LABOUR SHADOW MINISTER CLAIMS PARTY WILL RESOLVE JUNIOR DOCTOR STRIKES BY IMPROVING SHIFT PATTERNS

A Labour party shadow minister has dismissed warnings from the IFS that both Labour and Conservatives would have to raise taxes to fund their manifesto commitments by saying the party would ‘grow the economy.’

Shadow Paymaster General Jonathan Ashworth also ruled out Labour increasing junior doctor pay by 35%.

Speaking on GB News Jonathan Ashworth said:

“I understand why people are sceptical given we’ve had paltry growth these last 14 years under the Conservatives but we believe that we can introduce measures that can get the economy motoring. Planning reforms, so we can build again in this country and industrial strategy with our energy policy by investing in renewable energy sources, will create good well-paid jobs, and of course, cut energy bills for good as well.

“We’ve got a skills and apprenticeships policy and welfare reform and employment policy. Whereas if we aim for 80% employment that would, support two million more people moving into the labour market, and we want to give those people the skills and opportunities to take up good jobs.

“So we believe we can grow the economy and by growing the economy, of course, you improve the state of the public finances.

“Actually, we’re very honest. We believe that not everything can be paid for. That’s why we have made very tough decisions in this campaign, where we’ve had to say there are certain things which we’re not able to fund.

“But where we have made spending commitments in this campaign we’ve outlined where the money, every penny piece, will come from. We are, for example, going to take that very tough decision to levy VAT on private school fees and use that money to invest in state schools, recruiting more specialist teachers.

“The junior doctor dispute, well, we’re not going to pay the 35%. That’s not realistic. We’ve got to negotiate and discuss these matters on the basis of a sense of reality about the state of the public finances.

“The dispute isn’t just about pay, of course, it’s also about working conditions. And so, you’ve got to look at working conditions, the way rotations work in our hospitals, the way in which people are added, the shifts that they do, the way in which these are scheduled. There’s a whole range of things that can be looked at.

“I’ll tell you what is fantasy politics is pretending that these issues cannot be fixed without engaging in serious dialogue, and that’s what the Labour government will always do; engage in serious dialogue.

“We didn’t have national industrial action in the NHS under the last Labour government. We didn’t have these national strikes in the NHS under the last Labour government

“The last Labour government would grew the economy, and if this government had grown the economy at the same rate the last Labour government grew the economy, there would have been billions of pounds more for public expenditure and our public services.”

Mr Ashworth also said Labour would have grown the economy more than under the Conservative government, saying:

“It would have grown at the same rate as before the financial crash because we would have had a plan for growth. We have a plan for raising productivity.

“The Conservatives have given up on growth and have accepted that paltry growth, anaemic growth, is just the way it is.

“We had a plan for growth in 2010 which George Osborne cut back on. We had a plan to reduce the deficits because we’re always prudent with the public finances.
“Of course it would have been [different from the 2010 manifesto pledges] because we grew the economy when we were in power. The Tories have failed on growth. That’s what happens when you get the Tories in power, they fail.