Brown spells out pre-election plans

PRIME Minister Gordon Brown today set out his legislative programme for the last few months before the general election.

It included new "entitlements" for users of public services, a boost to house-building, extra training opportunities for young people, and the removal of the final hereditary peers from the House of Lords.

In a statement to the House of Commons, Mr Brown unveiled the draft legislative programme which will form the bulk of this autumn's Queen's Speech.

The Premier said: "There is a real choice for our country – driving growth forward or letting the recession take its course; creating jobs for the future or doing nothing.

"We will not walk away from the British people in difficult times. Our policy is to build the growth, the jobs and the public services we need for Britain's future."

But Conservative leader David Cameron responded: "The Prime Minister is living in a dream world, in which investment is going up, spending is going up – when is someone going to tell him he has run out of money?

"People are entitled to ask, simply, what world is he living in?"

He dismissed the Premier's announcements as "a package without a price tag" and "re-hashed initiatives".

Mr Brown said that from next January, all under-25s who have been out of work for a year will receive a guaranteed job, work experience or training place which they will be obliged to take up.

From September, all 16-17-year-olds will receive an offer of a school, college, training or apprenticeship place.

He said legislation in the Queen's Speech will seek to ensure that the British economy is "best placed" to take advantage of opportunities in the industries of the future, including low-carbon energy, digital technology, financial services, bioscience, advanced manufacturing and transport.

This will include an Energy Bill to support up to four carbon capture and storage power plants to help make Britain a "major global player in the low carbon market".

Private sector investment in low carbon energy can be expected to reach £100 billion by 2020, while more than one million could be employed in the sector by 2017, he said.

A Digital Economy Bill will pave the way for universal broadband access by 2012 and a nationwide high-speed network by 2016.

And a new £150 million Innovation Fund will "lever in" £1 billion of private money for the hi-tech sector.

These and other measures would help create 1.5 million new skilled jobs in Britain over the next five years.

Mr Brown said that, by reallocating funds, the Government would more than treble investment in housing to £2.1 billion, financing 110,000 affordable homes over 24 months.

Local authorities are to be given new powers to give priority to local people on the social housing waiting lists and there will be a consultation on changes to allow them to retain all proceeds from council house sales and rent.

Mr Brown said a Financial Services and Business Bill would take forward "far-reaching" reforms of financial supervision triggered by the economic crisis, including a ban on unsolicited credit card cheques.

The new public service "entitlements" will largely replace Labour's flagship programme of targets pursued under Tony Blair.

NHS patients will have enforceable entitlements to prompt treatment and care, including a guaranteed two-week maximum wait to see a cancer specialist, a free health check for all over-40s and a limit of 18 weeks on the waiting list for hospital treatment.

Parents will be given a guarantee of "individually tailored education" for their child, with personal tutoring for all those who need it.

And residents will be given more power to hold local police to account at monthly beat meetings, to have a say on CCTV use in their neighbourhoods and to vote on how offenders "pay back" to their communities.

A Policing, Crime and Private Security Bill will give officers more time on the beat by cutting paperwork.

And the points-based immigration system will be extended to probationary citizenship, ensuring that migrants who contribute to society have a better chance of gaining British citizenship.

On Lords reform, Mr Brown said that in the next session the Government will legislate to "remove the hereditary principle from the second chamber", along with a draft bill for a "smaller and democratically constituted" upper house.