations to 
&pound;100 million. We will maintain our 
commitment to NATO and our close 
relationship with our European partners, 
and we will use our influence at the 
United Nations to support peace and 
security worldwide. 

Labour supports the renewal of the 
Trident nuclear deterrent. Labour 
will also actively lead multilateral 
efforts under our obligations to the 
Non-Proliferation Treaty to create a 
nuclear-free world. 

Labour's commitment to spend at least 
2% of GDP on defence will guarantee 
that our armed forces are versatile and 
capable of fulfilling the full range of 
roles and obligations. 

We will scrap the public sector pay 
cap, which resulted in a real-terms 
pay cut for our armed forces, ensure 
decent housing for forces members 
and their families, and guarantee better 
access for all forces children to good 
quality local schools. We will consult 
on creating a representative body for 
the armed forces, akin to the Police 
Federation. 

Labour will improve opportunities for 
veterans through access to lifelong 
learning and training, housing and 
mental and physical health services, 

and will seek greater consistency in the 
implementation of the Armed Forces 
Covenant by public authorities. 

We will pay a lump sum of &pound;50,000 
to each surviving British nuclear-test 
veteran to support them and their 
families with the health conditions 
they have suffered as a result of 
exposure to radiation. We will also 
ensure that black and Asian soldiers 
who fought in Britain's colonial armies 
receive a full apology and explore 
ways to compensate them for the 
discriminatory demob payments they 
received compared to their white 
counterparts serving at the same rank 
in the same regiments. 

The UK defence industry is world-
leading and Labour will continue to 
work with manufacturers, unions and 
export partners in line with Labour's 
foreign policy to support innovation 
in this sector to ensure it maintains 
its highly skilled workforce and world-
class apprenticeship programme. We 
are committed to procurement that 
supports UK defence manufacturing 
including our aerospace and 
shipbuilding, alongside a vibrant 
supply chain that includes the British 
steel industry and other component 
manufacturing companies providing 
good jobs throughout supply chains. 
Labour will publish a Defence Industrial 
Strategy White Paper, including a 
National Shipbuilding Strategy, that 
keeps all Royal Navy and Royal Fleet 
Auxiliary shipbuilding contracts in the 

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UK, to secure a long-term future for the 
industry and its workers. 

Reducing our carbon footprint can 
only happen with ambitious emissions 
reduction targets at the Ministry of 
Defence, one of government's biggest 
energy users. So as part of our Green 
Industrial Revolution, we will create 
a Climate Change Sustainability 
Committee within the department to 
review the feasibility of increasing the 
use of sustainable energy in defence, 
and publish a strategy to accelerate the 
safe and sustainable recycling of our 
old nuclear submarines. 

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INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY 
AND SOCIAL JUSTICE 
INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY 
AND SOCIAL JUSTICE 
The scale of the 
challenges facing our 
world are enormous. 
Conflict, climate change 
and a global economy 
rigged in favour of a tiny 
elite are driving instability 
and inequality across the 
world. A bold international 
development policy driven 
by social justice has never 
been more needed. 

Labour will use Britain's influence within the World 
Bank, IMF and WTO to transform the rules of the 
global economy so they work for the many. 

We recognise the need to address historic injustices 
and will reset our relationships with countries in the 
Global South based on principles of redistribution 
and equality, not outdated notions of charity or 
imperialist rule. Unlike the Conservatives, Labour 
is fully committed to a standalone Department for 
International Development (DfID), with an aid budget 
of at least 0.7% of gross national income. We will 
introduce the reduction of inequality as a goal for all 
aid spending alongside existing poverty reduction and 
gender equality goals. 

For the Conservatives, too often humanitarian aid is 
undermined by their disastrous foreign policy, as in 
Yemen. Under Labour, we will ensure policy coherence 
across our international-facing departments. Under 

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Labour, DfID will continue to respond 
to the world's biggest crises and will 
ensure humanitarian aid is provided 
according to need, not whether the 
UK has commerical or other interests 
in the country. DfID will assume a 
strong position in cross-government 
decision making, including a permanent 
seat on the Export Control Joint Unit 
responsible for licensing arms exports. 

Our international programme 
will be based on human rights 
and gender equality. 

We will: 

&bull; Uphold basic rights to education, 
health and clean water by establishing 
a new Unit for Public Services 
within DfID, which will include 
increasing direct budgetary support 
to governments so they can build 
sustainable services for their citizens. 
&bull; Promote fairer international tax rules 
and help countries in the Global South 
build progressive tax systems to 
finance essential public services. 
&bull; Support trade unions internationally 
in their efforts to promote collective 
bargaining for better pay and 
conditions, and include binding social 
chapters in trade agreements to 
safeguard workers' rights. 
&bull; Support ongoing UN efforts to introduce 
a binding international treaty on business 
and human rights, and make companies 
legally accountable for failing to prevent 
human rights abuses or environmental 
damage in their operations and supply 

chains, including criminal liability in the 

most serious cases. 

&bull; Implement a gender transformative 
approach across all our international 
work, including tripling funding for 
grassroots women's organisations 
and establishing an independent 
ombudsman to tackle abuse in the 
development sector. 
Labour believes in climate justice. 
Wealthy countries like the UK bear the 
greatest responsibility for the climate 
emergency. Countries in the Global 
South that have done the least to cause 
climate change are already facing the 
worst impacts, such as rising sea levels, 
more frequent hurricanes and greater 
food insecurity. We have a duty to right 
this wrong. 

We will: 

&bull; Provide a top-up of new and 
additional spending on international 
climate finance to bring the total to 
&pound;4 billion a year, and also support 
international calls for compensation 
to those nations already suffering loss 
and damage. 
&bull; Stop all aid spending on fossil fuel 
production overseas, redirecting it 
towards clean, renewable energy 
for all. 
&bull; End all UK Export Finance support 
to fossil fuel projects, and reject any 
trade deals that conflict with our 
climate principles. 
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&bull; Undertake a root-and-branch reform 
of CDC Group plc (DfID's principal 
vehicle for encouraging private 
sector investment in developing 
countries), transforming it into a green 
development bank mandated to 
fight poverty, inequality and climate 
change. 
Labour respects the crucial role played 
by small-scale farmers the world over in 
guaranteeing people the right to food. 

We will: 

&bull; Establish an aid-funded Food 
Sovereignty Fund to enable small-
scale farmers in the Global South 
to gain access to land, seeds and 
finance, and uphold indigenous 
peoples' right to land. 
&bull; Support sustainable local food and 
agriculture markets in the fight against 
climate change. 
Labour believes human rights should 
drive our trade policy. 

We will: 

&bull; Implement UK arms export controls 
to the highest standard, putting an 
end to exports where they might be 
used in violation of human rights or 
international humanitarian law. 
&bull; Ensure government procurement 
contracts are not granted to 
companies that are complicit in 
serious human rights abuses, and 
require all UK trade agreements 
to be consistent with international 
humanitarian law. 
&bull; Introduce legislation to ensure 
transparency and parliamentary 
scrutiny of trade and investment 
agreements. 
&bull; Reject any trade agreements that 
undermine labour standards or 
environmental protections, and rule 
out UK Export Finance support to 
companies engaged in bribery or 
corruption. 
Labour recognises the right to essential 
medicines as an integral part of the 
right to health. 

We will: 

&bull; Promote fairer international patent 
regimes that do not prevent countries 
from accessing essential medicines 
and support efforts to increase the 
transparency of medicines pricing so 
governments can negotiate fair prices. 
&bull; In the long term, ensure that all 
medicines developed with the support 
of UK taxpayer money are accessible 
to people in the Global South. 
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12904_19 Reproduced from electronic media, promoted by Jennie Formby, General Secretary, the Labour Party, 
on behalf of the Labour Party, both at, Southside, 105 Victoria Street, London, SW1E 6QT.